The stunning coastal scenery of the Poor Knights Islands

Although the Poor Knights Islands are meant to feature world-class diving beneath the surface, the scenery above the surface is pretty awesome too. Steve takes us between towering cliffs of the islands and under numerous giant archways, before anchoring up at a dive spot that Jacques Cousteau himself once explored! Here, we get on the top deck of the boat which is open to the coastal scenery made by a super volcano and carved by the ocean over the years. Steve tells us more about these fascinating islands, the geology, the cultural history, and what makes this place one of the top diving locations in New Zealand!

Gearing up and learning the diving skills

When we get back down to the bottom deck, the scuba gear is all set up and waiting for us. We squeeze into nice thick wetsuits, an underlayer with a hood, sockies and fins. Then we are being helped with a weight belt, a BCD (stands for Buoyancy Control Device – a jacket that inflates and deflates) attached to an oxygen tank, and a mask and snorkel. It all feels extremely foreign even to people like us who have done a couple of dives before, but once we step into the water and look down with our masks on, all those weird feelings are washed away. Wow! The clarity of the water is amazing! Before we get too carried away with the sights of the underwater world just yet, we repeat a couple of diving skills in the water, which is far less scary than anticipated. With that, we can descend to 10m deep and start exploring this famous dive site!

We see what they mean when they say: “There are plenty more fish in the sea.”

Exploring the kelp forest

From the get go, our breath is taken away by the variety of fish seen in the water (but we remember to keep on breathing because literally losing your breath wouldn’t be a good thing when diving). Small black fish with colourful spots slowly swim past us, not bothered by our presence what-so-ever. Among the kelp forest, Sophie clear the kelp to reveal a crazy-looking brown fish with great googly eyes, a scorpionfish. Although this section of the dive has many amazing aspects, we can’t talk about it for too long, because it’s only going to get more weird and wonderful as we swim into an archway.

Archway into a new world

It’s a whole different world in here… A vibrant world of sea plants boasting orange, green and yellow colours. They shine all the more brightly with the beams of light piercing through a large hole part-way through the arch. All kinds of fish gently swim in the shelter of the arch – fish usually found at greater depth. The fish that steals the show, though, just happens to be the massive school of blue maomao. Swimming slowly enough, we find ourselves among the school ourselves – fish so close we could touch them (but we don’t. No fish were harmed during the making of this NZPocketGuide.com story). Although we see hundreds of fish, we can’t communicate to ask what they are until later…

Another win for shoulder season travel!

How long we stay in the water depends on how well we breathe and how much oxygen we use. Because we manage to stay relatively calm as a sea cucumber, we spend around 50 minutes in the water. And you know what, we weren’t even cold – another win for the shoulder season!