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Pemba Island Diving: Day 6, last day of diving and disaster averted

I’m still not entirely sure how it happened, but somehow saltwater found its way into the battery compartment of my strobe. I only discovered it the previous afternoon while preparing my camera gear for the next day’s shoot. Thankfully, Mudy stepped in to help me carefully clean it out. After that, I left it to dry overnight and checked it again first thing in the morning. The moment I inserted the batteries and the strobe powered up normally, I let out an enormous sigh of relief.

After this the morning initially proceeded in the usual way, until we got on the dive boat and one of the engines refused to start. Since it was our final day of diving, Michael had planned to take us to a more distant and rewarding site. With the large boat fully loaded with divers, however, running on a single engine made the longer trip impractical. After a quick discussion, we transferred to the smaller boat for the extended journey, while the rest of the group remained on the larger vessel and headed to a nearer site.

The longer journey proved more than worthwhile. We were rewarded with some breathtaking corals —vivid, intricate, and almost impossible to capture fully in still photographs, especially with a macro setup. Liana’s video (watch in 4K if possible) comes closer to conveying the sheer spectacle, yet even it falls short of the experience in person. With stronger video lighting, perhaps one could come nearer to revealing the true magnificence of that underwater world in full colour. **

The experience was further enhanced by an abundance of fish life.

We saw several geometric moray eels, apparently very common, although I can’t remember having seen one before.

Another bright pink Leaf scorpionfish was lying in ambush, waiting for prey to appear.

A Freckled Hawkfish and an Arc Eye Hawkfish were also perching on the corals, waiting to pounce on passing prey.

At a distance the Variable Thorny Oyster looked like some gap-toothed monster.

Nudibranchs and flatworms, despite their vibrant colours, can be difficult to spot due to their small size.

The shrimp seemed almost as curious about us as we were about them and I had do keep backing away to get one in focus.

After another afternoon of photo and video processing in the comfort of our air conditioned room, we sat down to another superb dinner to end our time at Afro Divers .

**Just a little footnote for the non-divers: colours disappear quickly as you dive deeper, red being first to go, until eventually only blue remains. The only way to see the true colours of the corals at depth, is to use a strong torch, video light, or for photos a strobe.

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Pemba Island Diving: Day 5, getting better with the cameras

As our confidence in underwater photography and videography grew, we increasingly looked forward to each day’s dives. The morning routine—early coffee, breakfast, and gearing up—had become second nature.

This day, the dive center was noticeably busier than before, dispatching two boats full of divers. For our first dive, Mudy guided us once again. On the second, Michael suggested we dive with him so he could provide more hands-on help with my camera settings.

Both dives were outstanding, filled with incredible sights and encounters. We spotted some impressive large fish in deeper water, though I didn’t attempt to photograph them—I’d opted for the macro lens that day, having found it delivered far better results than the wide-angle.

Almost immediately after descending, we came across a stunning leaf fish.

This was soon followed by a frogfish, so well camouflaged that I would definitely not have seen it if Mudy had not pointed it out.

We were entertained by damselfish swimming around in the coral.

We saw several lionfish on both dives,

as well as a few nudibranchs.

A mature male ribbon eel, recognisable by its bright blue colour, poked its head out at us as we were passing its burrow.

A red scorpionfish was closely followed by a Tasseled scorpionfish, which I struggeld to see initially, even after it was pointed out to me.

Toward the end of the second dive we saw multiple Black spotted pufferfish, more Sailor’s eyeballs and finally some anemonefish nestled within their host sea anemone.

During our second dive, an especially feisty little damselfish decided to harass Liana and her GoPro, repeatedly charging in with surprising bravado. It was a perfect reminder of those tiny dogs that bark fiercely at the world, utterly convinced they’re far bigger than they actually are.

That afternoon was devoted to sorting through a wealth of photos and videos from the dives, editing them in the welcome comfort of our air-conditioned room at Afro Divers Lodge.

The internet connection proved frustratingly inconsistent—strong and reliable one moment, vanishing entirely the next—which forced me to delay posting my blog update until the following morning.

Dinner, however, more than made up for any earlier frustrations: a special Saturday barbecue featuring perfectly grilled marlin, tender octopus, and succulent chicken, accompanied by an array of delicious side dishes. It ranks among the finest meals we’ve enjoyed at any of the diving and wildlife lodges we’ve visited in recent years.

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Pemba Island Diving: Day 4, Diving and More

This will be a short post after a very long day. As usual, we started with coffee and a simple breakfast—fresh fruit for Liana, pancakes for me. Then it was straight to the water for diving.

We were excited to put Michael’s advice from the day before into practice. The dives themselves were beautiful, even if the photographic opportunities proved a bit elusive. On the first dive we spotted a large turtle, but it stayed just out of ideal camera range. Later, a magnificent ray rested motionless on the sand—another breathtaking moment, though not quite the perfect shot.

Sometimes the camera has to take a backseat so you can simply be present and soak in the wonder of it all.

Still, I did capture a few decent photos, and I can already feel Michael’s tips making a real difference. Progress, one dive at a time.

Once again, try to watch Liana’s video in 4K or at least HD and remember that you can enlarge any of the photos by clicking on them.

I’d been contemplating a long open-water swim along the Pemba coast ever since we booked this trip—and today was the day.

The original plan was to swim from Afro Divers to The Aiyana, roughly 4.5 km along Pemba’s stunning northern coast. But I misjudged the tide and currents. Instead of an easy glide, I spent the entire swim battling a relentless head current. I eventually called it quits about 500 m short, finishing at Pemba Paradise—exhausted but satisfied.

The combination of fighting the current and the almost absurdly warm 31°C sea temperature turned what should have been a relaxing cruise into a proper test of endurance. My arms felt like lead by the end, yet there was something rewarding about pushing through in such a beautiful setting.

The combination of exhaustion from the day’s activities and suddenly slow internet connection called for an early night for me, although Liana remained up till late to finish her video.

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Pemba Island Diving: Day 3, slowly finding our way with the cameras

By this point, we had settled comfortably into our daily rhythm: early-morning coffee, followed by a light breakfast of pancakes, before preparing for the day’s diving.

Our first dive site of the morning was Deep Freeze, located on the south side of the channel separating Njao Island from Fundo Island. You don’t need to descend very deep to encounter an impressive variety of marine life.

After the challenges of the previous day, we were gradually improving our handling of the cameras. I had added 2 kg of weight to offset the buoyancy of my camera rig and was now diving with 5 kg total—despite forgoing a wetsuit. The water temperature remained steady and wonderfully comfortable at 28°C. Camera settings and focus continued to test us; many shots ended up out of focus, overexposed, or underexposed. Still, there was some progress compared to the day before, and I managed to capture several usable images. Liana, meanwhile, was gradually mastering her GoPro for video. At this rate, we might just have everything dialed in—right about the time we head home.

Our first encounter of the morning was an eel, carefully peeking out as we went past.

We met a school of pygmy sweepers in a swim-through.

Next up a Guineafowl pufferfish and a Black spotted pufferfish

For some reason, I remain fascinated by the Sailor’s eyeballs (bubble algae) which are some of the largest single celled organisms in the world.

I would not have seen the well camouflaged frogfish, had our dive guide not pointed it out to me.

A bright yellow nudibranch was unfortunately facing away from us, but still makes for a colourful picture

As we were heading towards the surface at the end of the dive, we encountered a large school of parrotfish. Watch the end of Liana’s video to see their mesmerising movements.

Watch the video in 4K if you can and also remember that you can click on any of the photos to see a full size version of it.

After our customary surface interval—spent relaxing on one of the island’s many small, pristine beaches—our second dive of the day took us to Mandela Wall.

This striking site, situated just outside the gap between Fundo Island and Njao Island, offered another captivating wall dive rich with healthy corals, vibrant marine life, and the characteristic clear waters of the region.

The remainder of the day passed in leisurely fashion. We lounged around the lodge, sorting through photos and videos from the morning’s dives while simply unwinding and enjoying the relaxed pace.

As we sipped our sundowners, Michael shared some excellent tips on underwater photography—advice we are eager to put into practice tomorrow.

Dinner was outstanding, featuring beautifully fresh fish as the main course. Afterward, we retired to our room early, resting up and recharging for another full day of diving ahead.

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Pemba Island Diving: Day 2, First dives

As I glanced at my dive computer while preparing for this trip and saw “Surface Time: 1035 days,” I was stunned. Could it really have been nearly three years since our last dive adventure in Pemba Island? Time had slipped by faster than I’d realized.

For our first day back underwater after such a long break, we deliberately chose something gentle—just enough to ease ourselves back into the rhythm of diving and rebuild our confidence. Thankfully, the morning greeted us with perfect conditions: windless, glassy calm, the sea like polished glass.

After a relaxed breakfast, we set off, passing a handful of local fishermen gliding quietly in their dugout canoes.

For the opening dive we left the cameras behind on the boat, wanting to focus purely on reacquainting ourselves with the water. We visited the Aquarium site, and it did not disappoint—vibrant, teeming with life, and exactly the kind of gentle, beautiful reintroduction we needed.

Our surface interval passed on one of Pemba’s countless tiny, secluded beaches lining the shore.

For the second dive I brought along my camera, and Liana her GoPro. Unfortunately, I quickly proved that leaving an underwater camera rig unused for three years is rarely a good idea. First, in my preoccupation with the housing and settings, I neglected to properly prep my mask—it fogged almost immediately underwater. Then I discovered I’d positioned the camera’s built-in flash incorrectly, preventing it from triggering my external strobe, so I was left relying solely on my video light for illumination. To top it off, I’d completely forgotten how much the camera housing affects buoyancy; the extra volume kept pulling me up, turning every moment into a small battle for trim.

Liana faced her own learning curve, diving for the first time with both the GoPro and her new torch, and struggling to get the lighting right.

Photography-wise, the dive was frustrating and largely disappointing. Yet in every other respect it remained another stunning Pemba dive—rich, serene, and alive with color and movement. Sometimes the images we capture are secondary to simply being back in the water and enjoying the experience together.

After a relaxing afternoon, we enjoyed sundowners on the beach, followed by an excellent dinner.

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Pemba Island Diving: Day 1, Getting There

When South Africans hear “Pemba”, they immediately think Mozambique, prompting a little geography lesson. Pemba Island, Tanzania, is part of the Zanzibar archipelago and is situated to the north of Unguja Island, which is the one most people think of when talking about Zanzibar.

Out trip had been in the planning for a long time, ever since we heard that Michael and Carlotta of Afro Divers were building their own lodge. Our initial November 2025 plan had to be postponed due to some logistical problems at the new lodge, but finally we were on our way.

After a night sleepover at the airport City Lodge in Johannesburg, we boarded our early morning Safair flight to Zanzibar.

Once through the chaos of Customs & Immigration upon arrival in Zanzibar, we had to find our way to the Domestic terminal for our Auric Air flight to Pemba Island. Fortunately we found a very helpful porter to guide us and help with our luggage, since this would have been quite a mission otherwise.

The flight to Pemba, in a Cessna Caravan, carrying a pilot and 13 passengers, took about 35 minutes.

This was followed by an hour’s drive, going progressively more off the beaten track.

Eventually, 12 hours after we started queuing for check-in at OR Tambo International Airport, we arrived at Afro Divers lodge, to a very friendly reception in Paradise.

After catching up with Michael and Carlotta over a couple of beers, we sat down to an excellent dinner of Fish Ceviche, followed by a Beef Burger. We decided to skip dessert and opted for an early night in preparation for our first day of scuba diving in three years.

During dinner, we had an interesting visitor to our table.

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Something different: Dog agility

The past weekend I had so much fun photographing a dog agility competition, something totally different to my usual nature and wildlife photography, but equally close to my heart. I just share a few of my personal favourite photos from the weekend.

All sizes and shapes of dogs (and humans) competed and all seemed to be having great fun.

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Exploring Madikwe Game Reserve: Day 5

Our last morning game drive was done in cold, overcast and windy conditions, with the animals inactive and hiding from us. We did get to see a group of three lionesses with one young male with them, eyeing the wildebeest before stalking away in the long grass. They were so well camouflaged that you would not see them if you didn’t know where to look.

The bravery of the trackers never ceases to amaze me.

We saw one more sleeping adult male lion on our way back to the lodge.

Our flight from Madikwe to OR Tambo ended up being 90 minutes late, resulting in a mad rush to make it in time for our flight back home. Fortunately Federal Air, who were responsible for our lateness, arranged to have us fast tracked through bag drop and security, resulting in us arriving at our boarding gate for the flight home with 10 minutes to spare.

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Exploring Madikwe Game Reserve: Day 4

We had our usual early morning start. Sam decided to take us to a spot close to where hyenas with their cubs were known to den. According to him, the curious cubs would often come out to look, when they heard a vehicle stop nearby. We could see them lying under a bush, but after waiting a while, we thought that they were not going to come out and we decided to leave. Soon Sam got a call on the radio, informing him that they had emerged when another vehicle stopped there, as we were leaving. This led to us making a U-turn and returning to the site.

Adult hyenas may be considered part of the “ugly five”, but their cubs are extremely cute.

After this we drove north to an area with open plains, where we saw some Springbok

and also found the lions we had seen at the zebra kill on our second day, now relaxing and sleeping in the grass. One male briefly acknowledged our presence, before lying down again.

The afternoon was cold, windy and overcast, the animals pretty much hiding from the elements and from us. My attempt at photographing a Wahlberg eagle in flight was not a great success, the dark eagle against the white clouds not photographing well. I did take my obligatory Lilac Breasted Roller shot though.

Once again, we saw numerous elephants and Wildebeest (Gnu).

In the overcast conditions, darkness arrived rather quickly, with none of the previous days’ spectacular sunsets. Just before dark, we found a group of two lionesses with 8 cubs. With aperture wide open, shutter speed as slow as I was comfortable with while shooting handheld and ISO as high as I was comfortable with, the photos were still very dark and some work in Lightroom and Topaz Denoise was required afterwards to make them usable.

A Jumble of Lions

This day was also an unfortunate reminder that things do not always go to plan during traveling. First there was an unfortunate little incident, resulting in my one camera meeting with a sharp edge on the floor of the game drive vehicle. This rendered the camera inoperable, but at least it was at the end of the day and I did not lose any photography opportunities due to this.

As if this wasn’t enough, when we arrived back at the lodge, we were informed that our flight out of Madikwe the next day, was going to be at least an hour delayed, causing concern about our ability to still be in time for our flight home. Not much one can do about that except wait and see.

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Exploring Madikwe Game Reserve: Day 3

The usual early morning start, after a quick cup of coffee, had us out on our game drive as the sun was rising, providing a lovely background for a shot of a Pale Chanting Goshawk in a dead tree.

My pursuit of the perfect Lilac Breasted Roller shot (as mentioned in a few of my older blog posts) continued.

You cannot move far in Madikwe without seeing elephants. Sadly, elephant conservation in Madikwe is a victim of its own success, with the number of elephants now exceeding the carrying capacity of the reserve, resulting in significant destruction of vegetation. While debates about the management of this problem are ongoing, the size of the problem just seems to be increasing.

There was much activity at a nearby water hole.

About 90 minutes into our game drive, Sam received a radio message that the Wild Dogs had been seen in the far eastern part of the reserve, where they had caught an impala. Obviously we wanted to go there despite the distance and time involved. After another long drive to the east, we arrived close to the sighting, where we had to wait a while for our turn, since only 3 vehicles at a time are allowed at a sighting. But it was absolutely worth the wait. A pack of 14 Painted Wolves, including six pups of about 5 months old, with full tummies and in a playful mood, greeted us.

Liana got some lovely video

All too soon we had to move along and allow others their turn at the sighting. Driving along on our way back to the lodge and aware that we were going to be quite late for brunch, we just had to make a brief stop when we saw a group of four lions chewing on the remains of a wildebeest right next to the road.

After an action packed and exciting morning, the afternoon game drive was a somewhat more uneventful affair, but I did continue my pursuit of the perfect Lilac Breasted Roller shot