Everything ocean related, with a special focus on scuba diving the rich coastal waters of Cape Town, South Africa.
For those who are learning or considering learning to dive
Hey dive buddies! Thank you for a year of amazing dives and good friendships. Please find yourself in this selection of happy diver photos taken in 2013. I’m sorry we don’t have one from every single dive we did. We look forward to many more good dives together in 2014!
Here are two special Festivus miracles (forgive the poetic licence) for you: videos I took while diving in the Red Sea in October. Don’t know what Festivus is? Educate yourself!
Kate airs her grievances at Sha’ab Abu Nuhas.
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uO7j-DjGjY0&w=540″]
Ok not really. It’s just Kate sneaking up on Christo, who was oblivious to the world around him, intently stalking what he thought was some kind of grouper (which turned out to be some broken plumbing or coral debris, I forget). This clip is only six seconds long, so you’ll have to watch it more than once to fully appreciate its beauty.
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryMNFdG7qTA&w=540″]
I should point out that Tony denies all responsibility for teaching Kate the sort of antisocial behaviour you see here. Despite what this picture would suggest.
I teach both SDI and PADI dive courses, and – as any small business owner does – I am occasionally required to print out some forms, student exam answer sheets, or other supplementary material. Mini cat’s fascination with the printer, and great love of interfering with the pages as they emerge, can make things tricky.
A few months ago one of the outboard motors on our 6.2 metre rubber duck had a piston failure. A lean mixture caused the engine failure and we ended up with a hole in a piston. Being a triple cylinder motor it required a complete rebuild and the cost estimates to do this were extremely high. The engine was a little long in the tooth which meant there were a host of other items that would need replacement if the motor was dismantled, such as mountings, so it was not an option to repair.
The boat is in my opinion over-powered. It is equipped with two 90 horsepower two stroke engines, so I looked at the options of either replacing the broken engine with a used engine or replacing both with a smaller pair. The question of two stroke versus four stroke reared its ugly head and this also needed some consideration. I decided to call the manufacturer, Gemini Marine, and ask them what the boat was ideally designed for. I discovered more than I had bargained for.
The boat was originally designed for sea trials for a tender for SA Navy transporter boats. For the sea trials about ten boats identical to ours were made. Each one was fitted with two 60 horsepower two stroke engines, loaded with 14 soldiers and 50 kilograms of gear and and weaponry, and achieved a top speed of 35 knots. The hull and deck is stronger than the usual design strength requirement, and it has a different hull design in that the deadrise is optimal for rough seas. Deadrise is the angle of the bottom of the boat measured from a horizontal line at the level of the keel. The larger the deadrise angle, the more V-shaped the hull is. Boats with smaller deadrise have a much flatter bottom. It’s not a constant angle in most boats. Often a boat is more V-shaped at the bow and gets flatter at the back. The deadrise is significant because it determines whether the hull is to plane or cut through waves.
As the boat is now it is tail heavy with the two 90 horsepower engines, but the performance is outstanding. Empty it will do 43 knots at 5500 rpm, but in all honesty it is more airborne than on the water and almost impossible to control at that speed. When we do replace the motors at some point we will definitely go for 60 horsepower engines.
We did not get the boat with high speed trips in mind, and its primary use is a platform for our students as a calm, no pressure introduction to boat dives. For this it serves us well.
First, be completely unmoved by the curious looks from people nearby.
Make sure your fins are within easy reach and that your weight belt is secured. Then, lie on the slipway and wait for the tide to come in, of course!
The cameraman, Mark van Coller, is awesome, so you should follow his advice. You can look at some of his work here.
He was in Hout Bay to film the Jan Braai television insert about the world’s first underwater braai.
Do you get tired during long dives? Would you like to know how to conserve energy, use less air, and annoy your buddies all at the same time? Fear not. The inimitable Kate is here to show you how it’s done.
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjTzo-q943Q&w=540″]
Kate was back in town during August, September and October, along with her squire Brian. The two of them dived a lot while they were here. Kate was up to her usual tricks: here, she rides on the unwitting Brian’s cylinder during a dive at Shark Alley in September (no cowsharks to be found). Notice her perfect buoyancy, allowing her to let go as Brian turns around, and then grab hold of his gear again as he turns his back to her.
She did this to me once for almost an entire dive on the Clan Stuart. I felt as though my own buoyancy was up the pole, but couldn’t figure out why. Also, I used up my air really quickly and felt quite fatigued after the dive. Kate, of course, emerged from the dive with a nearly full cylinder, bursting with energy!
We upgraded the sign on our gate. Now we’re easier to find!
This is what low visibility diving looks like. I estimate the viz on this particular day, diving the wreck of SS Maori in Maori Bay, to be a solid two metres. The video shows Tony adjusting Lisa’s BCD while Dominique looks on (at right, in the yellow and black wetsuit). There’s nothing wrong with my camera; the viz was really this bad.
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBQ2_MPjVsk&w=540″]
This was a day after two days of strong south easterly wind and declining water temperatures in the Atlantic, which generally indicates good visibility as the west coast upwelling process works its magic. Unfortunately this time those factors did not lead to the expected result!
Here’s six seconds worth of Tony backward rolling off the boat. I was not more than four metres away but he’s barely visible as he hits the water. Compare it to this footage of a backward roll at Shark Alley last July.
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXCvOWAEZQo&w=540″]
Photographer’s Reef is a lovely little reef quite close to Simon’s Town. It is eminently suitable for Open Water training, as it has a maximum depth of about 15 metres at high tide, and an excellent first boat dive site as it is close enough to land to give a feeling of comfort to new divers. This is a very short clip I took one day in early August, when a group of six of us dived this picturesque reef. You can see that the visibility is good; my camera skills, not so much!
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7q-_o6vFbGE&w=540″]
Hi divers
Last weekend we dived Sunday at Alpha Reef and it was really surgy and the viz not so great. It is odd that the visibility is so low given the amount of westerly wind we have had, but I suspect the very large swells that have accompanied the storms may have something to do with it. We then dived the wreck of the Brunswick where the visibility was a bit better, and finished off some Divemaster training.
This weekend I am staying out of the water due to some scheduled maintenance but the glue should be dry by the end of next week… Luckily for you, if you want to dive, OMSAC are holding a Treasure Hunt, and you can join one of the boats going out on that day. There are also a few shore dives. We went two years ago and it was great fun. The event details are here. You need to book in advance if possible and it’s filled up quickly, so get to it.
If you learned to dive with me and do find yourself on another dive boat, please do not use the words flippers or goggles. Too embarrassing. I would never be able to look that skipper and Divemaster in the eye again!
regards
Tony Lindeque
076 817 1099
www.learntodivetoday.co.za
www.learntodivetoday.co.za/blog/
Diving is addictive!
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