HOW ABOUT DIVING SOMEWHERE A BIT DIFFERRENT

Fiordland is one of those places where the diving and the scenery is so unique, you’ll think you were on another planet. Try ascending from a wall that drops off to well over 300 metres and look straight up a glacier formed rock face well over 300 meters above you.

Mike Moffet on a typical drop-off dive in Fiordland

July is the best time to dive Fiordland due to the settled weather patterns, it may be cold but it is well worth the visit. This years trip is to Doubtful Sound and is on the very comfortable vessel Affinity, dates 2nd to 6th of July. Cost is $1500.00 per person, plus air fills and transport into Doubtful Sound.

Congrat’s to Rick Kort of the Netherlands on completion of his PADI Advanced Open Water course.

Rick who just finished his Open Water in the Bay of Islands had a couple of good days diving with Nine and Andrea with dives completed on the Koi wreck, Fish Reserve and Long Island Marine Reserve.

Thanks for diving "Go Dive" Rick.

Brent

Phew…its a bit quieter now after a very hectic Christmas and New Years, there wasn’t a lot of time to put into reporting dives etc. Time to come up for a breath and let you know whats going on.

Good news is the water temp is up to 18 degrees in places, and the visibility has been good in the Inner Sounds. This week saw a full moon and some big tides, due to the water movement the current was quite strong on Cape Jackson and this created a bit of turbidity. We had some good dives out their this week, but vis was down to around 5 metres.

The Lermontov is suffering from the same fate, we actually cancelled trips this week to it due to the very low visibility, considering it not enjoyable and unsafe for guided groups. Hope she will clean her self up shortly.

The next couple of days are predicted to be windy, so looks like Inner Sounds diving until at least Tuesday.

There’s plenty happening all the same, any one wanting to do their Approved Air Fillers Ticket then we have a course on Monday. Contact me for more details.

cheers

Brent

Go Dive Marlborough

Other than the  excellent wrecks, Go Dive Marlborough has some really good cave and cavern dives. These cave systems are on the Eastern side of the Sounds and given the right conditions make for some excellent dives.

Cave exit

The diving in this area is quite different to the more often dived Western side of the Sounds, with more variety of kelp’s etc. The geology is also quite different due to the major fault lines that separate East from West, hence the formation of these cave systems.

Divers enjoy a cold beer as we depart the remains of New Zealand’s last Whaling Station, a regular stop off after our cave dive trips.

Photos courtesy Guy Drayton

For more info on diving these sea caves and fresh water caves in the region contact Brent at Go Dive Marlborough.

The Dive Team at Go Dive Marlborough wish you all the best for the new year.

Conditions on the Lermontov have been exceptional for this time of year, with 10 metres vis on the out side and up to 20 metres in some places on the inside. We have had back to back trips over the last week out to the Lerm and visited areas like the engine room, bars and restaurants. Sure has been nice.

Congratulations to Mark Turton who has just completed his Wreck course with us this week and also to Ammon Weiss and Margaret Davis on completing their Open water course. Well done.

There’s been an unusual visitor in the Sounds over the last 5 days in the form of a very large sun fish, its been given a few people a heart attack as it looks like a large shark when you first see its fin. Hope to get some photos of it, also been Orca in the Outer Sounds.

Looking a bit windy over the next few days, so we are taking a bit of a breather from Outer Sounds trips and concentrating on a few local trips.

 Cheers Brent