The Poor Knights Islands are about 15 miles from the New Zealand Coast. We left from the small picturesque northern harbor town of Tutukaka for the hour long ride. The islands are rocky, extinct volcanoes. They are covered with thick vegetation and have many natural features, including caves, tunnels, water spouts, sheer cliffs, and archways.

The origin of the name is said to derive from the islands' apparent resemblance to Poor Knight's Pudding, a bread-based dish popular at the time of discovery by Captain Cook. The late Jacques Cousteau rated Poor Knights as one of the top 10 best dive sites in the world, and the best subtropical dive site.

We spent two days and one night in this marine reserve. People are not allowed on the islands. The boat carried a divemaster, a skipper, and the clients - only two of us for this trip, so it felt like a private boat. We did a total of five dives. At night, the cloudless southern sky was filled with stars, and they appeared so close, you could touch them. The choppy water created challenges for me photographically speaking, but also made me seasick and sleepless at night. I also managed to injure my tailbone in my first entry to water, but did all I could to make the best out of the trip.

This gallery consists only photos on the surface of the water. Under the water and only in our memory and dive log, we saw demoiselles, blue maomaos, a black spotted grouper, long tailed sting rays, snappers, morey eels, red moki, trevally, king fish, leather jackets, scorpion fish, black angel, wrasses, many colorful sponges, and oh, kelp forest!