Diving at Rabbit Island

Today we'd made plans with James, the owner of Starling, to come out and meet us at Pauanui and stay for a couple of nights. Originally he thought he'd get to Pauanui by 12, but he messaged us at about 10.30 to say he was nearly there (we think he was a bit excited).

So we pulled up our anchor and headed for Pauanui. The waves on the beach were a little daunting, but after a bit of scouting and discussion we were confident we could get in without flipping the dinghy. So we put on our lifejackets, launched the dinghy and made for shore. We found a nice flat spot between sets and beached the dinghy without any drama.

We then headed for a spot of lunch, before sending Vela back through the breakers to Starling - she was a little nervous but pulled it off like a pro! Meanwhile, Nathan and James headed to the boat ramp to launch James's fizz boat. We negotiated the estuary and the bar without any issues and soon met up with Vela back on Starling. We sent James ahead to scout out some fish while we motored Starling back over to Slipper Island. We parked in a different bay and were met with some stunning clear water and not a breath of wind, so we had to put the drone up for a bit of footage!

James then picked us up and we motored to the southern end of Rabbit Island. The water was amazingly blue, so we pulled on our wetsuits and jumped in to check out the fish. There were massive schools of blue maomao, which are so much fun to swim with as they whirlpool around you. There were so many that they were even bumping into the end of the spear gun. Nathan quickly shot a leather jacket, and Vela fired a nice shaft into a blue maomao which we captured on the 360 camera. Nathan then spent a bit of time playing with an eagle ray, and checking out the edge of the drop off for some other fish species. A couple of kingies showed up, and Nathan took a shot which hit, but unfortunately the spear didn't go all the way through the fish and it swam away. It feels bad to hurt a fish like that, but kingfish are resilient so fingers crossed it will live to fight another day.

After that we called it a day and headed back to Pauanui to meet up with Vita and Tina, who have rented a bach for the weekend. Hot pot for dinner and we stayed the night on shore so we didn't have to navigate the Tairua bar in the dark.Read more