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Tuesday, 29 July 2008 02:00 |
Mood: 
07.29.08 7:59 am
SATS GENERAL BOTHA - 19/07/08: Finally we arrived at the dive site to be greeted with good conditions. The sea was flat, there was hardly any wind and the water looked clean. This would come back to haunt us during the dive, but more on that later...
We were quickly out at the GB and had the shot in - viz looked awesome. We finished off our last checks and quickly entered the water. The descent was great until about the 40m mark when the lights went off. This continued all the way down to the bottom and all you could make out was the strobe flashing incessantly.
The shot had landed midships on the starboard side and we slowly headed up to the bow. There the one bottom diver encountered something interesting....., but given our time constraints we had to leave "it" for another day.
The main objective of the dive was however to recover the plaque that we had laid on her on the 13th of May 2007 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of her sinking, as it had become heavily overgrown with marine life. This we accomplished, but no sooner had the bottom time been depleted and we were forced topside. The viz on the deck was a lot better than on the sand, but still it was very dark down there. Again the 21W HID did a sterling job :)
On ascent we again encountered the good viz and had a very pleasant 14C water to deco out in. All in all a good dive.
Our next tech dive is again planned for her on the 10th of August 2008, during which we aim to put the plaque back. Keep watching this space for details.
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Tuesday, 15 July 2008 02:00 |
Mood:
07.15.08 3:57 am
SATS GENERAL BOTHA - It seems like the weather will allow us finally to get onto the GB. This Saturday (19/07/08) we should hopefully get to dive on her. Post dive details to follow shortly.
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Monday, 07 July 2008 02:00 |
Mood: 
07.04.08 4:42 am
Hi all. We had planned to dive tomorrow (Saturday 4/7/08), but with the weather forecast predicting 5m swells and gale force winds, we have decided to yet again roll over the dive until next weekend.....
This is starting to get a bit monotonous, but I suppose it is winter.
Keep watching for more details.
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Saturday, 28 June 2008 02:00 |
Mood:
06.28.08 12:09 am
For the past two weeks we have been trying to get another tech dive in on the Bloemfontein (or even the GB for that matter). On the first weekend the weather did not play along, and this weekend one of our bottom divers and our one safety diver has the flu……
As I sit here and type I see that there is no wind outside, the sea looks flat and realize we should be diving. Bugger!!!!
We will unfortunately roll this dive other to next week hopefully – details to follow soon.
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Monday, 26 May 2008 02:00 |
Mood:
05.26.08 6:56 am
SAS BLOEMFONTEIN - 25 MAY 2008: The weather was finally playing along and we actually managed to get out to the site..... On the way there we had hundreds of dolphins and whales keeping us company, which also promised to be a good sign. We put the shot in and the viz looked absolutely awesome. This was confirmed upon decent, with visibility easily in excess of 20m!!!
As we got deeper however, the viz started to decrease, and by 40m it was down to about 6-7m. Anything past 53m and it was down to a meter or two, with the result that we hung around the decks at 50m. The shot had landed amidships and we then headed down to the stern, after checking out a few of the penetration entry points. It was then back up the starboard beam, during which we did a great little swim though and even got across to the port side. We then continued our slow cruise up to the bow and before long the 25 minutes of bottom time was up. We slowly began our ascent and were soon in crystal clean water again - great stuff. From about 20m the dolphins that we had seen earlier paid us a visits and for the next 30 odd mins kept circling us and keeping us entertained on deco with their tricks and a serious amount of shagging!!!!
The water was a very warm 17C which also made the dive and deco extremely easy and comfortable. Three cheers for False Bay diving!!!
Many thanks to our new standby diver Gareth, for helping out on such short notice.
For our next dive we are planning to get onto the SATS General Botha. Watch this space for more dive details.
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