Poor Knights Northern Arch
DESCRIPTION
Dive Site Review by Anna Clague
Photos by Andrew Simpson
This has to be one of the most iconic dives at the Poor Knights Islands Marine Reserve. This Arch is one of the few at the Knights which is too small to drive a boat through. Underwater though, is a different story. The archway walls slope downward in an inverted cone shape with underhangs and nooks on one side and a much more sheer profile on the other. The width of the arch ranges from approx. 4m - 13m. This one site has a number of different ways to be dived depending on light angle, surge, current or lack of.
If the surge and swell are little to none you can circumnavigate the point (Te Araara Point) in one dive. Pick your depth to manage your air supply for the full circuit as it is a decent distance around and the wall drops down to around 70+m. Off the tip of the point you will often find schooling fish patrolling the waters and if you keep an eye looking out into the blue you may be rewarded with a shark sighting here. The walls around the point are teeming with life and you will be dragging your vision from one amazing critter to the next the whole way round.
If you are at the arch with the point behind you - the bay to the left is Maomao Bay. If you keep the wall on your right shoulder heading away from the arch you can follow this in a gentle curve taking you time to make your way back up to the surface with plenty to keep you occupied on the way. The wall is covered with Kelps and Flapjack seaweeds as well as low growing Corals and Bryozoans creating a great home for Nudis, Triplefins, Shrimp, Eels, Leatherjackets and Wrasses. You will often see Rays skimming over the kelp forest here before heading off to hang in the arch. Sponge gardens, as well as seasonal blooms of Ascidians and Hydroids and the nesting behaviours of Demoiselles and Angelfish also add to the variety of things to keep coming back for throughout the year. Heading out of the arch on the other side you will encounter a much more squared off bay. At the exit of the arch on this side there is a crack in the wall at about 20m where a pair of Yellow Banded Perch can regularly be seen. The wall has more guts and cracks running through it on this side and at the corner of the bay there is a narrow cavern with a sandy bottom at about 20m.
Northern Arch itself is definitely the highlight here. The current that runs through the arch makes this a great place for a variety of fishes to hang and let life be brought to them. You can expect to see schools of Pink and Blue Maomao, Demoiselles, Sweep, Mado and Snapper and there have been sightings of schools of Golden Snapper here in the past. You can hang nose into the current in the archway with them and let the school accept you as part of it - Bliss. Off to the sides you will see groups of fish tucking into the underhangs and indents in the wall to rest or shelter as Kingfish or the occasional Shark stalks its way through. The arch bottoms out at approx. 40m and then slopes off on either side to 70+m.
