Day 6: Navy Pier - Dive from Hell

After our sad goodbyes from the night before, we woke up to another big day. Exmouth holds some of the best scuba spots in the world. Most notable is Navy Pier, which is listed as one of the top 10 dive sites in the world. Navy Pier is a massive concrete and iron pier that shoots into the ocean and rises high above it. Underneath it lives a plethora of aquatic life; everything from sharks to tiny vibrantly colored nudibranch along with giant schools of fish that swarm in the pier’s shadows. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any of these things.

We booked the tour with an amazing dive company, but one thing they couldn’t control was the ocean conditions or the weather. We happened to arrive during one of the worst weeks of the year; it rained all week. This is a place that doesn’t see rain for years. The bad weather was a bit of a shock. We didn’t let the downpour stop us, and our tour headed out as planned around 4pm to catch the best tide conditions of the day. Our tour was plagued with problems before we even hit the water. After our briefing, we pulled away from the dive shop to head to the pier. We were given a paper that had an alphabetical list of everyone on the tour, which we were supposed to legibly sign next to our names. I emphasize LEGIBLY.

The first bump in the road of many problems came when a German father, with his son (the father was in his fifties, the son in his twenties), signed his name in an unreadable chicken scratch. There is extremely tight security at Navy Pier, because it is on a fully-functioning, American-owned and operated Navy base. We all needed to have our passports with us, and to have our signature on the page legible, or else we would be denied access. This meant the man needed to re-sign his name, and therefore we needed to turn around the bus and go back to the dive store for the dive assistants to re-print the page. Another manifest was printed and was given to the group to be signed again.

Ok, Round 2. This should have been easy; we had all done it once.

“Oh, what is that, German father? You wrote your name horribly AGAIN?? Turn the bus around!”

This is exactly what happened.

Round 3. All eyes were on the father as he carefully signed his name nice and neatly. As he passed the list on, we all released a sigh of relief. Then Cassie got the manifest, and went to sign next to her name. As she looked down the list of names she could see that the man had in fact signed his name quite legibly… in the wrong space! He signed next to her name instead. As Cassie explained the problem to the dive assistant, the son translated in German to his father. As the rest of the bus stared at him, all he could do was throw his head back, with both hands gripping his hair, and scream, “Noooooo!” As frustrated as we all were, we couldn’t help but feel bad for the guy, and the bus made one last turn around.

After driving in circles for almost half an hour, we had made it to the Navy base. After a short stop at the security gate, our list of names and signatures was approved and we made our way down to the pier. Upon arrival we were given flashlights. “You probably won’t even have to use these,” the dive assistant explained, “Maybe just a little at the end of your dive. This ended up being the biggest understatement of the year! Those flashlights saved our lives.

The jump into the water is hardcore by itself. It’s a 10 foot jump off a platform on the underbelly of the pier and that’s with all your weighty gear on. Before making the plunge we noticed the water looked very angry. As we stood there, a gust of wind blew the assistant’s clipboard with the manifest, other dive information and the company’s cell phone into the choppy sea.

We should have seen all of this as a sign, but we assured ourselves that just because it’s rough on the water’s surface, won’t mean that conditions will be bad 40 feet below, but we were wrong. It was. It was much worse, in fact. As we floated in the churning waves, below the quickly darkening skies, we gave each other the ok sign to descend. We slowly glided down, using a lengthy rope to guide us to the landing zone at the bottom, and we realized how quickly darkness was enveloping our small group. Instantly everyone had his or her lights on and we were only halfway down.

It was chaos at the bottom. There was a powerful current running its course right through our group, it was pitch black, except for the beams of thrashing flashlights, and as the people on the bottom were trying to get their bearings, other divers were unintentionally descending right on top of them. No one could tell who the group leader was, and panic kicked in. Our breaths were growing quicker as we sucked through our air supply, trying not to give in to a full-blown panic attack. Soon, we had found our guide in the murky water and he was working hard to keep our group together. He got everyone in a tight circle, and once he checked that we were all ok, he signaled to our group to slowly follow him.

A few people in our group decided to take a different route than that of our guide, and those who were following them in line (including us) were unknowingly led astray, and we were right back where we started. Lost and panicking. We decided rather than get ourselves more lost, to sit right where we were, alone in the dark, hoping our guide would come to find us. As we sat in this creepy alien environment, 40 feet below the surface, trying our best to avoid the tangle of sharp, barnacle-encrusted support beams below the pier, all we could think was, “This f-ing sucks!”. It didn’t take long for out guide to come back for us, and realizing that we were in over our heads, he led us carefully through the maze of beams and pipes in the darkness back to the starting point. Our guide once again signed to us, checking that we were ok. I wish there were a sign for “Get me the hell out of here!” Instead, we signed that we had had enough, and wanted to ascend. We slowly floated up back into the light, and lived to swim another day.

It was such a great feeling when we had made it back to dry land. As we undressed from our wetsuits, we soon found that our friend Nate was not so lucky. Somehow he had gotten lost and separated from the rest of the group. Down below, Nate had searched for his lost partner for one minute, then, as is standard when diving in a pair, ascended to the surface, where the two could reunite. By the time Nate surfaced, he had drifted out from below the pier into the open ocean where the waves are bigger, the currents stronger, and groups of Tiger Sharks were known to hunt. Luckily, Nate is an all-American, gold medalist, Olympian swimmer, who is half-man, half-dolphin and managed to swim back to safety quickly. We’ve seen him swim, he really is half-dolphin.

On the ride back all we could do was try to wrap our brains around what we had just experienced. It was all due simply to bad luck. Nature was against us that day, and she always wins. It’s a great dive site and a great dive company, but unfortunately it just didn’t work out. It wasn’t meant to be. That night at the caravan park we saw the guy who wrote his name wrong 3 times, with his son. They invited us over for beers as we recounted the day’s terrifying events and laughed about it saying “Well, at least we’ll have the story to tell.”

Day 5: Exmouth - Snorkeling with Sharks and The Amazing Human Bicycle

Exmouth (pronounced, quite literally, "X-mouth") isn’t much in the way of a town; it’s more like a truck stop. However, it’s the gateway to Ningaloo Reef, one of the best places in the world to see aquatic life of all sizes. It rivals its East Coast counterpart, the Great Barrier Reef. Unlike the GBR, you don’t have to hop on a boat to see the reef, you can simply walk off the beach and find yourself immersed in an awesome coral reef. The most notable sight is Turquoise Bay. It’s about an hour outside the “town” of Exmouth itself, and shouldn’t be missed. This was some of the best snorkeling we’ve ever done. We saw tons of coral, fish both large and small, turtles, sting rays, sea snakes, and most exciting of all… SHARKS!

They were tame reef sharks, that aren’t interested in smelly humans, so it’s somewhat safe to swim with them, and a huge adrenaline rush. We encountered three that day, the biggest one being 2 metres/6 Feet! Matt spotted this one. As he turned around, there it was swimming directly at him like a heat-seeking missile, but turning at the last moment before impact. As Matt’s heart was pounding out of his chest, he decided he should swim after it. As he trailed the shark he remembered, “Oh yeah, these animals could take off a limb if they so choose.” So he eased away and joined the rest of the group of snorkelers.


Our guide, Ben, had quite the job of wrangling 13 snorkelers and let’s just say, some were less than okay swimmers, which is sad because it’s usually the coral reef that pays the price by being kicked and broken by flailing fins. Remember: coral is a living creature and shouldn’t be touched. Even your sunscreen can harm the coral while you’re admiring its beauty.


After the group surfaced, only 4 of us chose to swim the reef again. On our second go, we didn’t find any more sharks, but did see a blue spotted stingray. That was pretty cool. It was a bit more tricky getting back to shore, seeing as the tide was going out, leaving less and less water between us and the razor sharp coral. At some parts, all you could do was hold your breath, think skinny, and glide over. We all made it out unscathed and with all our limbs.

The "Doris" sandwich

After our snorkeling adventures, our sweetheart friend, Doris, decided to share her special, self-created snack. It was a tuna sandwich topped with ketchup, mayo (but we didn’t have mayo, so ceasar dressing was substituted), and finally strawberry jam. What a treat! She created it for when she was in the mood for a “salty-sweet snack”. This all came about as a World Cup bet, and because England lost, our UK friend, Amy, agreed she would eat the Tuna Delight. Matt just ate it anyways, so did a few other girls. It’s quite an interesting taste when that jam hits the tuna. As everyone was politely admiring how it was a “very unique taste”, Jo blurted out, “No!” as we all stared at her with our mouths full, “It tastes like SICK!” She was right. She couldn’t have been more right. It tasted like sick. This may have been one of the grossest things Matt has ever put in his mouth. And that’s saying a lot. He’s eaten cow balls!

Vlamingh Head Lighthouse

Before returning to our hostel, we stopped off at Vlamingh Head Lighthouse to catch the sunset, and of course take a million pictures. Then it was back to our hostel for one of Ben’s awesome dinners. We would like to add that for Matt, eating with a group of girls is awesome. Seeing how Matt is a human garbage disposal, and most girls aren’t, he usually ended up with second and third helpings.

After dinner, a German girl, Monika, showed us a trick she had learned on her travels, The Amazing Human Bicycle! Naturally, the Human Bicycle was recreated within our group. Even “Look into my Face” girl got into the act.



This was also our last night with our group. We decided to hop off our tour and spend a few days seeing what the Ningaloo reef had to offer. But, nothing would prepare us for the giant surprises that awaited us deep in the ocean. Before the night ended, and our group of friends continued up north, Ben was nice enough to share a few bottles of champagne with all of us, to celebrate our last evening as a group.


It was sad saying goodbye to our newly made friends. Especially since we all bonded so closely over the past few nights, mainly over out mutual frustrations with “Look Into My Face” who loved to remind everyone that she’s done it bigger and better than everyone else.

She actually made everyone sit around and watch her bungee jump and skydive videos, where after landing she screamed into the camera, “I did it, MOM!” with the crazy I-just-jumped-out-of-a-plane look in her eyes, “I promised you I wouldn’t, but I did it anyways!” We were waiting for her to follow with, “I hate you and Rodger will never be my real father!” But that last part didn’t happen. Revisiting the memory of these videos provided hours of entertainment with the rest of the group, and we had all bonded quite closely by the end of this leg of our trip. 

But don’t worry, this isn’t the last you’ll hear of “Look into my Face”, she decided to spend a few days more in Exmouth too. Hurray for us!