With Autumn well and truly here and the days cooling down, the time has come to shake the dust off the drysuit. In fact last weekend was my first dive in my trusty Otter for quiet a few months, and I must say it is nice to arrive back on the boat dry and warm. But in saying that the water temp is still up around 16 degrees so still comfortable in a good wetty so don’t be put off.

Sunrise on the road into the Lermontov Lodge Port Gore

Go Dive has had a couple of recent trips to the Lermontov, the recent last weekend where we had some very nice weather and improving visibility. Lydia run a PADI Advanced Openwater course over the weekend and has a Rescue course due to start this Thursday. We are still running regular trips every week and have a three dayer over Easter. Over the winter I have scheduled regular weekend trips and hope to do a D’Urville Island trip sometime in July. Remember visibility is better during the winter and with a warm Lodge and hot shower to arrive back to after a days diving it makes for some good times.

With the Rugby World Cup not to far away now, I am expecting busy start to the season as visitors travel up and down to the games, fortunately we managed to retain a few of the lost Christchurch games in the main land and with the Russian rugby team staying in Blenheim it will be a good  opportunity for diving visitors from Russia to dive the Lermontov.

safe diving

Brent

Finally a weekend off from being out at Port Gore, funny though the weather has been perfect for over a week and conditions all round are well worth splashing for.

My plan was to dry-off a bit, as I have  been getting a bit super saturated lately. But as always, my plan of a relaxing week didn’t quite eventuate as Lydi come down with the flue and I helped out with some training.

Congratulations to Drew Laslett from Christchurch who completed his openwater course with Go Dive last week, we also started a PADI Openwater course over the weekend as well as running a couple of DSD’s. Thomas Frech from Switzerland enjoyed his DSD so much he come back this week to continue on with his PADI Open water course. I splashed for the first time yesterday at Karaka Point in probably 2 years, and surprisingly really enjoyed my dive and revisit to the wreck of the Vara. It just goes to show that you should never overlook those dive sites close to home.

On Feb 25th Guy Drayton contributed to a blog, writing about his dive through the restaurant off the Mikhail Lermontov and fulfilling his dream of recovering a keep-sake from the wreck.  Guy is sad to say that after surviving a ship wreck and 26 years underwater, the two pieces he recovered didn’t survive the Christchurch earthquake. Luckily though Guy, Chrissie and his hound Bell are all well, with no structural damage to their house, Guy explaining that he was one of the lucky ones. We will just have to get you back into the restaurant next time your up Guy for some replacements.

It’s been a very distressing time for most Kiwis lately as we all knew someone or were directly involved in the quake in Christchurch. But to see those images in Japan of the Tsunami and the complete devastation is just unbelievable. Mother nature can never be taken for granted and we should all give her the respect she deserves. Our thoughts are with all those who are affected by all these events. It’s going to take  quite a while for the memories of these disasters to fade.

NEW GENERATION WING AVAILABLE AT GO DIVE SOON

On the lighter side here is an image taken from a 1972 issue of Dive South Pacific magazine. Quite cool looking through the pages of these magazines and seeing faces of 40 years ago. Keep an eye out for more blasts from the past in future Blogs.

I have set dates now for trips out to October, remember winter is a good time for clear water. Check out the calender on the club page or live-a-shore page.

Safe diving

Brent

Go Dive

Go Dive now have available a set of three Lermontov slates designed to be taken along on your dive and that will fit in the standard log binder..

One is of the outside of the wreck, given her statistics like length, beam etc, the other is of the three most interesting decks the Boat deck, Lounge deck and Bridge deck, while the third is a dive log slate that is designed to show decompression schedules etc. The set cost $18.00 or can be brought individually for $7.00 each.

The slates are a great help in navigating the wreck, especially if your new to it, they add safety to your dive as you can find your way back using reference points to the mooring lines and will increase your understanding of the wreck, making for a more enjoyable dive.

They can be brought from the Go Dive shop in Picton or at the Lermontov Lodge in Port Gore.

Dive Shack Sterling were down for a 3 day trip over the weekend. The conditions topside were a bit sloppy due to a northerly weather pattern, vis on the wreck was a bit average but inside it was very nice. 

The guys meet their goals of visiting the Leningrad restaurant and crews mess and set some new goals for their next trip down. Being able to progressively penetrate the wreck is by far the most rewarding and safest way of doing it, with a number of this group having dived it now close to 100 times previously. Having the right training, kit and attitude also helps and the first two being obtainable through PADI or TDI wreck and advanced wreck training.

Next year Go Dive will be fully focused on continuing to provide a memorable and top notch service out at the Lermontov Lodge, our retail operation in Picton will be down scaled to accessories only, with larger items being ordered on demand at internet competitive rates. Stock like wetsuits, BCD’s regs etc will be cleared out over the next few months at really competitive rates, so if your in need of a new wetty or kit give me a call on 0800GODIVE and see what we have to offer.

1000m Astina watches for sale $225.00 each (new)

Remember to that even though we are into the end of our summer the water stays warm right through to end of May and the vis will improve as the plankton’s have done their thing. I have posted dates for regular monthly trips on the home page right through to October so no excuses not to splash.

safe diving

Brent

Congratulations to Liz and Tim who just completed their PADI wreck course with me on the Lermontov. Both are from the UK and were visiting NZ to attend a friends wedding in Marlborough and then visit other parts of the country.

Over the two days of the course we completed four dives, starting off with an orientation dive along the wreck, identifying potential hazards and points of entry. This was followed by mapping exercises and an introduction to deploying a wreck reel, followed by a penetration dive through the pool and winter gardens areas.

On completion Liz and Tim commented on how this was the most enjoyable course they had completed to date and how doing it on a wreck like the Lermontov was so educational. Thanks Liz and Tim for training with Go Dive.

In my last blog Guy wrote a piece on his artifact recovery from the wreck. Collecting artifacts from the wreck is done in a very controlled manner and we only encourage those with the correct training and equipment to attempt this. Go Dive also has a voluntary exclusion zone on where artifacts can be collected from, discouraging collection from  the recreational diving zone.

Guy and his treasures collected from the Lermontov

For those keen on wreck diving doing the wreck course, followed by the Adv Wreck course can be very rewarding and teach skills you just won’t get during normal recreational courses.

Safe diving

Brent

It’s certainly been a week that I hope is never repeated.

With the 2nd major earthquake in 7 months hitting my home city Christchurch and many family and club members directly effected, I have felt helpless sitting in front of the TV watching the rescue teams and public try to help those in need. My heart goes out to those effected and truly hope things get back to some sort of normality as soon as possible.

Guy, one of out regular club members from Christchurch and a good friend wrote this report about his trip to the Lermontov Lodge during the 25th anniversary week, although Guy and Wife Chrissie are ok, their house is trashed.

My eight year diving odyssey with GoDive ended on the weekend of the 25th anniversary of the sinking of the Mikhail Lermontov in success. Under the close eye of Brent McFadden, I finally made it to the Leningrad Restaurant to liberate a "Morflot" branded cup and a Champagne flute from their dark and silty hideout. A branded piece of china has been my goal all that time!

Hi everyone,

Brent and me just got back from a long weekend at the lodge. We had Jamie and Mel from Tech-dive NZ (who are also the Halcyon distributors for NZ) and Andreas with his wife Gabi, (a German couple living in Hong Kong who are the presidents of the South China Dive Club)staying from Fri until Tue(4 diving days). Then we had Craig one of our club members from Wellington staying from Fri until Sun, and Jan a German traveller was there from Sun until Tue. George went in and out over the weekend and I myself only went for the last day.

Everyone had a great time. The water temperature was 18C on the surface, 15C on the bottom. The visibility was averaging between 3 and 5 metres outside the wreck and up to 15m inside the wreck. Apart from one day of rain, the weather was pretty good, and especially the last day was absolutely stunning!

Mel and Jamie covered a fair bit of the Lermontov, diving on Twin tanks. They went to part of the wreck, where noone has been before and took some amazing photos, e.g. of this sign

The Anniversary of the sinking of the Lermontov is ahead now too, we have a few divers booked for a 4 day trip but also have a few spaces left. Feel free to just join us for a days or two too, we are quite flexible with the dates.  Just give us a ring or send us e-mail.

Save diving,

Lydi

We had a pretty busy weekend dive wise in Picton, for a change we didn’t have a Lermontov trip which made a change and gave me the chance to have a break and get a local dive in.

Lydia completed an openwater course on Saturday, the vis however in Waikawa left a bit to be desired, Nine had a Club dive out to the Koi and the Fish Reserve with Lavina trying out her new dry suit. The vis over the other side was a lot better than in Waikawa with it being round 6 metres and really warm, up to 18 degrees.

On Sunday Nine and I successfully searched for a mooring lost earlier in the month during storm, see my earlier blog. We found it in 39 metres of water. It had dragged well over 300 metres from its original position before the launch owners connected to it realized what was going on and cut it loose. The mission now is to get it back to its original position. Might need some really big lift bags.

KISS rebeather divers preparing to splash on the Lermontov

In the afternoon Nine took out another load of local divers to the Koi for a couple of nice dives. Today I am off to the Lodge with group, with the expectations of a nice days diving tomorrow, next weekend I have 5 days over their with some techy type divers one on a rebreather, so if your keen on a day or two and want to see how these rebreather thing’s work come along. We have a vehicle heading in Thursday night and Friday night, returning Sunday, Monday and Tuesday so plenty of options.

With the Rugby World Cup coming up in September/October this year we are expecting things to be pretty busy and off course this is the best time for visibility on the Lermontov, I will be scheduling later this week dives right through to October so keep an eye out for these. For those worried about the cold during winter, don’t s I will have 6 Otter Brittanics in rental this winter so you can enjoy some nice worm winter diving.

cheers

Brent

Go Dive

Hi, long time since I blogged, must be the time of year.

Things have been pretty busy over the last few weeks with much of my time spent over at the Lodge diving the Lermontov. The weather has been typical of a Kiwi summer, hot and dry and then torrential rain and wind, but at least we aren’t under water like much of Aussie.

The weekends weather looks pretty good with a brief southerly tomorrow followed by a  change to a nor-west, so Sunday is looking good for an Outer Sounds excursion. We have few club members coming up from earthquake city for a dive tomorrow and an openwater course finishing.

Congratulations to Manuel who finished his PADI Deep course week. Talking about training we now have access to Cuda DPV’s these are the real McCoy when it comes to scooters, Lance who is up from Queenstown is now running courses for those who want to learn how to use these machines. They are fast and a hell of a lot of fun, great for cave diving and wreck orientation dives . I hope to post some dates for a try-dive and course with these in the next week.

I am also working on scheduling a club dive out to Outer Islands like the Chetwodes etc soon so keep an eye out for that. We will soon have access to another boat capable of cruising at 25/30 knots so thees islands will be easily assessable for our Lodge in Port Gore.

There is still a couple of spaces left on our Lermontov  Anniversary week in Feb, we have a number of members coming up from Christchurch for this event, some happy to share travel costs if your keen on a ride or sharing costs in your car.

Have a great weekend and safe diving

cheers

Brent

Hi everyone 

We have another Club weekend planned for Feb 5&6 (2 days of diving), and if you want to extend, you can stay from 4-6 (4 days of diving!) We don’t have many divers booked yet, so sign up now to save your spot! Special price for Club Members, but non-club members and want-to-be-members are very welcome.

This is a perfect opportunity to imrove your experience and skills, to meet our old and new club members and other divers!

Call on 0800 463 483 or e-mail to info@godive.co.nz to find out more or make a booking.

Looking forward to hearing back from you.

Cheers

Lydia