We finally have a bit of overcast weather, a very welcome relief from the scorching heat and humidity of the last few days. The ocean is flat like a lake and visibility has improved drastically. Current has picked up to a N – S, bringing in the cleaner water. Great diving conditions today.
Archive for January, 2010
At last some overcast weather
Tuesday, January 26th, 2010Raggies, raggies and more raggies
Monday, January 25th, 2010Can you believe we are nearing the end of January and we STILL have raggies on Chunnel and Raggie Cave with 1 lonesome raggie at Cathedral. This raggie seems to move around quite a bit and is not always there. We are extremely fortunate for the 2nd year in a row to have raggies here in summer time.
Calm Aliwal Shoal
Monday, January 25th, 2010These past few days Aliwal has been absolutely calm and flat seas prevail. Current is starting to pick up N – S inshore which will push in that purple blue crystal clean water so watch this space over the next few days as the viz improves.
Aliwal this weekend
Sunday, January 17th, 2010Well we STILL have 8 raggies at Raggie Cave, one large female and the rest juveniles. One female has a trace hanging out of the side of her mouth and is clearly very mature with the nice hump on her head. We had a small raggie on the northern small cave at Cathedral yesterday on our double tank dive in the afternoon. Lots of potato bass about and loads of nudibranchs. We had an awesome visit by a blacktip shark on our safety stop on the late afternoon 2nd dive yesterday. Diving has been superb with very clean visibility.
Excellent diving
Sunday, January 17th, 2010We did an afternoon double tank dive yesterday and an early morning dive today and we have had brilliant viz – around 20m. 24 degrees C bottom temperature and south – north current. Today, flat calm ocean conditions, current had dropped off to a mild south – north with surge on the reef. Still great viz and water temperature.
Manta rays the order of the day today
Monday, January 11th, 2010With a gusting south westerly on the surface and a mild, if anything north-south current, the ocean was a bit chopped up. This did not deter from awesome sightings today. 8 juvenile manta rays, mating nudibranches, spadefish, white tip reef shark, hawksbill turtle, potato bass and many, many more. Viz milky from 0 – 7m, after this it opens up to around 15m on the bottom.
Change in dive conditions
Monday, January 11th, 2010Today we had a gusting south westerly come through at around 8am, which chopped the ocean up somewhat, seeing that we had a buster of a north-easterly the day before. The flying N – S current moderated to almost nothing today on our dive to North Sands – Inside Edge. Viz was around 15m, water temperature cooled down again to 22 degrees C bottom temperature and 24 degrees C midwater temperature. Great skippering by Andrew with a bit of a grumpy ocean to contend with today.
Manta Rays, whalesharks
Saturday, January 9th, 2010When we say that Aliwal is cooking, we mean in all aspects. At least 30 juvenile manta rays have been spotted this past week, 2 whale sharks behind backline, raggies at Raggie Cave and Cathedral, turtles, potato bass at the cleaning station at Shark Alley and much, much more.
Aliwal Shoal update
Saturday, January 9th, 2010We have the most amazing diving here at Aliwal at the moment. Viz in excess of 30m, moderate N – S current and a water temperature of 24 degrees C. Whale shark sightings daily, at least 5 raggies at Raggie Cave and 5 at Cathedral and on a recent drift down south, we encountered at lest 30 juvenile manta rays. Aliwal is cooking!!!!!!!!