Todd Thimios - Ultimate Dive Sites

Summary
In this conversation, Todd shares his journey as a dive instructor and underwater photographer, discussing his experiences in various diving locations worldwide, including the Galapagos and Thailand. He reflects on the changes in his life, including starting a family and writing a book about the best dive experiences globally. The discussion also touches on the beauty of cold-water diving and the thrill of encountering marine life, particularly Orcas. In this engaging conversation, Todd shares his extensive diving experiences across various global locations, highlighting each site's unique marine life and conditions.
From the seasonal dynamics of herring in Norway to the vibrant underwater ecosystems of Tubbataha and the Coolidge wreck in Vanuatu, Todd provides insights into the best diving practices and the importance of conservation. He also discusses the allure of blackwater diving, the majestic manta rays of the Maldives, and the thrilling shark encounters in Fuvahmulah. The conversation culminates with Todd's reflections on his most memorable dive locations and the upcoming launch of his book, Ultimate Dive Sites.

Todd's book is currently on sale at a 15% discount and can be purchased via this Amazon Link

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introductions
• 4:56 Life Changes and Family Dynamics
• 11:05 Diving in Thailand and the Galapagos
• 12:59 The Green Monster
• 17:05 The Journey to Becoming an Author
• 26:58 The Editing Journey
• 31:57 Antarctica
• 33:39 Diving in the Mergui Archipelago
• 38:33 The Anacondas of Brazil
• 40:20 Addicted to Orcas
• 43:49 Future Diving Adventures
• 49:06 Philippines: Tubbataha and Anilao
• 57:48 The Wonders of Tonga: Whale Encounters and Clear Waters
• 59:06 Dwarf Minke Whale adventures with Matt, Nicolas and Martin
• 1:02:59 Diving the Coolidge: A Historical Wreck Dive in Vanuatu
• 1:09:49 Tufi: A Hidden Gem in Papua New Guinea
• 1:12:57 Exploring Lord Howe Island's Unique Ecosystem
• 1:18:21 Diving Adventures in the Maldives
• 1:23:46 Memorable Dive Locations and Experiences
• 1:29:41 Book Launch and Final Thoughts

Transcript

Matt Waters: Hey there dive buddies and welcome to the show. Today we're diving into the incredible journey of Todd Timius, whose career has taken him from a decade long dream job on Lord Howe Island to the glamorous world of super yachts. Working an extremely niche job as a dive scout for a scuba obsessed Russian billionaire, Todd found himself jetting around the world creating underwater video and photography footage for his boss to review and decide if he wanted to dive there.  

Todd's back. Ultimate Dive Sites launches this week and captures his passion for the underwater world and highlights some of the world's finest dive locations. So, join me as we discuss the book, Todd's journey, and hear of his future underwater plans. Also, if you'd like to grab a copy of Todd's book, it's available from the newly launched ScubaGoat Amazon Shop, which you can get via the show notes.  

Now let's get into the chats with Todd. Please enjoy.   

Todd Thimios: Welcome to the Scuba Goat Podcast, with Matt Waters. Let's dive right in. G'day Matt.   

Matt Waters: G'day mate, how you going? Where, where are you speaking from? Are you, you up in Byron Bay? Yeah, Lennox Head, just south of Byron Bay. Um,   

Todd Thimios: are you familiar with the area?   

Matt Waters: Um, I've, I've been up there once.  

We went and did a, like a five day trip up there with me and a missus when she was introducing me to Oz. Awesome. So we went and dived with Simone at, um, Sun Dive.   

Todd Thimios: Okay. That was pretty recent. Then I think, I think they took over maybe within the past five years or six years. So does that make sense with you visiting?  

Matt Waters: Um, I think they're a bit longer than that. I think, um, I seem to recall it went up for sale when I was still in Thailand. So it's got to be closer to eight years now.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. Pre COVID. Okay, cool.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, go on.   

Todd Thimios: Oh, they've just interrupted. They've had an amazing season. It's, um, it's really nice to   

Matt Waters: know.  

Yeah. Well, I'm not surprised considering there's only one dive shop in the town now. They must be going hell for leather. They are. I   

Todd Thimios: mean, it's probably the same as where you're at. We've had an amazing run of weather all summer. Just not too much rain, really clear water. And, um, yeah, I had a chat with him, with David, um, his partner.  

Um, just this week and he said it's the busiest season they've had since they took it off. Well, busiest summer anyway. So, but I'm sure, I'm sure they look forward to summer more than anything else.   

Matt Waters: I'd love him to come on the podcast, but I think the best way to do it would be to actually be in person in Byron   

so that I   

can set the cameras up and get it, get it all done properly, you know?  

Yeah, that'd be fine. Sure. Cause I think David, David's story in itself is a, it's a, it's a good one, isn't it? So.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, definitely. Oh, that's a good excuse to come up. Maybe you'll get a dive in and, um, yeah, do some podcasts. It's probably a period. Hell yeah.   

Matt Waters: So are you, have you always been based up that way?  

Todd Thimios: No, I am originally from Cairns, all my family's in North Queensland, um, but I haven't really been there since I was in my 20s, early 20s. I gave a bit of a timeline for you, I, um, was born in Brisbane, so I grew up there, but then all my family's in Cairns, so I kind of spent forever up there. And then, um, in my 20s, moved to Lord Howe Island and did, uh, close to 10 years on Lord Howe Island, off the coast as a dive instructor, and then hit that, that awkward predicament of life.  

I need to leave because if I don't leave soon, I'm going to be here forever. There's very much a utopia, boy's paradise of just great diving, great fishing, great surfing, nobody there, insanely beautiful.   

Matt Waters: You know, you know, when you instantly really like people and then you go off from very fricking quickly, that's just happened.  

I'm so jealous of that. 10 years, oh lord, hell. Oh,   

Todd Thimios: I, I, um, yeah, I loved it. I loved it. I kind of got, I think I hit, I think I got to 29 and I was sort of like, This is good, but I don't know how much as a ca as a person, you're gonna grow if you stay like into your, into your thirties. Um, and what challenges you get.  

I'm gonna sort of have ahead of me if I, if I did that. So I went, so I kind of, I went to France and looked for work on super yachts and started working pretty quickly as a dive instructor dive guide on a, on a, well, I got a boat, I got a job. Very good job actually within three weeks of being there, um, as a instructor, photographer and that kind of.  

Sped into me being on a boat full time for three and a half years. We went around the world two times and just dived like crazy. We had a, um, it was the richest Russian in the world at the time. Um, still very rich, obviously.  

And, and then he stayed, like his pastime was diving. So, um, that was perfect to me. So I kind of, the job morphed on very quickly since I was there. I, um, it turned into like a dive scout. So basically I ended up spending half the time on board. And half the time off court, scouting off new locations that he'd be into, spending a lot of time there, videoing them, recording them, photographing them, getting them ready for him to arrive.  

And then he'd get there and be like, I showed him a video and say, all right, this is the Mel Dives, goes for 10 minutes. What do you want to do? And he'd be like, I want to go to, you know, three minutes into it and it's just like sharks everywhere somewhere. Honestly, Russians are bad sharks. That's all they want to do.  

So that was incredible. And then I did that up until about, um, for full time for one boat. And then I did it freelance for a number of other boats. Um, a nice little segue into your night at the circus. The other day I did it for Guy Libetard, who's the owner of Circus, or used to be the owner of the creator anyway, Circus du Soleil.  

Speaker 4: Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: So he was a client for one stage. Um, one of the most recent ones, he just sold his boat. He had a sailing boat called Tiara. And, um, he was a diver, but obviously amongst many other crazy things. So, um, yeah, we had a few good trips with them as well. So yeah, it did freelance work for super yachts, uh, sort of guiding expedition stuff until probably COVID really ramped in.  

COVID was, COVID was, um, find a base and get to your base quick. And who knows what's going to happen.   

Matt Waters: Did you, is that what, is that what brought you home?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. So I went to Cairns. I was in Dominican Republic with Guy, the French Canadian, and you can see in his mind that the world's kind of melting down, you know, like something's going on.  

When those characters that are super connected start to panic a lot about cancellations and so forth, you realize it's pretty mega. So yeah, I went straight back into Cairns and then, um, yeah, stayed there for about six months or so. Met my wife, who was traveling, she's Australian, she was traveling in, um, around Australia at the time.  

And hit off straight away, and she said, Do you wanna go and live with my old farmhouse in Lenox Head? Which she was renting out.   

Matt Waters: Hold on, wait. Is this, is this how you met your wife, or is she   

Todd Thimios: Really? Yeah, we met, we met, um, in COVID maybe, yeah, like first year of COVID or 2020, I think.   

Speaker 4: Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: 2020, she bought, she purchased a print of me, like sign art photograph and obviously she's asking all the right questions and I saw the face behind the person asking.  

And, um, yeah, we got together straight away, which is amazing.   

Matt Waters: That's awesome. Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Two kids rock.   

Matt Waters: Is she a Cairns girl as well? What's that, sorry? Is she a Cairns girl as well?   

Todd Thimios: No, she's from the Kimberley, from up in Grimm, west, um, northwest WA.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, nah, I've just made the link. Yeah. It's her mum and dad that have got the, um, booking website over on that side of the world.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, exactly. The Kimberley Cruise Centre. Yeah, well done. Yeah. They have one of the longest running, probably the longest running cruise centre, which is like a booking agency for, um, sort of expedition boats that run up and down the Kimberley Coast there.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, because they've got, they've got the big boats, haven't they?  

Like True North that cost you a gazillion dollars a minute to be honest. Yeah,   

Todd Thimios: yeah, so I haven't done too many trips on that coast, but um, we're actually looking at doing Roland Schultz. Have you been out there?   

Matt Waters: I've not. I've got a few friends that have been there and they absolutely love it and it's, it's obviously a bucket list item.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, I think the fact that it's off the coast so far just looks amazing. So yeah. So that's, that's a quick little timeline to bring me to Lenox Head. Um, we've been here since Yeah, four or five years now and, um, two little girls, got two little, we got straight into business and made babies and, um, yeah, just loving life.  

Very, very, very different than, than before, but   

Speaker 4: yeah,   

Todd Thimios: but, um, still busy, still doing trips. Um, still trying to find any different avenue for photography, underwater photography as possible, which just brings us into books that we'll talk about later. Um, yeah, very lucky, very lucky to have us. And I've always loved this part of the world anyway.  

I've always had connections down here. So. It's um, it's nice to be based here full time.   

Matt Waters: Oh mate, I mean it's um, when you look at the, the country as a whole, I think it's an absolutely beautiful country and then you get those pockets where it just goes off the scale of wow factor. It's just beyond, isn't it?  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, it's very special.   

Matt Waters: We've just come back from, we did a weekend in Blueys Beach. Uh, sorry, I don't know, four hours north of us here. Um, and it's just, uh, so, so relaxing just to be in that location. And of course we got the usual, uh, Bureau of Meteorology saying it's going to piss down all weekend and thunder and lightning, and we're going to be stuck in a cabin all weekend.  

But lo and behold, they were wrong. And it was just glorious sunshine. Yeah. That's good.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. I mean, it was, yeah, that's it. You know, well, then like when it's just such a diverse coastline and, um. Yeah, it's just diverse. Like, it's so different from one spot to the next and quiet. I think, like, even here we live in a pretty sort of public area, I guess you'd call it.  

Like, a pretty developed area. But we've got a seven mile beach down the road, which is just seven miles of nothing on it. It's incredible. Right in the middle of everything, too.   

Matt Waters: That's beautiful. Alright, so we spent the whole day down the beach the other day. And, um, you know, I'm from the UK, so a beach in the UK is dark, murky water and cobblestone, if you're lucky.  

And, you know, The odd trolley going past. And then I sat there on the beach this weekend in my, in my little beach chair. And I was like an old man. I must've spent nearly, nearly three hours of just saying nothing and just watching the world go by and the ocean do its thing. It was just phenomenal just to be in the moment.  

Todd Thimios: It's funny how you, it's, it's good to hear that. It's funny how you transform into different modes of sort of how your characters on the beach, how you're like, now I'm the same, now I'm a. I've got like a little cool cabana, which every other family has. I got a little armchair, I got two kids running around and I'm like, man, this is the best backyard ever.  

Like, I come here all the time. It's a healthy environment for the kids too, because they're just washing off all the, all the dirt, all the everything else.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. I was just talking to, there's a couple of friends of mine that, um, were over in Thailand when I was over there and they've, um, they've bought themselves a, a sailboat and they're in the Mediterranean at the moment, heading over to.  

Um, the Caribbean at the end of the year and, uh, opening it up to families with kids so that parents can dive together, that kind of thing, but they've got two kids of their own and they're constantly asking the kids, are you sure you want to live on a boat? You don't want to go and live in a normal place and go to a normal school.  

They're like,   

nah,   

you know, you can just imagine them swearing if they knew what swearing was. Um, I just wake up in the morning on a boat and they go, you know, snorkeling and swimming and do a bit of schooling and down the beach and it's heaven.   

Todd Thimios: I would love to do that. I think that if I could crystal ball it, I think, I think might be doing the family little sailing boat thing one day, but, um, got to get all the chess pieces in line first, right?  

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. Well, you never know if you end up having to take the Sprogs on holiday, you can chuck your Reese's way and you can go and spend a week with them on the   

Todd Thimios: boat. Yeah.   

Matt Waters: Great.   

Todd Thimios: Mate, so you've dived Thailand a lot, right? In the past.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. I spent the first time I was there like four years and then I went to Papua New Guinea and then back across to Thailand for nearly a year.  

Um, so yeah, it's like a second home.   

Todd Thimios: I, I, I, um, I always loved Thailand cause I kind of found it in my early twenties. I think it's the whole like local Thailand thing, like doing like, um, Kotow sort of, whatever you want to call that, culture. But I probably didn't really discover diving in Thailand until, until late part of my thirties and just like, cause I was sailing boat based as well.  

And, um, yeah, it just goes off and it's just such a nice coastline. It's such, such. So many different, sort of, um, in and away places to dive, it's great for sailing.   

Speaker 4: Yeah. And   

Todd Thimios: that's really a dream, right? If you can live on a sailing boat, eat Thai food and go diving every day. Well,   

Matt Waters: that's the dream, isn't it?  

And, um, yeah, I was, I was fortunate enough to be, you know, managing a boat in the Similands. So we do the Similands and Surin Islands and, um, we did exactly that. We went diving every day and ate Thai food and, um, loved every minute of it, to be honest. Probably every, every fifth or sixth day we're at Richelieu Rock, you know, so it was just fabulous.  

Dream come true. Richelieu Rock, and what's Cobon right next to it, is it? Cobon and Co Yeah, you've got, um, Cobon, Cote d'Achailles, and then Richelieu Rock.   

Todd Thimios: Cote d'Achailles. Man, I love that, um, just thing of memories, you know, about stuff, like, the green one's still out, you know, like, Waddle Waddles. You get good visibility, but then you've got this green, whole current comes through, and it kind of goes down to like, half.  

Maybe 10 meters instead of 20 and you're instantly cold because it drops, I don't know, 5 degrees, maybe a little bit more. And you're sort of hanging on to like, kind of just permatosing, you know, you're going to hibernation by waiting for it to go past. But I say that because I have one memory where, I think it was, um, Kodach, like Kobon, was Kobon.  

Matt Waters: Was it on the ridge?   

Todd Thimios: It was like the one that has a, um, like a big sort of, uh, keyhole in the rock formation there.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, so that's Kobon.   

Todd Thimios: Anyway, on the back of the green monster, there was a whale shark. And I was just like, I'm good as well. That is just like, all the elements. And straight away, the thing like, the penny drops in your head, right?  

Because you're kind of like, it's not a coincidence there's a whale shark there. You know, it's because it's, it's a rich nutrient instead of the cold water. It's probably just following, maybe it's moving around like a cloud, and it's kind of doing its best to stay with it. I don't know, but like, it was awesome.  

It's kind of just like, going from like freezing, kind of seeing it popping your head up, and it's like, oh, look who's on the back of the clean water, coming in.   

Matt Waters: I used to, um, whenever we did Bond to Chai or Richelieu, I'd mention the Green Monster and sometimes down at Three Trees as well in the Similands.  

And I, I, I'd mention the Green Monster and explain it's cold water, nutrient rich, blah, blah, blah, but it's really cold. So, excuse me, when it comes through, don't instantly tell me that you want to go back and have a beer and end the diving day. Um, just give it five minutes to see what comes through because generally you've got that wall of fish that comes with it as well because all the little fish are feeding on the plankton.  

All the, the bits of crap that's in the water there. Um, sometimes you get lucky and sometimes you just end up dithering. So, you know, there's a few times I've turned around and seen guests and they're, do you want to, do you want to stay here or do you want to go up? And, you know, they give me the sign that they just want to go and have a beer and that's it, done.  

Todd Thimios: We're going to hazard, hazard wild travels. Do you get, uh, you just have scheduled internships each year that you get away for?   

Matt Waters: Yeah, not, not too shabby. I mean, we did, um, the, um, um, Galapagos last year. All right. I took Galapagos Master and we did a week on there with a few guests and, um,   

That's pretty good.  

Oh, yeah. I mean, it's our second time out there and I say our, you know, I, I, I tend to want to leave me expeditions, but then the really good ones that the missus wants to come along as well. So, um, you know, she, she, she's highly appreciating that. Um, so yeah, it was second time rounds. So we've done Galapagos Sky and Galapagos Master and both trips were fabulous and just very lucky, you know, it was, um, Great interactions in the water and and no dry dramas with major ripping currents or anything like that.  

So   

Todd Thimios: yeah, we enjoy that   

Matt Waters: They are a great deal   

Todd Thimios: for me It's it's it's a top five dive locations in the world without doubt and it's kind of my favorite guiding to which is just Sitting on the bottom really in a kind of current waiting for something to turn off You know, like it's kind of just sitting there waiting to take a just got what happens And when you're waiting and waiting you're observing you see how everything's connected together.  

I hope some One of those big pregnant, pregnant wow shots at, um, Darwin's arch just comes up at the last minute.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Um, yeah, we had a, um, we had a massive tuna come through last year. And it's the first time I've seen a proper, proper size one. Um, I shit you not, it must've been over 300 kg and it was just, you know, you know, that plateau that they take you to, like they call it the theater or the amphitheater or whatever.  

It was just right off the lip of that. So maybe two meters off you. Off, off, yeah. Oh, it's fabulous. Yeah. How long did you spend down there then? Did you go down on the private yachties?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, I did that. We did the, um, I did, I took the Galapagos once. And I did it by, um, superyacht. And by superyacht, like sort of, we had superyacht, but we obviously employed, I forget who it was, like a, uh, a Galapagos agency, a dive agency that joined us.  

So we had dive guides from, um, one of the boats out there with us. And I think there is a fixed amount of time, this was a long time ago too, 10 plus years. I think there's a fixed amount of time you can spend at each location, right? Yeah. Maybe, I don't know. Yeah. But um, yeah, uh, Wolf Rock and Dalhousie obviously, like, that's where it's at.  

Yeah, beautiful memories from both times. Just kind of having, um, what I was talking about before, just staying put underwater for a long We had rebreathers as well, so that was   

Matt Waters: Nice. Yeah,   

Todd Thimios: just staying there for an hour and a half and nothing happens. But what I mean, nothing happens. It's just like instead of the beauty of Galapagos moving in front of you and then all of a sudden, um, maybe the Hammerhead Shoals come in or whatever.  

But the, the funny part of all that, I said, it's my favorite kind of diving time that I was in Galapagos with, um, the Russian owner. They've got no patience, you know, like your briefing is like, listen, we've got rebreathers, rebreathers means that we can stay down for so long when we just don't go deep, stay a certain depth, hold on, wait for it to happen.  

And, um, yeah, I mean, I can spend two hours in one spot waiting for something to happen. I think up to 30 minutes. You just see this guy who's like, like, like four of us, me, my other dive buddy, another cat photographer, and, um, the owner, and all of a sudden you see the owner, like, just let go of the rope.  

It's just, you guys, everyone just looks at each other like.  

Matt Waters: Yeah. There's no, um, there's no hanging around once you let go, is there? Yeah. It's, it's,   

Todd Thimios: yeah. I mean, it's nice to be in the blue there, but you've just got to hang on to the weight, right?   

Matt Waters: Yeah, I mean, people have always asked me to describe it and I think it's, it's relatively simple to describe, but it's hard to picture because we get taught as divers never to touch anything.  

Don't touch the bottom. Don't lie anything. Be careful with coral, blah, blah, blah. But especially when you're looking at, um, Darwin's Arch, that main section there, where the current runs through, it's just lava rock. So, you know, you've got to hold onto it as well. Otherwise you are gone. You know, you, you, you dive 10 minutes Um, so it's completely puts, puts diving on its head and I, I'm in agreement with you.  

I love it. Just being static and watching the, the, the fish world come past and, and come and say hi.   

Todd Thimios: I think it's a different beast. I like, I totally, I mean, I'm all for it when it touches the reef, it's a no brainer, but when, but the Darwin's Arch and, and Wolf Rock, they're not coral gardens per se, they're, they're not like just fragile reef everywhere.  

And then probably the main thing about it is it's, so it's. There's sorts of novices out from the expert divers, maybe we'll call it, so maybe the dive crowd's reduced, um, you're not going to have a bunch of sort of rookies or novices holding on, destroying everything. I think you're going to have, we'll put it this way, I've got a reef hook.  

I've got a massive red camera, enduring three knots of current in the face, you know, so it's probably shouldn't be there, but, um, I've done mine, I've got my stripes, you know, I'm ready to, I'm ready to be there. I can handle it. So,   

Matt Waters: yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Um,   

Matt Waters: to be fair, the first trip we did there, I took my camera and took the big rig and strobes and everything, jumped in, did maybe four or five dives and I just ditched it and went with the GoPro.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah.   

Matt Waters: It was just too much to handle in the current. And you're   

Todd Thimios: gonna get more anyway, if it's not a, if it's not a paid job, you wanna, you wanna enjoy it and see it with your own eyes and, and everything else. Yeah. How was the, how was the hammerheads in the last trip that you did in recent newsletter?   

Matt Waters: Uh, the, the last one wasn't too great for the hammerheads.  

They were further down in the, in the colder water. 'cause we, we went, um, July and it was surprisingly warm. Um, I think last year, everywhere in the world had weird weather conditions and water conditions, but it got up to 28 degrees at one point. And. I'm, I'm just using shark skin in the water and not a, not a seven mil.  

Um, so we were, we were going to have to, you know, when you come off the, um, that theater area and the, and the rock and you go across to the sands, um, which ditched down to what, maybe 35, 40 meters. Um, so they were hanging around the 28 to 30 meters, Mark.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. And that's,   

Matt Waters: yeah, we, we, we got a lot of them. Um, but the people that hadn't been there before didn't actually get that, uh, um, You know, I'm ads, it shall in above you.  

Yeah,   

Todd Thimios: that's what it's all about. Hey,   

Matt Waters: it is. Unfortunately, yeah,   

Todd Thimios: you kind of just like that's for me. That stuff keeps me up at night. I'm just like, yeah, that's like cool memories. When you see that sort of thing, it's just, um, yeah, you know, it's one of the best wildlife events on the planet. If you can just define it like, you know, Galapagos or Cocos, um, other places, my, my, my, my belly.  

Sorry. Um, yeah, if you can just. Find yourself witnessing some of the others hammerheads gone nuts. I do that every day in my life.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah, and there's I mean Especially when you're doing the photography as well I do a lot of photography very rare that I'll jump in and do a dive without a camera in my hand of some sort usually the big rig and I'm itching to get in the water again.  

Now that mrs. Got me a ram Uh, a retro snoot for Christmas. So I want to get down Clifton Gardens here and start shooting macro again.   

Todd Thimios: An experiment for once in a time. That sounds great.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. Hey, anyway, um, let's, let's talk about your sexy book. Um, thanks for sending me your copy.   

Todd Thimios: I've got a copy here.  

I was, um, throwing my backpack. So I thought I'd have it on standby. You've, you've seen the, uh, the digital copy, but sorry, I couldn't get you one of these hard copies out in advance.   

Matt Waters: I mean, I'll, I'll, I'll snag one from you when you come down for the dive show in March.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, it was, it was very good.   

Matt Waters: Yeah.  

Um, so what, what, um, what was the, what was the switch that decided you were going to become an author and, and write this   

Todd Thimios: book? That's a good question. Um, as you know, as photographers now, it's, we know that we just take photos and make money from taking the photos, right? It's just, you've got to.  

Diversifying this as a photographer. Like what it is to be a photographer these days is so different than what it was five years ago, 10 years ago. So I've never, I've always looked at the different ways of sort of diverse, like diversifying income as a photographer, underwater photographer anyway, because it's niche.  

Um, and obviously a book's always like this. Personal, you know, um, goal of mine to have a, to have a book, but then coming, then came around COVID time, having two small children, being home a lot. Um, I didn't realize that I basically got a really good intellectual knowledge of some of the best dive sites in the world and I've got photography of it all too.  

So. Yeah, so we start pitching the idea of, of, um, of different books, but probably the most obvious one was a bucket list sort of, um, mentality book of, like a top 50 dive experiences in the world. So yeah, so once we got signed by Hardy Grant, the publishing house, which I'm very grateful for them taking on the project in the first place, it was kind of nice to see the initial pinch evolve into something different.  

Um, at the core, it's the, at its core, it's the, it's the best to run down of the best 50 dive sites in the world or dive locations, sorry, better way of saying it is 50 dive experiences. Um, and what that means is that we've brought in scuba diving locations, um, or experiences. Speed diving experiences, free diving experiences, you know, snorkeling experiences and um, and we've touched on submersibles as well, right?  

And that was fun, um, to kind of diversify that list. So yeah, so that was for me just to put together this list of 50 best dive locations for them. I could straight away, what's your favorite dive location, what's the best one in the world and you're like, well, it's pretty complicated, it's not as straightforward as that, like what are you into?  

Mostly big stuff, little stuff, so, so it was a very fun project and probably the best part of it all is to go through all your hard drives. Over all those years, the photos that never see the light of day, um, you know, quarter aus with you just before realizing that those photos live on your desk, on your hard drives and they don't come out and to put 'em into print, it's the best place for a photo.  

Right. It, it's not on a wall. It's even better. It's in a book. So, so yeah, it was a lovely, lovely journey. It was a two year journey, pretty much from, from around today. It's all, so when I, it's, um, conception and it's amazing to see good physical, um, product in front of me.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, there's a lot to be said for, isn't there?  

It's, um. I, I kind of, when I was reading through it and I, I picked up on that bit about the hard drives and instinctively I'll just look down to my right at the stack of hard drives that I've got and that, shit.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. And then you realize like hard drives, they don't last either. Also, it was kind of nice to go, all right, I've got that photo off a hard drive and it's on a paper now, like it's out there.  

But, um, no, it was a, it was a lovely experience to do it and, um, it was really fun putting it together. And, um, I had a wonderful editor, um, Debra Dixon Smith. Uh, she helped me as an editor, put it together too as well, which was, which was awesome. She's a very well traveled diver. She runs Dive, um, Planet.  

Matt Waters: Yeah. She's been on the podcast a couple of times. Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Sweet. Yeah. So that was excellent. We kind of, um, it was funny actually, we were shopping around for an editor and, um, well, we didn't realize that we had a say in who the editor could be. We're probably more like it. And then my wife actually, she knew Deb from previous life.  

And with Australian Geographic and said, what about her? And I was like, I don't know, Dave, but this would be a great idea. That was, that was, yeah, depth of it on it. And it was really fun to work alongside her when it came to the editing process. Um, yeah, and then thanks to Heidi Grant as well. They, they added, they gave us a bit of, um, leeway, I guess, going about it.  

Matt Waters: How does it, how does it go with, um, the publishers then? They have to strike up a deal on how, what they're going to do for you and what they're going to get from it, obviously, and don't need to go into numbers and that kind of stuff and just intrigued on how. Everyone gets a slice of the cheese and decides that this is a good project to go forward.  

Todd Thimios: I think, ultimately, they're, they're investing in you. So, they need to, from your pitch, they need to know that this book's going to sell. Because there's a lot of glory pro, what's the word? Um, not glory projects, but vanity projects. You're right, so, you know, I could, I could write a, I've got a hundred book ideas, but I think they're great.  

I don't, I don't. So. I'm not sure if other people would, but, well, I don't think about, I'm not sure if other people would see money in it more likely, so, um, they just need to come, come on terms with, uh, seeing if the book would be profitable, um, if it would appeal to a large market, obviously they had a, they had a big demographic, they've got, um, an audience all over the world, so, um, it was important for me to, um, make a North American and a European audience happy as well, um, I could easily do top 50 dive sites in the world.  

And not leave Indonesia universe, , that, that brought another element to it. So it was nice to kind of just, and I dived a lot around the world anyway, so I knew, um, that it wasn't hard to find really good experiences, um, all over the world.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. And you've got some fabulous photos in there as well, mate, and, um, thank you very   

Todd Thimios: much.  

Matt Waters: Yeah. There's a few I'll ask you about in a bit that, uh, that put the shivers down your spine.   

Todd Thimios: Well, I think when I, uh, yeah, just sort of. I'm going to cut you off a little bit. I think the word experience is really kind of um, got more and more potent during the making of the book because I sort of realized that the way that we dive is pretty different.  

The way that I used to dive back in the day is different to how I dive now. Um, and I think the whole sort of bucket bucketness mentality is probably a little bit more evident than ever before. Like trying to, um, Um, like, all my life I've wanted to see hammers in Galapagos, or all my life I've wanted to dive in northern Great Barrier Reef, or see weedy sea dragons or leafy sea dragons in South Australia.  

So, I think traditionally we've probably just sort of always enjoyed scuba diving in a holiday destination or going somewhere new. That was like a diving location. Now it's sort of more orientated around like, I want to see orcas. Where do I see orcas in the Arctic maybe? Or, um, I want to experience sailfish or marlin.  

Where do I experience that? In the Baja, Mexico. So I kind of really, and that was my job was to kind of, these experiences in front of people for a long period of time. So I really enjoyed that direction of the book, trying to think about like, all right. What are the best sort of experiences we can do because as I said, it's easy to reel up the best dive sites per se, around the world.  

Um, and that's just scuba diving, that's just kind of, it's a different, that's just, um, that's recreational scuba diving, basically there to sum it up. But it was nice to really give the Booker experience kind of based theme, so.   

Matt Waters: Well, it's not only experience as well. I mean, for me, it gives a little insight into, you know, arguably if you're a diver, probably the best job in the world is, you know, dive scout, uh, and a nice insight into who you are as a diver and a person as well.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah. Cheers. Yeah. So I guess it was nice to put my previous work into a job. Hmm. And when, when do we launch? Uh, it comes out on the 29th of January, so we'll say the 1st of Feb, um, there's free sales at the moment, um, yeah, all the fine details, but you can grab it on my website if you're Australian based, it's probably the best way of doing it.  

And there's all small bookshops and even some big ones called Amazon all around the rest of the rest of the world. So hopefully it's very easy to find.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Well, show me the links, mate. I'll throw them in the show notes when we're done as well. Now let's dive into the book a little bit, shall we? Let's, look, please.  

Yeah. I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, Um, well, I've got a few written down, speak to me about Antarctica.   

Todd Thimios: I think that was an important one for the, um, for the audience because from the publishing house I said before, they sort of said, listen, can you, can you keep that demographic happy and this demographic happy?  

I'm like, well, I can, but we can't leave out Antarctica, people are going to say, I'll ask a lot of questions about like this continent on the bottom of the, um, of the globe and can you dive down there and so forth. So.   

Matt Waters: I'm, I'm actually listening to, um, audio book of Shackleton. Wow. So when, when you're thinking of, you know, late 1800s, the first people going down to the Antarctic and, and they're all dying cause it's so fricking cold.  

And yet nowadays people are going there on holiday. It's just insane advancement.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. Um, some of my friends are expedition guides down there and they said, so basically there's boats every day of the year, sorry, every day of the season. But they've got rotation. So this, this wonderful concept of like, we're down in Antarctica, it's empty, it's wilderness, it's no one down here, but like every day and it's sort of tagging, tag out and they take a different route so they don't see each other.  

Matt Waters: Yeah. I kind of imagined it like that because much akin to Galapagos, you know, as you mentioned earlier on, they precision timing for all of the dive sites, you know, and I think it's, when I first went there, there was seven boats, there's now 12 or 13, um, I don't know how many more they're going to go. Um, we'll see.  

But hopefully they'll maintain that, you know, timely fashion of movement. So you do feel like you're somewhat remote.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. Otherwise it's the Thailand thing, right? You kind of,   

Matt Waters: you   

Todd Thimios: just kind of, you kind of, you hear that, you hear the dinner bell of someone, another duck boat diving in the water and you look across it.  

It's, you're right next to that. Um, Thailand question. Oh, you know, you can't ask me that because you know more about Thailand than I do. So don't ask it.   

Matt Waters: Oh, I can ask you all about Thailand, mate. Oh, don't worry about that. But, in fact, now let's stay on Thailand for a minute. Did you, how long did you spend there?  

Because you went up and you did Myanmar as well, didn't you?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, so, uh, a few different trips, but we've done, um, up, uh, the Simla Island coast. Done a trip there, sort of, with the grand finale around Yirrishuli Rock and Cobon and everything else like that. I think we did, I think I did that trip with the, with guests and then we dropped, we went back to Phuket, dropped the guests off and did the same trip again, with different guests.  

Um, So done that twice and then, um, and then we did Southern Thailand, which was, what's it called? What do they call it? Southern Thailand? Um,   

Matt Waters: Oh, um, Oh, Jesus. You mean, uh, down towards Coalanta and Off the coast of   

Todd Thimios: Coalanta, yeah, there's a number of little islands out there, um, which was amazing as well. But then, yeah, then we did a expedition trip into, um, the Mergui peninsula, into where,   

Matt Waters: sorry?  

Todd Thimios: Pelago, sorry. Mergui, the Mergui archipelago.   

Matt Waters: Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. Myanmar. Yeah. And, um, that was amazing. That was really cool. We kind of had, um, green water there for the whole trip. I think, kind of just, it was just a lot of upwelling and that whole sort of trip, but it was, uh. Uh, it was a Manter Expedition shirt, so they wanted to see Manter rolls.  

Um, we didn't see quite a lot. We saw really good diving. Um, amazing, um, fan corals, huge fan corals, um, BlackRock, I think BlackRock's probably one of your famous sites up there. Um, other sites. But what really struck me too was just that invisible line of kind of protecting an area and not protecting an area.  

So GUI just, you could see that they, they, they knock it around, um, little fish traps in the water. Um. So, it was really, really good diving, but it was hard to see how it wasn't managed.   

Speaker 4: Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: But definitely, like, it has to be on any list. I think on its day, it's going to rival, um, the Similans as well. So what, just, um, just, what year was this?  

Uh, when, with, um, the Panisi, probably in, in Panisi on, uh, that was the Manta trip, Manta. Yeah, Steve. I don't know his surname.   

Matt Waters: Dutch guy.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, crazy Dutch bastard. Ha ha ha ha ha.   

Todd Thimios: Whoa. Um, I don't know who he was, I've met him, but I've sort of, I've shown him, I haven't seen him again since. But um, yeah, I think it was with Man to Trust.  

Ah. Awesome, yeah. Like, I mean, and you can see, and then you go and you visit these islands as well. Islands are stunning, right? There's um, I don't know, can't remember the names of certain islands there, but just hidden away horseshoe bays. I think one of the islands was called Horseshoe Island. Um. Yeah. And just so pretty.  

So pretty and so remote. Um, yeah, but that was interesting to go, just that, cause you can, it's really an extension of the Stimulums if you kind of, if you look at it on the map, right? So it was just nice, just amazing to see how, I say protected in Thailand, it's not really protected, like it's protected, but it's, it's, as we talked about before, it's mismanaged in a sense of 20 boats on site, but, uh, but then to go up to somewhere where there was less boats, less dive boats, but then no conservation practices, um, fishing and whatnot.  

It's pretty hard to watch.   

Matt Waters: I must say in Thailand's defense now in the last, I think it's two or three years, um, they've started, um, issuing tickets for the dive sites. So when an operator decides they're going to do a trip, then they've got to collect the diver's passport number and they buy a ticket on the backing of that passport number.  

If the diver doesn't turn up, they can't use that ticket for another diver. So it's, it's, they've, they've tightened the noose somewhat, which is, which is quite good to hear. Um, and it's, it, it spanks of, like, probably a decade ago now, the island that's, uh, well, Kota Chai, uh, the dive site there, the island, um, you used to be able to visit it and go on the, on the beach, but the speed boats went there on the masses with their snorkelers and all that kind of stuff, so they made a mess.  

And the government said, you know what, you're banned, you're not coming on, no one's ever coming on again. So, they're going eventually.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, well, I mean, look out, it's so pretty, look after the place, please.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Now, um, I know you've got a book there in front of you, you probably know your book because it's your own book, but, page 53, Anacondas.  

Todd Thimios: It's like a test, please open your book to paste it, oh man,   

Matt Waters: yeah. So there's, there's, there's the big ass anaconda on page 53, and then there's a photo of a diver in the water on page 62, and that just freaks me the heck out.   

Todd Thimios: That was really fun researching that we found the one guy that kind of does it reliably in the pentanel there.  

Um, not cheap.   

Matt Waters: I can imagine.   

Todd Thimios: Not cheap to do, bookings way in advance. Um, a lot of factors kind of need to align to score it. I think you need no rain basically because you need all the waterways to dry up. It's got to be a certain time of year too where the anacondas have just eaten. And they're, they're sort of dormant, you know, they're not, they're not super active.  

The last thing you want is a very active, very big snake.   

Matt Waters: But um,   

Todd Thimios: incredible.   

Matt Waters: That, that photo on page 62 with the diver. Yeah. It looked like the, the diver's buddy's inside the bloody snake. One point. He's like   

Todd Thimios: photographing his buddy but you can't see his bumblebee. His buddy's inside the snake.   

Matt Waters: Jesus. I think I'd be um, yeah, I'd be a bit dubious about getting in the water with those boogers.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, yeah, I don't know. That's, it's interesting because you are then putting like a list like this together. I think, I think anything that gets me, gets a heart racing before I'm about to jump in the water. Anything that makes me think, okay, you realize you're about to do this. So, you know, when you realize you're about to have this experience or you, you know.  

Matt Waters: That kind, that kind of explains your addiction to walkers. Yes. Well,   

Todd Thimios: there you go. Because I get asked that a lot, do I find them, even this morning I was asked if, um, do I feel threatened or unsafe, and not for a chance. And I can't even remember the first inter like I do remember the first interaction with an orca, but I don't remember the hesitation of getting in the water, I think I was just like, this is real, like.  

And also, you get the environment, right, like it's probably the same as being in the peninsula. You see yourself, you're on a little outrigger sort of canoe style thing, and you're like, you're in the jungle, and you're like, okay, wow, I'm in the jungle here, and I'm like, What do I do next? I jump in the water.  

Matt Waters: I jump in the water with a snake that can eat me.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, and, and then Norway is the same, right? Norway is just so pretty, like the, the light's incredible, the mountains are huge all around you, the water's dark, but it's very clear, um, and you're just like, I'm supposed to get in the water, like that's, that's why I'm here.  

That's what it's all about.   

Speaker 4: Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, you've, you've hit a chord with me. The orcas in Norway is something that's Defined me for many years. Um, I've made five return trips. I haven't been back since 2020. Um, so I went every year, kind of got possessed the idea of shooting something that looks like that cover.  

Um, it kind of, it came together on the last trip. Last trip I got amazing imagery and kind of just felt this nice weight come off my shoulders. Not that it was like a pressure, but because I really enjoyed the chase of it all. But I just fell in love with Norway too. Just fell in love with being, sounds silly, but being really cold.  

Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Fell in love with cold water diving, if that's what we can call it, like cold water free diving. Um, fell in love with the elements of just, um, as I said, like feeling alive and having big mountains all around you, that perfect light where the sun never sets. Well, it is setting, sorry, it is setting the whole time, but it doesn't get any higher.  

Short days, so only like four or five hours of light. And, um, yeah, and then orcas in the water, it's just incredible. Nevermind that, I just, sorry. They feel so intelligent, they feel so, they feel so smart in the sense that you're just not threatened at all because you know that they're way smarter than you.  

It's kind of my, that's my ignorance and feeling safe in the water and comfortable in the water because these guys just know what they're doing. They know, they know how it all works and I must look like some big frog man in a rubber suit that's flailing around and they realize that that person is not supposed to be there.  

Close more threat, .   

Speaker 4: Yeah. Um,   

Todd Thimios: so yeah, absolutely love Norway. And, uh, we're actually looking at going back this, this year for the first time. Um, or sounding like five years maybe. Um, but doing it different. Doing it very differently. Normally I've had land-based camps this time I'm gonna say,   

Matt Waters: so. Oh, okay. Yeah.  

So not, not with the misses and the no offspring.   

Todd Thimios: No, I did invite the misses and she, she is a, she's a broom girl, as, as you know, so. The concept of, uh, three or four degree water and negative 15 windshields sometimes. It's like, nah, that's for you.   

Matt Waters: Not a cat in hell's chance you'd get Jaz going there either.  

She, she's got a seven mil and a heated vest just for diving here in Sydney. So, it's not getting any colder than this.   

Todd Thimios: It's funny to say how I like falling in love with being cold because I had like, I mean one of the trips there, I couldn't use my keyboard or mouse pad for weeks afterwards because the fingertips just had no feeling in them.  

Um, you get out of the water and you're banging your hands together and you're putting like welding gloves, like not welding gloves but the equivalent of, you know, like to keep them warm and um, just loved it. Loved being cold.   

Matt Waters: So when do you go back? Is it next year?   

Todd Thimios: November. November, I don't want to give away too many secrets, um, in a sense of timing and everything, but November's, I mean, the whole world knows that already, but November's, uh, the target, sort of, it's all about light, it's all about news, I think, um, towards the end of November, depends where you are, and yeah, I don't know if you are, but towards the end of November, um, days get shorter and shorter, and some, for some reason, maybe it's, maybe it coincides, I don't know, but the herring are most active in the fjords, Um,   

Speaker 4: uh, yes   

Todd Thimios: in winter and they're probably very active in the dark in, in your December and Januarys.  

Um, and maybe we're just getting it on the, on the verge of that. So maybe the herring just moved into, into the fjords in, in the daylight months of November, say October. You really want that cusp of when there's no light, but there is life.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, I was gonna actually ask about the sea conditions, but yeah, that makes sense.  

If you are getting them in the fjords, then it's gonna be relatively good for. For the boat, isn't it?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, yes and no, the wind really wicks up, uh, those fjords because the mountains are so high, it just funnels through. Um, and it happens fast too, right? So you just got, you look at the forecasts of weather and some days it just says like, sunny, sunny, sunny, and you're like, oh cool, we're going to be okay.  

And then you just get this blizzard that rips through. Um, and the interesting thing, um, so yeah, it does get rough. Um, probably don't want to venture too far from, I have one, actually I have one story for you. One of the first trips we had, like a tender. Well, like I attended with a cabin on it, so I had four divers with me, and they were so excited to get in the water.  

So I was driving the boat from, I dropped them in the water, nice visibility on the surface, like topside. Um, it's like, sure, there's orcas over there, they're feeding, they've got control, obviously, you know, how it works with wildlife, don't approach them, let them approach you, put them into the water. By the time that I put them in the water and I sort of did a, like a, a U turn to come around and, and be, nose on to the wind, this blizzard, which I had been seeing, I didn't even see already, otherwise I would have jumped into the water, um, had a whiteout.  

A lot, like I, I lost them in the water for about 30 seconds. And I was just like, this is the worst, and then sorry, I forgot, they did jump even quicker than I asked them to, that was, because I remember that, because I got really upset with them when they got back on the boat. I was like, guys, you saw, because that was really cool, I'm sure you're excited, but I'm gonna tell you right now, that was one of the worst experiences, my heart was like, in my mouth for 30 seconds, because I didn't know where you were.  

I mean, and how long do you last in the water, and that sort of places, if you're floating at sea.   

Matt Waters: I'm assuming you're all on dry suits as well, and   

Todd Thimios: No, not at all. Can't, can't freedive in the, or you can, of course, like, you guys can wear whatever you want. Um, so tell the people, but, um, no, you can't freedive in a, you want to freedive, you want to dive down.  

So I've got a smooth skin, which I think is 7mm.   

Speaker 4: Okay.   

Todd Thimios: And that's the best thing for, I find it actually quite incredible, because the smooth skin, um, deters the, the wind chill.   

Speaker 4: Okay.   

Todd Thimios: So, yeah, you get cold, you want to be moving the whole time, but If it's on, you can't eat it out of the water, eat it out, you know, non stop, so hopefully the blood's flowing pretty well.  

Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah.   

Todd Thimios: You can do it in dry suits, everyone else does it in dry suits, but you're a floating starfish, right?   

Speaker 4: Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: It all comes back to a bait ball. You're chasing that bait ball. So the orcas ignore you, the orcas are like, I'm here to feed, leave me alone. So you want to witness it all, you want to keep up with the bait ball, but the last thing a bait ball wants is to be static.  

So it's constantly moving. So you met him pretty quick.   

Matt Waters: That's much akin to South Africa. People ask me about that. And they're like, I ain't getting on the, not getting in the water with a shits on a sharks. And well, the sharks aren't looking at the big silhouettes that you're making. They're looking for the tiny little fellows that are running around with their heads on fire.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah. You haven't been to nowhere.   

Matt Waters: No, no. Uh, to be honest, I mean, I would, I'd love to see Orcas, but I think, yeah, I'm, I'm a bit of a pussy when it comes to the, the colder climates now. I mean, I, I went to Norway a few times when I was in the military, but, um, you know, having lived in the sun for too long now, I, I get cold when it gets down to anywhere near 10 degrees, and that's it, I'm done.  

Todd Thimios: That's cold, right, it's, it's, yeah, I, I guess it's, uh, for me, it's a, it's a, um, I know I'm coming back home, right?   

Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah.   

Todd Thimios: We're gonna be warm soon. And also, it's the, you, you kind of, um, you look forward to being in that little cabin. Well, it's all warm with the fire and everything else, so hopefully you don't stay underwater too long.  

Matt Waters: Let's get away from the cold for a bit. Tell me, tell me about Subataha, buddy. I'm going there next, next year.   

Todd Thimios: Subataha is a marine reserve in the Philippines. It's a very long way off. Um, uh, it is, there's a bit of everything out there, actually. Basically, just, there's no landmasses, really. You've got a ranger station out there.  

So you can do a liveaboard out there. How did I do it? I think I did a liveaboard in my twenties. So I was a long time ago. Um, but just lovely diving, healthy diving. Um, uh, and as I said in the book, kind of just expect anything to happen. You sh you shoot macro, but you don't want to shoot macro in case there's a wow shark behind you.  

My brother had that exact same story. Um, he, he lived based in the Philippines for some, some periods. I, and he, um, he had a well shot couple when he was photographing on the wall. Um, no, he was trying to, someone else was photographing on the wall and he was the little guy pointing it out for him. And all of a sudden the turn around was a whale shark, almost tapping him on the shoulder.  

So yeah. And the Philippines is um, there's a few Philippines locations in the book, but Subataha is a must. How are you doing that?   

Matt Waters: Um, I've charted the boat with, um, Astor Liverboards.   

Todd Thimios: Awesome.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. So if you know anyone who wants a spot, I think I've got three spots left.   

Todd Thimios: Okay, tomorrow, what am I looking at for, um, and allow and allow in the Philippines as well.  

Yeah, that was an interesting one to touch on, um, blackwater diving. Have you, have you doubled with? Yeah, how   

Matt Waters: did you get on with it?   

Todd Thimios: Uh, I did it kind of, I feel like I did it when it wasn't a thing, like years ago. Um, I think maybe it was, well, obviously it was a thing, but I wasn't like wise up about it.  

And since then it kind of blew up and I've just seen like, this is a really cool thing that I'd love to try. Um. I might have, I might have, from memory, done like a bonfire dive instead, when it was, same story I love, it was in my 20s doing it there. Um, but it looks incredible, man, like, so, I like, I remember Antelada well, so close to the, like, you got, you're only diving right off the coast there.  

It's kind of a confined environment, where it's pretty calm all the time, deep water, and just the concept of stuff that comes up, um, and there's some amazing blackwater photographers out there now.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, I've seen, um, Who was it, the latest one, uh, Alex, uh, Alex Terrell, he's, he's just been, in fact, he was diving in, um, the Similans, did some blackwater diving in the Similans, posted some photos yesterday.  

I think it was in there. Fabulous. Yeah. Yeah. You got Don, Don Silcock doing it as well. He's enjoying it.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. You probably can't go wrong. If you've got deep water and like a calm sort of environment, right, I'd love, I would like to, um, from doing the research, like really learning about it for the book, I would love to have a dedicated blackwater trip.  

And that's why I chose it as like an introduction to Blackwater photography.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, I had, um, I had an introduction to it in Ambon and, um, it was, it was an introduction from the staff there and excellent staff. However, you know, I'm, I, at the time on that trip, I had a, uh, a compact with me, a G7X. So it was having real difficulty trying to focus in the water.  

Um, I'd like to. Do it again, but with the bigger camera and, and, and crack on with it in proper fashion with a bit more, a bit more guidance, I think, on how to achieve the goal.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, I think, I think that's why I say it'd be good to do a dedicated, um, sort of blackwater trip, because I think your instructor or your dive guide would definitely have a new on learning so much quickly than he would by himself, because even like little things of like, um, your point of reference, you know, I'm sure I would kind of just like drift away, but kind of get.  

Not vertigo, but sort of lose my orientation pretty quick. Um, yeah, but just like look like this so alien. Like, hey, I'm just a factor It's crazy in it. He's insane. Yeah, that little guy's probably too sunny or something   

Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: I'm photographing macro when you're static on a, on a, on the ground.   

Matt Waters: Now do it while drifting at night time.  

Todd Thimios: While drifting at night time, um, the Pacific, we can, we can go into the Pacific as much as you like.   

Matt Waters: What's, what's your, what's your favorite bit in the Pacific then? Tell me about that. Well, I   

Todd Thimios: can touch on Palau that I went back to, um, this year, sorry, last year, um, I went back to Palau for the first time in probably 10 years in September, August, September.  

And, um, loved it, man. I thought, I went out for, um, just sort of to promote it to Palau Tourism because they, it's actually, they, they just got direct flights with, um, Nauru Air out to, um, from Brisbane to, um, Couture, but I think, I think it stopped straight away, and I think Qantas, I think Qantas is taking it over, which is good, as they probably do, they probably watch the small players attempt something and not last, and then jump in.  

Um, But I went there from a point of view to promote it and just loved it now because what I saw was the effects of conservation in action like, you know, lots of these locations around the world have good goals or, but they haven't had the test of time to sort of show what a long period of conservation does.  

It went up just healthy. There's just a lot of fish there. And the best thing about LAU is if you could time it around spawning event, which we didn't, we, we originally had, um, spawning. Maybe it was No, it was it something else. Something um, par. I dunno.   

Matt Waters: They, they were like snapper spawning and stuff like that.  

I   

Todd Thimios: think it was Snapper because what happened is we went for Snapper plane got canceled 'cause of Naru Air and um, we went on the next flights, which means we missed, we missed this morning. But we were for the, there for the buildup because they got spawning like full moons and new moons like all the time.  

We were there for the buildup of us spawning for the, for the grow up. And it's just grow up everywhere man, like they weren't spawning as such, like moving around actively. They were like dolently just getting ready. It's like, you know, coral trout, we call them here in Australia. They're just, it's incredible.  

So many.   

Matt Waters: Did you, um, did you notice a significant difference between 10 years ago and last year?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. I just felt it totally. I just felt like it was just. It was somewhere where you, where you would take somebody to show them how beautiful the underwater world is, because it was just vibrant, it was vibrant, it was full of fish, and I feel like 10 years ago, um, it just was good, but I don't, I wasn't, wasn't raving about it to other places, like, to other people, sorry, that had to go there, but now I just feel like it's just somewhere they have to go, and particularly when I, and you, the funny thing is you used to have to, from Australia, you had to go, I'm gonna stuff this up, I think it was like Taipei, Taipei, Guam, Lao maybe?  

Um, so, so now we did six, uh, five and a half hours to get to tour from Brisbane. So that was just like, that was as close as Bali was or something. So,   

Matt Waters: yeah, yeah, that's it. I mean, Bali for us is like nine hours, I think.   

Todd Thimios: And if you forget about the conservation of it all, like naturally it's stunning. It's just got the, the rock, the rock islands, um, jellyfish lake, well, actually there was no jellyfish in jellyfish lake.  

That was the one, that was the one down point of, um, comparing it to 10 years ago, 10 years ago, it was.   

Matt Waters: So there's nothing there now?   

Todd Thimios: Nah, it was empty. I heard   

Matt Waters: rumours that it had come back.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, there was nothing at all as of, um, 6 months ago.   

Matt Waters: Right.   

Todd Thimios: I think they had a drought 12 months prior, maybe? I think, I can't, couldn't really get to the bottom of it, but um, I remember for memory's sake it was going off 10 years ago, like, it was just, yeah, but not this time.  

Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah.   

Todd Thimios: So yeah, Palau, absolutely couldn't recommend enough. Nice wrecks, um, What else? I went to Tonga straight after, um, Blaeu on that same trip. Um, came home for a few days, changed the camera gear, changed the clothes and went back to Tonga.   

Matt Waters: Mate, tell me, tell me about Tonga. It's, it's, it's so close and it's so on my hit list and I wanted to go and then COVID hit.  

Tonga's the best. It's funny because I   

Todd Thimios: thought it was a little off Tonga, but I was just, I just knew it was popular. I knew it was this destination that, well, just, I, because a lot of Australians, like, a lot of Australian photographers just go to AirBnB. I think it must have got saturated with imagery of whales and clear water that it, it coasts through.  

But I had been to Tahiti a few times to, to experience, um, humpbacks in the Pacific. But, um, a good friend, Scott Patelli, he invited me over, um, this year and it is just, I don't know, what I was thinking, why was I putting it off, I don't know, it was just incredible. Like, crazy, crazy clear water, whales that are, and you can, whales that are, just, the behaviour is so close, um, mothers and calves, excited escorts, heat rungs.  

Everything. Breachings. Um, and I think if you time your trip differently throughout the season, you get different behavior as well. But we had a lot of um, mothers and cut offs. And yeah, that wonderful combination of crazy clear water, um, whales up close, and just um, engagement. I want to go every year for the rest of my life.  

And the other thing about it is it's Tonga. Tonga is just so beautiful. The people are beautiful man. It's, it's a, it's a paradox, it's a very special box.   

Matt Waters: What's, what's the best way to do it then, would you, um, would you offer that you find your accommodation and your, your snorkelling, um, operations separately?  

Todd Thimios: No, I think you could go about it in many ways, but I think you'd struggle with that. I think a lot of, um, operators provide accommodation. So I think you need to find an operator. I didn't meet anybody, I don't know of people that would go there first for the, for accommodation and start looking for an operator.  

I think you'll want to work out your operator first, um, and then, um, the operator as a package they would, they would include the, um, the accommodation. Um, for our listeners, Scott Portelli is the man, I have to say that, I have to give him a plug. He's been doing it, um, he's an Australian, as most people would know, he's a, an incredible Australian photographer that's been, um, going out there for, let's say 20 plus years, longer than most people, and, um, he's got dialed in, and he's He's got trips and accommodation and everything and obviously just knows how it works.  

Matt Waters: Pick me up mate, I'd love to have a chat with him.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, you guys should chat because Isn't it? Yeah.   

Matt Waters: Hey folks, Tonga and those amazing whale encounters. How awesome do they sound? Well, if whales are your thing, how about joining me for an unforgettable dwarf minke whale adventure on Australia's Great Barrier Reef.  

This July, I will be on board the MV Argo with just 12 lucky guests, alongside two phenomenal co hosts. World renowned underwater photographer, Naughty Cam and Mara's ambassador, Nicholas Remy. founder of the Underwater Club and local Great Barrier Reef expert Martin Connolly, founder of Scuba IQ. This is a once in a lifetime trip with the incredible wildlife, expert guidance and epic photography opportunities.  

Spots really are limited, so check out the details in the show notes and book now before they're gone.   

Todd Thimios: Sorry, the next page I had here was the Coolidge in Vanuatu. Have you, um, have you Oh yeah,   

Matt Waters: go for it. We were, we, Ja and I were gonna go and do it. And again, it was one of those that got kiboshed when Covid kicked off.  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a really interesting, I, I, it's, it's, it's right here. Like the beno Arts is so, is a very easy, accessible, um, location for Australians. And I did my, I went over there as a 21-year-old dive master and did six months in . It was my first time. As a dive professional, of course, so I ended up being a dive guide in Port Vila and then later on the Coolidge here, um, in Santo, so I've got a nice sort of sentimental bond with it, um, but I did my first return trip, uh, two years ago, um, to photograph the wreck for the book, because 20 plus years ago I didn't have any photographs of the wreck, but, um, man, it's just, it's wild, it's wild to see that it's one of the best wreck dives in the world.  

It's wild. And even if you're not a rink diving person, it's just not your thing, um, it's a must do. It's a shore dive. Um, so yeah, just, just, I'll break it down from the sort of, from the beginning. It's Um, Santos, uh, the largest island in, second word, largest island in, um, Vanuatu, it's the northern island, um, and during the war, the, the Americans ran out of battleships and they decided to, um, modify cruise ships by putting artillery and everything else all over, um, cruise ships and then to bring them into action for the war.  

So you've got yourself a, a ship that's got Um, ballrooms and sort of spiral staircases and, um, nice sort of ceramic artworks and whatnot. And then it's got cargo holes, it's got, um, machine guns and everything, it's got military toilets, like all lined up in a row, that sort of stuff, so it's a, it's the best of both worlds.  

And then, what happened is it just, um, was coming into, uh, the canal right in, um, canal? Yeah, right in, in, um, in Santo there, in the capital, and, um, hit one of its own lines. That was meant to be for Japanese submarines, I think. So the captain just ran out of the ground. Um, I think everybody got off apart from the captain.  

I think one person died. It could have actually, I think it might've been the captain. I'm not sure. Um, so you got yourself an incredible shore dive, which is this 200 meter long wreck that starts in 20 meters of water and it slopes down to 70. And you could, you   

Matt Waters: could spend an age on that. Couldn't you?  

Todd Thimios: Well, I mean, the dive guides dive every single day of their life. I don't know, but you just, you can dive it. Forever, over and over and over. It's stunning, and it's, and it's deep enough, it's probably a really good introduction to deep diving, to a lot of people, because you tend to like, find yourself going deeper and deeper all the time.  

Um, and you know, as you dive deeper, it becomes the main, um, focus is the fact that you're deep, so you're thinking differently, you're acting differently, you're learning about narco, narco, ah sorry, narcosis as well. Um, it's awesome. Uh, what I was going to say, probably my hot tip, do a night dive. Yeah, I'm, I've, I'm not a big night diver.  

I don't like dive whenever it's recommended, but I'm probably done by the time it gets to night time. The best thing about, um, diving in the Coolidge at nighttime is flashlight fish. It is, um, it's just flashlight fish are your little cardinal fish. Um, they're probably, um, probably an inch long and they have a little neon blue, um, flicking light behind their eye.  

And they're a firefly of the sea. Okay. So you've got Um, schools of this colour of fish, they're just flicking off, on, off, on, off, on, on, like that. And they silhouette stuff. So you do the typical job, go down the torches, see where you're going, sit down, turn everything off, wait for 10 minutes, see your first one, see your second one, all of a sudden you've just got a thousand glowworm fish all around you, it's insane.  

Matt Waters: Beautiful.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, it's very trippy.   

Matt Waters: And you did, you say you did six months there?   

Todd Thimios: When I was, yeah, 21, well, I did, um, I did a bit of time in Port Vila as a dive guide and then, um, dive master, dive guide, and then, um, on the Coolidge somehow just ended up, well, that's the main business there, but I ended up doing a little bit of guiding on it too, which.  

I didn't take people too far because it's, you think about it, it's like, it's like the fare star, right? You're going to get lost in the fare star when it's on the surface, let alone on the water.   

Speaker 4: So I'm going to be   

Todd Thimios: doing a bit of guiding pretty much on the exterior of the, of the boat.   

Matt Waters: Oh, it is.   

Speaker 4: Yeah.  

Matt Waters: There's a, um, Kevin, Kevin Green. He, he was, he lived in Vanuatu and. I think he owned one of the dive shops there for many years. Aqua, no,   

Todd Thimios: Aqua, Aquamarine? Is that right?   

Matt Waters: Oh, it might have been it, yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, there used to be two operators in, um, in Santo. Now there's one called, um, Pacific Dive. But, but, um, yeah, Alan Powell, he was a, he was a famous guy too.  

Yeah. He, um, he was like the, the godfather of the Coolidge, I think he was, the nickname at one stage, yeah? He's just an old fella that kind of, I think he, I think he sort of brought diving to, to the, to the area.   

Matt Waters: Now, Toofie? That's where I ran the dive operations. Wow. Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: I wanted to put Sufi in there because I knew I wasn't as known as much as other locations, you know, in New Guinea.  

I just felt like, because, plus the top side of the, of the fjords they have there, what they call them fjords, they're Rias, I think, Rias?   

Matt Waters: Rias, yeah. Um. I was fortunate enough to be, um, employed there and given a free reign to go off and explore as well when there was no customers. So I don't know, there's several reefs that I found there and, and named the local villagers names.  

Yeah. Well, to be honest as well, Tufi, um, in fact, Master Liverboards took me on board, uh, 2019 to, uh, to, to bring their boat into Papua New Guinea and show them where to dive. Cause they'd never been there. And, um, we went all over the place, went up into regions of the Star Reef that were, you know, by off the charts and nothing I found.  

Nothing compared to the outer reefs of   

Speaker 4: Tufi.   

Matt Waters: The reefs there are, you know, some of them come up to breach the surface by half a metre and they plummet down to 90 metres plus. But they're massive. You know, a couple of the reefs are half a kilometre by three quarters of a kilometre and just phenomenally beautiful.  

It's, it's an insane location.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, I, I, my brother, my brother was based as a, um, art there for a long time. Was he Tropic Air? No, he was Heli Lift.   

Matt Waters: Ah, okay. I'm actually, I'm going out there next January, end of January, with, um, Nicholas Remy. Okay. Um, yeah, taking him out there so he can have a look at the location.  

We're gonna spend a couple of weeks and just, um, invite people to come along and do it as a mini exped. Because I, I'm one of the few that are a regular diver of the Blackjack as well. Okay.   

Todd Thimios: So you're looking after two feet.   

Matt Waters: May I done, I've done over a thousand dives in 2v11. Ah,   

Todd Thimios: there you go. Definitely, that's good.  

Matt Waters: Much like you were saying earlier on about Lord Howe, if I hadn't of left 2v when I had, I think I'd still be there now. Just get drawn into it.   

Todd Thimios: Did you get off to be much? Was there like a rotation of sorts where you could quiet time and get away or, or, uh,   

Matt Waters: Nah, I had, I had two trips where I went to Port Moresby.  

Yeah. And that was just to get away. One, one was when I was feeling a bit crook and the other one was when I got a leg infection. So I had three, three days away each time to Port Moresby and that was it.   

Todd Thimios: Chasing through time, a thousand dolphins, I love   

Matt Waters: it. Yep. Yeah, but I was, I was in me, in me element, you know, I was getting really good food.  

Yeah.   

They were shipping in bottles of whiskey for me, so I'd never run out of whiskey. And, uh, at the time I was a smoker as well, and all the P& G boys were smokers. Yeah. You know, I'd sit out the front with them and have a smoke and a yarn, and we'd go diving the next day and just take people diving.  

That's the perks   

Todd Thimios: of being a dive ma dive master in a, in a pond that you're very familiar with. Hey, that's kind of my time in, in, in uh, Lord Howe Island that we were talking about before. Just knowing how it works, knowing that you've got a window of like, you can get back in the water or whatever it might be, or.  

Matt Waters: Lord Howe actually intrigues me immensely. Oh, sweet. And uh, reading those bits in your book about it as well. It's just. It looks phenomenal and I've got a really good friend here who, he's not a diver, but he's been to the island and snorkeled and he just can't stop raging about it.   

Todd Thimios: I don't know how it's not, like it gets compared to like the Galapagos of the South Pacific but I'm sure that sort of terminology gets thrown around a lot with, no matter where you go.  

It deserves a lot of praise for its natural beauty, um, I think it gets called the southern most tropical reef in the world, um, if not definitely Australia. But it's got this really good blend of tropical and temperate species together on top of volcanic structure. And it's just unique. Like it just kind of looks, because you've got this volcanic structure which is like swim throughs and caves and everything else, and then you've got like grasses and algaes with coral mixed through it.  

Um, it's very special. And then, um, it's very Jurassic Park kind of um, Land, you know, lost in time kind of vibes. Like, have you heard about Ball's Pyramid to the south of, um, Lord Howe?   

Matt Waters: I read a bit in your book about it. Yeah,   

Todd Thimios: that's, so the highest sea stack in the world. So you got a 600 meter high, um, Shark's Den.  

And it's just this pure, sort of, really narrow, um, volcanic structure, which is just like a shark's den. And, um, it's, I think it's 16 nautical miles south of the island. And it's just huge, and it just, it's just got clouds that hang off it, birds swir uh, swirling all around it. You've got heaps of um, wildlife that only nests on the is on that rock, and then, you know, migrates to Japan and whatnot.  

Um, there's a stick insect called the phasid, which is the biggest incident endemic stick insect to that rock now, because it used to be, it used to be on the island as well until rats kind of did their thing. Um, so, yeah, and the diving is just, diving's beautiful. It's really, really special. It's um, you get a lot of sort of endemic species underwater as well.  

And a lot of stuff kind of, for some reason you get a lot of, a lot of sort of tropical species or temperate species that kind of excel where they don't in other environments so they become like more of a major player. Um, and Lord Howe, which is really interesting, Kingfish, the yellow, um, yellow kingfish.  

That's the main, the sort of fighting fish there. Yeah. Um, it's just like really, it's just too big mountains, big lagoon, um, a lot of crazy people.  

There's not a very big population there. Um, I think numbers must change a lot now, but it sort of sits around sort of four or 500, maybe. When I was there it was 350 so, it's probably 400, 450 locals, and then you're no more than a thousand tourists at one time.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, and they're, um Correct me if I'm wrong, but is it Lord Howe that's got, um, its own, like, endemic species on top of the highest point within the, the, the jungle there or something?  

Todd Thimios: There's, uh, there's a cloud forest on top of the, um, there's like a, what is it called, like a moss forest, I think it's called, like a, there's like a, so you've got, like, kind of, Mount Gower is the highest mountain there, you can climb up, you can climb to the top of Mount Gower. Um, and yeah, there's just, there's um, there's different mosses there, different ferns, there's um, the kentia palm, which is a palm tree that was exported all around the world and clan does the best indoor palm in the world, hails from um, North, sorry, Lord Hatholm.  

Um, so yeah, there's heaps of endemic, um, plant life. There's, the birds, the birds are like just untamed. Yeah. Like you can call them down from the sky, as crazy as it sounds. There's some difference. There's a letter. Yeah, there's a Providence Peg Shop, um, where certain times of year you can just clap your hands and scream out loud and catch them.  

What? You don't want to catch them, you're not supposed to catch them, but they do come down to, they come down to.   

Matt Waters: They just come down for a hug.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, they come down for a bit of TLC. That's fabulous. Yeah. Well, you have to, man. It's, it's, uh, it's incredible. And there's, um, there's a young fella there, Aaron, who's a lifelong old friend.  

He runs a dive shop now. Yeah. Where did he go at? Sorry. They're a lot of the pro divers. It's called, um, Lord Howe Divers, I think it's called. And, um, yeah, it's the only dive shop in the island and they're killing it. They're doing really well.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I'd love to get them on my website as well.  

One of the things that I'm doing with it is not only liveaboards and resorts, but I want to promote dive shops and dive ambassadors. People that are doing their own thing, you know.   

Todd Thimios: Oh, that'd be fascinating. Um, that'd be really enjoyable for both of you guys.   

Matt Waters: Yeah, nah, tip top. Um, alright, well, what about, um, in fact, Maldives?  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, I'd love more. I've been there a lot, mate. You've been there a few times, haven't you? Yeah, all over the place. Yeah, Bar Atoll. Bar Atoll is obviously a win for the Mantis. Um, Fumula, down south for different sharks as well. But um, oh, you there? Sorry. But um, yeah, Bar Atoll's incredible for your Mantis. I think that's one of the, one of the highlights I've had for sort of um, How do you classify that?  

Well, big mantra experiences anyway. Uh, I had the chance to be there for a month on a, um, one of the resorts, photographing for them. And, um, that was really cool to see the lead up once again to your full moons and new moons and how to sort of plan to. It became, um, prolific during that, that time and then your, your mantis, where you have like a couple of mantas, you had good days and bad days, and then get close to those Forloons and just go off.  

Matt Waters: Is that where you got the, like, the imagery for that, that manta trains. Yeah,   

Todd Thimios: so that was, that was really special because, um, have you done it down there, Soren?   

Matt Waters: No, not yet.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, it's, it's, um, the manta train is rad because you can't, can see it happening because you've got. This little Hanifaru Bay is kind of like this small, it's hard to get, uh, a judgement of how big it is because it's, you know, it's all flat everywhere in the Maldives, but um, it's just like a, how do I call it, like a, like a sand bank has created like a small bay, um, so you've got this small bay, and it's sort of, it's like concentrated plankton there, so the mantas, um, yeah, as they sort of become more prolific in one setting, they start to create like, um, train formations, and And it's all about helping the manta behind them.  

It's all about the efficiency of feeding. They all kind of create this sort of train effect and it just looks so rad, them coming towards you and then, you know, backflipping and once again the whole backflip is about how do I get maxo plankton in minimal, minimal, uh, efficiency. But the cool thing with, uh, with the manta trains is you start to have like a manta train and then eventually if you have enough there, um, the manta train can get quite long that it kind of links up to its tail.  

And it comes, they call it a cyclone. It's just this mess of melters just going everywhere.   

Matt Waters: Beautiful.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. It's really cool.   

Matt Waters: Does it, um, is it, is it, uh, the bay itself? Is it, does it get a bit hectic with the old tourism?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, cause yeah, you've got a number of, I mean, you're going to have a lot of operators there.  

Um, but they do come from different islands and I think liveaboard boats obviously do it too. Um, but they've got like a ranger and the ranger is on one of the boats. His, his job is to monitor how many people are in the bay at any one time. Um, he doing his job on there?  

Then somebody there and that they're aware that, um, well the main things by traffic, um, you, you, you got a surface mammal that's, um, that's, uh, easily just gets, you know, thin chops, propeller chop, if you wanna call it. So yes.   

Matt Waters: I'll tell you, I wanted to ask you about, um, Fuva Mala as well.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, all sorts of, yeah, they, they, they, um, tigers is a big thing.  

Did you see that tiger footage recently down there?   

Matt Waters: The what, sorry?   

Todd Thimios: Did you see the tiger shark footage recently down there?   

Matt Waters: Um, which bit? The,   

Todd Thimios: uh, there was, uh, footage of the, um, tiger shark. The   

Matt Waters: guy, the guy getting a bit of a chomp?   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, getting a head massage.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. I don't know anything   

Todd Thimios: about it, I just saw it, I just saw it recently.  

I was like, that's not a good look, is it?   

Matt Waters: Ha ha ha. No. Well, it was, um, see it, the reason I wanted to ask about it was because it's obviously come on the radar more and more popular over the last 3, 4, 5 years. Um, so I wanted to, uh, pick your brains and see if it's got as heck as it.   

Todd Thimios: I've, uh, I only went there briefly.  

Um, and it was pretty controlled. Uh, we saw hammerheads, I think we saw, I saw a Mako on the Mako or Thrasher. Thrasher in the shot, in the distance. Um, but I know, like, I kind of, like, I kind of flew in, flew out for it, it was with the, with the superyacht thing, so I kind of was, I don't want to sound like an expert on it because I did it briefly from like a touch and go kind of thing,   

Speaker 4: but   

Todd Thimios: that was before it seemed to be getting more and more popular now, and now it's, I think it comes back to the, sort of the discussion of shark feeding, right, um, where the, where one's place is, I don't really know how to, I think shark feeding has its place in a controlled environment, but if it's happening day in, day out, I don't know, Um, with too many punters, you know, someone's gonna be in the wrong place at the wrong time, obviously, as well, so, yeah, it's a tricky one to add, but I think, historically, it was also, um, Fumula was a, they had like a fishery, right, like chittering,   

Speaker 4: so, it's   

Todd Thimios: still, it's got a history with kind of the congregation of bigger predatory sharks, so.  

Matt Waters: Yeah,   

Speaker 4: yeah.   

Matt Waters: So, um, of your, I've got to ask, of your book, um, no. Of, of your life as Todd the diver, what's, what's been your most exciting and exhilarating location?   

Todd Thimios: I mean, Norway has, has its, uh, has its, its effect on me. I think that's been something that's, um, that's definitely, um, can't dismiss. Maybe I can talk about something else because I've talked about that a   

Speaker 4: lot.  

I had a funny feeling you would say that one.   

Todd Thimios: Lord Howe's going to be a close second as well, just because of sentimental reasons of kind of like bring so much time in there, same as yourself with two feet. Um, but I can't also, I can't dismiss like, I grew up in Kansas when I was, when I was younger. So I've had a lot of experiences out there and also, um, I've included the, uh, far North River Reefs, um, Australia Reef and stuff like that.  

So like we haven't, that's, that's incredible diving out there. It's, it's very, it's very sort of, um, open to the elements, but also if you put yourself in the right little coral garden, it's very fine and neat too, right? It's very just   

Matt Waters: perfect. May, I did it, um, a couple of years ago with Martin Connolly from Scuba IQ out of Port Douglas.  

Yeah. Um, he invited me along and I went with him for a trip for a week and I was, I was super impressed, you know, because as a, an outsider, you know, I've, I've, I've only been in Australia, what, seven years now. And as an outsider, you get told that the, the, the corals die in and it's all getting bleached off and it's shit, blah, blah, blah.  

But, um, I, I spent five nights up in the Ribbon Reefs and absolutely loved it. Especially, and I, much like you, I'm not a massive fan of night diving, but. I did a night dive and turned the light on and all of a sudden there's a gazillion sharks around you hunting for food. It's   

Todd Thimios: fabulous. The JT's are more dangerous.  

Oh   

Matt Waters: yeah.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. That's, that's an interesting one to have because I think you're right. It's like to, to touch on that quickly like, it does get a lot of bad press, the Great Barrier Reef. Um, and there's no denying it gets a very hard time too. Like it gets knocked around like crazy. It's a very fragile reef system.  

Um, it's very old too, so it's gone through a lot of adversity in the past, but the biggest takeaway is it's huge. You gotta be careful not to generalize, right? Like, I think, um, to just miss something straight away and say the Great Barrier Reef's not good or whatever, maybe some parts aren't as good as other parts, or maybe some parts have had a harder time lately than other places have, but um, everyone has to have to, everybody needs to dive Great Barrier Reef, different regions, but I need to, I, so I want to push the um, far north, I think the far north is.  

Um, down as well, really, and that's probably some of the more, you can argue, more fragile stuff too, because it's kind of more cyclone heavy, um, it's more tropical. It's not going to, it's going to sort of get the warmer temperatures as well, but um,   

Speaker 4: yeah.   

Todd Thimios: And then like the seamounts that, they're, they're incredible.  

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. Well, hopefully, uh, well I say hopefully, I'm actually planning to go back up there this July, uh, on, do the Minky trip. Yeah,   

Todd Thimios: I did, I did, um, I helped on a, on a crown of thorns research boat once, um, and the only reason I said I'd go on the boat because it was middle of winter and I knew that there's potential of seeing minkies, for one, but it wasn't the right kind of environment for me to go.  

You know what, I should have just waited for a dive trip, you know what I mean, like, it's like, can the photographer please get in the water, I know you guys are trying to work, trying to get rid of crown of thorns, but I want to go see minkie whales, but I don't know.   

Speaker 4: Awesome. Yeah, I know. Cool. Um,   

Todd Thimios: yeah, so I'm not sure that answered your question, mate, about the best, best pilot dive highlights.  

But, um, Well,   

Matt Waters: okay. I'll tell you what, then. Instead of the highlights, what's, what's the one location that is, is keeping a little ember burning in your soul that you want to go to that you've not hit yet?   

Todd Thimios: Um, there's a few in the book that I haven't put in the book because I don't want to bring too much attention to just yet.  

Speaker 4: Um,   

Todd Thimios: I would love to go back to the, to do a full loop of what we started looking about in the beginning. I'd love to get back to the Galapagos, um, because I just, cause I know it's super special and that scratches that little part of my brain that wants me to go back there. And if that, in that same conversation, Cocos Island as well, I'd love to go back to Cocos Island in Costa Rica, um, for the same reason.  

I did both trips in the same sort of route, um, on a, on a super yacht and, um, Just loved it, loved that part of the world. Love the big megafauna that comes outta there, big sharks, everything else. Um, I love the how just feels kind of not dangerous, but raw, you know, like it's, um, it's real diving.   

Matt Waters: Um, a little bit, it's a little bit off the beaten track from the mo the most, doesn't it?  

Todd Thimios: I think so. It's like, maybe it's for the diehards or the dedicated, I don't know, but kind of, um, yeah, I like the idea and I think, like we started talking about before, I like the idea of just sort of sitting and waiting. I know that those are the sites, those are the locations where. The rewards are the greatest for, for doing your time underwater.  

Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah. Yeah.   

Todd Thimios: That's probably a good answer. Yeah.   

Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right, mate. Well, I think, um, I think we'll round it off. So the book is going to be available start of February.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah. Start of February. Um, you can always just Google Ultimate Dive Slides or one named Todd Finneos, it'll, it'll pop up. Um, that's in a few different places, but the idea is that it's in all bookstores around Australia and overseas as well, Europe and, um, North America.  

Um, but yeah, the idea is that it's not too hard to find. So hopefully if I find it from my website, if you get lost or little and big bookstores like Amazon.   

Matt Waters: It is. Well, we'll stick all the links in the show notes and, um, people can find a way to, yeah, and if you get stuck, folks, just give me a shout and I'll point you in, in the direction of this legend and Todd's thanks for coming on the show, man.  

And you know, we, we tried a couple of times and wifi got in the way, but we got there in the end.   

Todd Thimios: Yeah, much appreciated. And that's been really, really fast. Hopefully we'll do it again soon. And I'll look forward to it. Senior person in, when's that, March?   

Matt Waters: Yeah, yeah, it's just around the corner now, isn't it?  

Todd Thimios: Yeah, it's too close.   

Matt Waters: I'll be doing   

Todd Thimios: some public speaking, so I'm not sure if I'm, if I'm wishing it to come sooner or later, I don't know.   

Matt Waters: You'll be fine, mate. You'll be fine. Awesome stuff. Thanks very much for coming on the show, man. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me. Thanks for listening, guys. Bye for now.