A month out of the official end of Summer and aside from a day of rain, the weather has dished up some amazing local diving conditions with calm seas, little or no swell, amazing visibility and water temperature still sitting at 19 degrees for divers to enjoy.
Regular haunts have provided some amazing dives recently with much marine life and critters of all shapes and sizes out on show, everything from the tiniest of tiny Nudibranch through to massive Smooth Rays and Wobbegong sharks patrolling the shallows for their tucker.
The month of March has also seen interesting sightings of schools of 7 Gilled sharks patrolling in the deep blue at Rip Bank, schools of Tuna and Kingfish in the heads, and a somewhat large Great White chomping on a very large decaying seal carcass a couple of Km’s out from Barwon Heads.
Wreck dives have provided some amazing experiences with fabulous reports and photos from the J4 submarine through to the Milora in the ship’s Graveyard for those seeking rusty action.
From my end, things were clearing up for some diving opportunities just to be bowled over with a nasty bug that’s taking it’s sweet time to leave me alone and go and annoy someone else! Hopefully, it will all be done and dusted within the next week or-so.
FORTHCOMING SHOP CLOSURE
As we head into April we bump into another forthcoming holiday period, that of the Easter/Anzac day break, this break coincides with term school holidays and sees a massive exodus of people making the most of that last holiday break before Winter, hence it’s pertinent to let divers know that we will be closed over that period of time from 18 April (Good Friday) through to Anzac Day (25 April) and re-opening Monday 28 April.
POST SERVICING REGULATOR CARE
We pride ourselves on the level of quality that comes from servicing work performed on your regulators, we only ever use genuine service kits and parts and proprietary tooling to ensure a top-notch job, after all, your regs keep you alive underwater and that’s a responsibility that we take very very seriously.
Although we service and accept all brands of dive gear to service, our in-house service specialises on the more “High End” brands such as Scubapro, Halcyon and Apeks along with a few models of Aqualung regulators, the rest of the brands such as Oceanic, Mares, Cressi, Sherwood, Poseidon are done by our external technician who’s been working with us for over 20 years.
One of the things about the mechanical aspects of regulators is that more damage is done to them by not diving than actually diving, the second thing is that regulators work with high pressure coming out of a scuba tank, being reduced to an intermediate pressure going into the low pressure hoses and through to ambient pressure when it comes out of your second stage.
Every time you breathe in and out, you activate a bunch of springs that move what’s known as “knife edges” on and off a seat allowing gas to flow downstream to fill your lungs, these “knife edges” indent the seats and with use and work help the seat to bed itself in and in doing so, line pressures can and will fluctuate slightly from the time we tuned them on the service bench to the time where you finish your first dive post service (although we cycle the regulators ad-nauseum through simulated breathing cycles on a Magna Hellic machine, it’s just not the same as actually being underwater) – sometimes, the diver who knows his/her regs back to front will notice very slight changes in the breathing characteristics, this is normal on ALL regs, and at that point, we suggest that you bring them back to us for a re-tune.
This process only takes a few minutes and is part of our post service offer, it doesn’t cost you a single cent, but it’s just part of being perfectionists at what we do and how we do it. We always advise that you jump in for a shore dive post reg service to assist with the process required to bed the seats in, and should there be any issues, we’re able to address them there and then.
Don’t leave it until you’re on holidays overseas to undertake this process, do it here so that we can make sure that your regs are in prefect shape for your dive travels.
GOT A QUESTION? LET’S SEE IF WE CAN HELP!!!
A question we are often asked by dive club members when they have just joined the club or begun diving in Victoria where a car is pretty much essential to enabling diving is:
“What do I do with my car keys when I go for a dive?”
A very practical concern and question that is posed by almost every diver. Prior to the invention of electronic keys and push button start cars the solution was reasonably easy and may still apply if you have an older model car. However, for those with a newer model car that has an electric component to their key the answer is more complex. Below we will delve into some of the options available to divers:
- Some cars have 2 options for keys. The electronic key as well as a spare key which is just the metal part of the key without electronics. Some wetsuits have a little internal pocket where you can stow this metal key. On your diving day, leave your electronic keys at home, put your metal key in your internal wetsuit pocket. If you don’t have an internal wetsuit pocket, you can put the key on a chain and wear it like a necklace.
- Buy a “Dry box”. Put your key in there, take the dry box diving with you. See https://scubadiveshop.com.au/products/oring-sealed-dry-pod-black?_pos=1&_sid=0a7b98e2e&_ss=r
O-ring sealed Dry Box
- Buy a “Surf Lock” or other type of portable key safe. You then put your keys in there and then attach this to your car.
- Car pooling. In order to save car spaces at dive sites, petrol and therefore money, why not use the Scuba Culture Closed Facebook page to see if anyone wants to share a ride with you down to the dive site? Then only one of you will need to sort out the “key” issue and you might just make yourself a new dive buddy!
- If you are doing a boat dive with Scubabo. You can bring your keys and phone on board the boat. They have a dry box on the boat for you to store your valuables during the dive.
MAJOR DISCLAIMER! If someone wants to break into your car while you are diving – they probably will find a way. The above are simply ideas and methods we and other divers have used over the years. You will need to find the option that best suits your level of risk appetite and style of car!
MALTA – INFORMATION EVENING
Well due to demand and interest expressed in organising a dive trip to Malta – we have done just that. With bookings and enquiries coming in for our newly announced trip to Malta in 2027 we will be providing some monthly short snippets of information on this dive destination in order to keep you updated and excited! Below is some information on a documentary series of the wrecks of Malta.
Various tourism and government bodies in Malta have noted the importance of Dive Travel to its economy and as such have invested into a documentary series titled Submerged World. This brings attention to the importance of preserving such sites whilst embracing sustainable tourism to the area.
The six-part series plunges audiences into the different depths of the Mediterranean Sea to explore six of the Maltese Islands’ most popular wrecks.
“Wrecks are one of the best ways through which man can attempt to turn back time and try to restore elements of the marine environment that have been lost through his actions. By concentrating marine life, wrecks very often act as oases within barren deserts, representing an opportunity for man to give back to nature and thus help to redress the balance.”
– Professor Alan Deidun, Executive Producer
UM EL FAROUD
The first episode from the Submerged World series takes viewers for a dive on the former fuel tanker Um El Faroud, which could be reached by a 250-metre surface swim from Wied iż-Żurrieq. Following a gas explosion during maintenance work in 1995, the tanker was deemed unfit for purpose, and was consequently scuttled off the southern coast of Malta back in 1998 as one of the Maltese Islands’ first artificial reefs. The vessel now sits upright on the sandy seabed with its top only 20 metres from the surface. Over the past years, different marine organisms, from the Triggerfish to sea urchins, have colonised the tanker’s decks, making for a most fascinating underwater experience for divers.
Check out the short 6 minute video here: https://youtu.be/QaFTIDq2CtM
Now, if culture and food is also of interest to you or your non diving partner then the below may just whet your appetite for a trip to Malta. To further support the local economy (nothing to do with us wanting to go to a winery…) we will also be visiting a local winery
We will be visiting Meridiana Wine Estate
The tour of the estate includes a visit to the fermentation-hall and underground cellar, both set within a picturesque Maltese farmhouse.
One of the highlights of the tour is the tasting of some of their premium wines on the panoramic terraces overlooking the vineyard, served together with some lunch.
All wine lovers wishing to enrich their knowledge about wine, should find this experience both informative and engaging.
Some of our dive club members have been known to begin speaking languages of their own after taking part in one of our winery tours of the Coonawarra so this tour Includes an English speaking guided tour of the winery