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December. Thanks to Dr. Jamie Seymour and Richard Fitzpatrick, our box jellyfish frenzy is almost coming to an end. Irukadji and box jellyfish have been keeping us company in tanks and in the water.
Our box jellyfish model Oscar performed beautifully in the wild and did not even attempt to sting us one bit. He was well trained and truly beautiful. We have total respect for these deadly animals.
November saw us back to Western Australia to continue our coverage on the diving scene of Australia’s biggest state. We dived Rowley Shoals on board the wonderful Kimberley Escape once more. The Shoals did not disappoint. We had wonderful warm dives and fast drifts and the colours of the fan and soft corals were in full tropical force.
Then we went back to WA’s best kept secret of snorkeling with Australian Sea Lions. To keep it secret, to keep it safe, we shall not write where 
Then we continued south and bravely got into our Scubapro semi-dry suits and dived the temperate seas of South Western Australia. Diving Busselton Jetty with Dive Shed was fantastic. Just 7 metres deep, each pylon hosted super saturated colours of orange and yellows and violets not to mention the fishlife that abound. The cutest imaginable globefish - WA’s equivalent to Nemo. Oh yes, the HMAS Swan was a good one too.
Then finally, Albany. It was a mighty fine trip with Albany Dive hosting our 4 spectacular dives. We did not mind freezing at 17℃, Uwe Klinge made it worth our while showing us the elusive weedy sea dragons and the playful New Zealand Fur Seals. Temperate diving for us tropical rats was truly worth freezing our butts off.
August came the emotional task for Stella to finish and launch the Chiu Family book, Remembering Ambrose - a commemorative memorial book of heartfelt stories from family and friends on her father Ambrose Chiu, 30 years after his passing. The quick two week trip back to Manila was a huge and emotional journey for Stella and the entire Chiu Family.
Finally home in June and just recovering from our back to back Kimberley and Philippine expeditions, there was a God sent chance of going on the Undersea Explorer for the grand minke trip of the season, nay the decade! We had a rare week of almost flat calm seas and Pavlova the dancing minke pirouetting for hours along the minke line! Phenomenal.
Quickly returning home to pack for our next expedition to the Philippines, we stopped over Sydney to meet with traveling friends Susanne Stellberg and Harald Hordosch picking up, in the nick of time, the very first Seacam housing for the D200. Thanks Harald for finishing it in time for our very important expedition.
Conservation International (CI) Philippines had our next 2 months filled to the brim with our very Asian type expedition. After 13 luxurious days on the Kimberley Escape, we had our very own exclusive liveaboard, the Nur Jaima - a unique Palawan cargo vessel which we “lovingly” called the pirate ship!
So how do we begin to tell you about this expedition. We’ll say it in keywords: box jellyfish, seaweed farming, octopus hunter, nautilus hunter, aquarium fisherman, shell trade, Tubbataha Rangers, and more.
Each keyword has intense stories behind it. Stories are better said in pictures and/or in person. What can we say, it was one hell of a great trip.
Thanks to AA Yaptinchay, Stella’s mom Pacita Chiu was able to visit Anilao where we were working. We managed to have mommy experience her intro dive at age 74 with the best dive instructor around Romy Trono, the executive director of CI Philippines! The grand event was documented in full by Yogi and filmed by no less than Sterling Zumbrunn of Conservation International US.
End March to early April were 13 fascinating days on board a liveaboard, the Kimberley Escape. We experienced the spectacular Kimberley coast’s stunning waterfalls, barramundi filled rivers and ancient aboriginal masterpieces of Wandjinas and Bradshaws.
Having had a good wet season, all the waterfalls like the King George and Mitchell were photographed in its full flowing glory.
After finally getting off our 13 day mobile water home, a quick but productive second trip to the Bungles Bungles proved worthwhile with still waters in the river beds making beautiful reflections. This trip was the last 35mm film expedition. It was time to retire the F100s and to say hello to the much awaited D200.
Just back home in February, Yogi just made it in time to attend Stella’s citizenship ceremony at the Cairns City Council which was presided by Cairns City Mayor Kevin Byrne. This special occasion was co-celebrated by good friends John and Linda Rumney of Undersea Explorer and North Queensland artist Robert Strachan and his wife Helen Weld.
Will write more about Robert’s work in a later “Bush Story”.
2006 started with Yogi being honoured by the Philippine Department of Tourism to promote diving in the Philippines during the BOOT Show in Düsseldorf/Germany. This is Europe’s biggest trade fair for watersports and has quite a big exhibition hall for scuba diving. Yogi gave 7 public slide presentations and stood in for Harald Hordosch to receive the Golden Tauchen Award for his brilliant SEACAM underwater housings.
It is incredible that the year is over again. We had the worst anticipation of a category 5 cyclone named Ingrid. Although used to typhoons from the Philippines, we were ill prepared for an inconceivable hit. Ingrid moved northwest and thankfully decided not to give Cairns a visit. But the rains again brought wonderful waterfalls and greener than green forests. One full moon night, we walked a waterfall trail in Wooroonooran National Park and saw the full moon rise and give light to the forest. Quite a middle earth experience.
From May to July, we traveled to Western Australia to shoot the the whale sharks of Ningaloo Reef and the amazing WA landscapes from Shark Bay, Kalbarri, the Pinnacles and boab trees, to the fantastic Kirijini and Bungle Bungle gorges.
The whole trip lasted three months and 20,000 km. We finally saw and photographed the much talked about WA light. What amazing colours. But this was a particularly weird autumn season. We arrived in Exmouth and it rained 3 out of the 5 weeks of our stay. And our friends Axel & Eske Passeck of Sea Breeze Resort said: “It never rains in Exmouth!” As a result, we have rare pictures of this area - green plants sprouting with flowers covering the red desert of Cape Range National Park!
We had to rush back home early August to do another shark story on the Undersea Explorer with our good friend, the fabulous writer/editor Alya Honasan from Manila. When she went back to home, Alya wrote a story on Stella for Sunday Inquirer Magazine: Giving It All Up for Love and Adventure - Forever stella-article.pdf. Alya kept busy and wrote a brilliant article on Undersea Explorer’s shark conservation and experience for Asian Diver’s Feb/March 2006 issue.
Another UE expedition for us in November was a coral spawning trip. Terribly LONG night dives waiting for the coral eggs sticking out of the polyps to spew. It got quite chilly on the second hour . . .
December was more diving the Great Barrier Reef from off Cairns and Port Douglas - a preparation for a Tauchen magazine story on diving Cairns and Far North Queensland.
2005 is very much a small taste of what Australia is all about. Visiting WA just made us realize that we saw just a spec of this big continent. It makes us eager to move on - to document a truly remarkable country.
June 2003. We immigrated from the Philippines to North Queensland, Australia. Now based near Cairns: the gateway to the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree National Park (the world’s oldest rainforest), we concentrate on Australian subjects as well as Asia and the Pacific Island region.
The first quarter of 2004 was our first Australian wet season experience. We spent quite some time photographing the Tropical Rainforests of North Queensland especially after having a few cyclones passing through, leaving lots of rain behind causing raging rivers and waterfalls.
Forests remained a big subject throughout the second quarter of the year. We traveled to the very south of Queensland, to the subtropical forests of Lamington National Park.
June and July were spent on the Undersea Explorer visiting the Great Barrier Reef to swim with dwarf minke whales.
In August and September we traveled to the neighboring country Papua New Guinea to photograph the world’s best coral reefs for Tauchen and Action Asia magazines. For 2 months, we dived all the major & best dive sites of PNG such as Rabaul, Kavieng, Kimbe Bay, Tufi, Milne Bay and Loloata Island. Thanks to liveaboards Mike Ball, Febrina & Telita we were able to reach remote places, and dive as much as our lungs could take.
November and December, Yogi was back on the Undersea Explorer to experience two Shark Research trips.
In November, scientist and documentary maker Richard Fitzpatrick caught and satellite tagged tiger shark “Lola” in the Far North Great Barrier Reef’s Raine Island. Richard revives his sleepy subject while John Rumney dares to photograph the freed tiger from below.
In December, again with Richard Fitzpatrick, an Australian Geographic Magazine sponsored shark expedition trip was organized with Ron and Valery Taylor, the famous Australian documentary producers and shark legends, as the expedition’s guest speakers. 2004 was one busy year. And as it is fondly said in Australia, “There’s no rest for the wicked!”
