Careless Reef

In the early 1990s, the crown-of-thorns starfish attacked Carless Reef and left its corals dead. Boats stopped going there and, after a few years of rest, the reef began to recover, and the dive lets you see the progress of this regrowth.

The site is known for its large population of semi-tame giant moray eels, which are often free swimming and easy to approach. This large number of diver-friendly moray eels is attributed to prolonged fish-feeding by visitors. Being isolated and surrounded by deep water, the reef also attracts pelagic fish such as tuna and barracuda. Life at the site ranges from nudibranchs to tuna and sharks, and the animals reported include amberjack, turtles and whitetip reef sharks. The first group in the water occasionally meets hammerheads, which are usually seen at Carless in two windows, April to May and September to October.

A few meters east of the saddle between the two pinnacles, a steep wall offers many caves and recesses. Since it sits in the middle of the open sea with no protected moorings, the reef is very exposed to the weather and needs genuinely good weather, as it does not take much wind to make the dive difficult or even impossible.