There are a few very wet days heading our way, which is fortunate as this month has been very dry.
Diving-wise the odds are 50/50 that False Bay will have some clean spots, however it will depend on just how much of the forecast rains fall on Friday. If it is as much as predicted (25mm from some forecasts) then run-off may be an issue.
I will take a look late tomorrow and make a call. If we do dive it will be an early start, at 7.30 am. Let me know if you’re keen on rising with the sparrows for some in-water time.
Given the time of year, the large swells we are having are not all that unusual. Neither is the odd day or two of south easterly wind. Friday and Saturday feature both these gremlins, so conditions won’t really be great. Sunday’s forecast is a little rosier, however I doubt the visibility will have recovered and the surge will still be a lingering factor. This weekend my choice is to stay home.
The weekend wind does not look devastatingly bad, but it doesn’t look all that great, either. It seems that the best days for False Bay are going to come late next week. I think Saturday will work for shore diving, or inshore boat diving at the top end of False Bay, for example in the Roman Rock area.
I will take a look at the conditions this afternoon and make a call. It’s the time of year when many people are on leave, so we can dive any day next week providing we have weather. Let me know if you want to be kept informed of plans!
We will not be diving this weekend, but if you are able to get into the water then do so. False Bay looks promising. We will be back to full dive mode on Monday morning.
Strawberry anemones, by Jerrel
Thank you to Jerrel for this week’s gorgeous photo of strawberry anemones, which he took on a dive off our boat to Roman Rock on Freedom Day.
Things to do
The winning photographs from the prestigious international Underwater Photographer of the Year Competition are on display at the Chavonnes Battery Museum until 30 September. The exhibition is in partnership with the NSRI. If you have a Wild Card, take it along for discounted entry.
We dived Long Beach on Saturday, and on Sunday went to Atlantis and Maidstone Rock. Conditions were good but then the south easter arrived! On Wednesday we launched in Hout Bay. The swell was around 2.5 metres and the wind started out light but eventually was gusting to closer to 40 km/h. Tafelberg Reef had around 6m visibility and about the same at the Katsu Maru. Below the surface it was okay, but the boat trip was a little hairy.
Strawberry anemones at Maidstone Rock
Weekend plans
This weekend looks really good from a wind point of view, but finding good viz will require going out and looking for it. False Bay and the Atlantic are both very patchy with a whole range of different colours offshore. Our plan is to Launch from Buffels Bay and go and look for viz. We are joining OMSAC for the day and they are going to dive, snorkel and braai.
Sunday will really depend on what the bay delivers on Saturday but I think it will be better at deeper sites like the Fleur and Outer Photographer’s Reef. There is a 14 second, 3 metre swell that will be felt on the shallower sites closer in shore. Sunday may be a day where we just cruise around and look for cleaner viz.
We’ve been back from our Sodwana trip for almost a month, and I’m starting to look forward to my next dive trip, which has not been planned yet. Alas. With this small problem in mind I had a rummage through the underwater photos I took while we were in Sodwana, to try and recreate the experience.
Under the boat
I haven’t done a lot of diving this year, and no underwater photography to speak of, so I viewed my camera as a strange, unfamiliar machine when we arrived in Sodwana, and spent most of the six dives figuring out how it all worked (again). Furthermore, my confidence in my buoyancy wasn’t great at the start of the trip, so I didn’t want to go too close to anything. I want to punch divers who crunch the coral, so I didn’t want to be that diver this time around!
Swimming across the sand gap at Stringer
As a result my underwater photos from the trip are mostly quite questionable. I include some here, more to show you how beautiful the reefs and clear water can be in Sodwana, rather than for you to marvel at my prowess in underwater photography. I took several videos, which I’ll share in the coming weeks – you can get an idea of how good the visibility is and how abundant the coral is from a bit of moving picture footage.
Angie photographing snappers
We struggled a little with the surge on one of our diving days in particular, but this is something that is a fact of life when diving on South Africa’s north coast. We mostly did shallow dives, and the reefs at Sodwana lie along a very exposed stretch of coast with few natural bays to protect divers from wind and swell. These factors combined to expose us to some near-washing machine conditions at times! Relaxing in the water and letting the surge move you about is the only way to deal with it, assuming you’ve got a handle on your buoyancy. Holding onto the reef or swimming against the surge are bad ideas.
Otti is almost hidden by a school of tiny fish
Otti and Matthijs
Male ember parrotfish
Potato bass at Stringer
Porcupine fish is shy
Tami photographing something on the reef
Ember parrotfish (male)
Tony riding Kate’s cylinder
Safety stopping
You can see some photos from past Sodwana diving trips here.
We are off travelling for ten days, so this week’s newsletter is a list of dates to diarise!
The photos in this newsletter are from a lovely deep dive for an Advanced course that we did at Outer Photographer’s Reef on Saturday, followed by a dive at Phoenix Shoal just outside the harbour in Simon’s Town. There are some videos from the Outer Photographer’s Reef dive here. The visibility on both dives was 6-8 metres, but yesterday it had improved to 10 metres at Seal Rock and Shark Alley (no cowsharks though).
Anemones at Outer Photographer’s Reef
ScubaPro Day – Saturday 26 October
The ScubaPro Day takes place at False Bay Yacht Club on Saturday 26 October. Discounted boat dives and the chance to try some dive gear (tips on that here) – the participating dive charters will take bookings directly. There are four launch times, starting nice and early. Underwater Explorers is participating if you’re at a loose end!
Diversnight International – Thursday 7 November
November 7th is Diversnight International, sign up here. It is an international event with the aim of having as many divers in the water as possible at 8.13pm (2013 – get it?). If you enjoy night diving, or want to try it out, then you should be there. It’s quite festive. More details about this event will be provided when we get back from the Red Sea!
DAN Day – Saturday 9 November
We attended the last DAN day in Cape Town, which comprised a tour of the SA Navy diving facility, and a series of excellent talks by DAN medics and the NSRI. The next one is on Saturday 9 November, and comes highly recommended. Early booking is essential (the last one was fully subscribed) – more info here.
It’s winter so not as many people dive as they do in summer, but the week’s diving has been good with little or no swell and clean water at around 15 degrees. We had lovely conditions at the infrequently-dived wreck of the Brunswicklast Saturday, before the rain came, and equally good conditions at Long Beach yesterday. There are some photos on facebook here and here. If you haven’t liked our facebook page already, please do – you can keep up to date with what we’re up to. We post photos regularly and try to do a visibility report whenever we dive.
Fish and box jellies at Long Beach
For once the weekend weather and dive plan is an easy call. Both days look exceptionally good and the bay is quite clean and calm right now. We are attending the DAN Cape Town event on Saturday so there will be no diving, but we will launch on Sunday to do qualifying dives for Open Water students. We will launch from the Yacht Club in Simon’s Town and the plan will be to visit Photographer’s Reef and the cowsharks.
Anemone on the Brunswick
Please remember your MPA permits. If you plan to come diving, check that yours is valid. If you don’t have one (or if it’s expired), head down to the post office with your ID book and about R100 and ask for a “scuba diving permit”. We dive a lot inside the marine protected area, for which you need a permit.
Wreckage of the Brunswick
Our Red Sea trip is in October (17-26th). There are still one or two spaces on the liveaboard if you feel like a last minute (almost) holiday, but it’s almost full. We’ll do a local trip (to Sodwana or Durban) again in the new year so don’t worry if you miss out!
Tony and students on the surface over the wreck of the Brunswick
The Brunswick is a historical wooden shipwreck that lies a few hundred metres off the northern end of Long Beach in Simon’s Town, directly opposite the northern end of the white apartment buildings overlooking the Main Road. Like HNMS Bato, she is infrequently dived. Having lain underwater since 1805, she is heavily overgrown and much of her decking and hull is covered by sand. She used to be a shore entry (with a precipitous climb over the railway line), but in recent years a large number of boulders have been added as a breakwater between the ocean and the railway line, and climbing over in dive gear is no longer possible. For this reason we do the dive from the boat. Close to shore and in shallow water, the Brunswick is an ideal site to get used to boat diving.
Extensive field of wooden decking
The Brunswick was a British East Indiaman, which means she carried men and goods between Britain and the East Indies – (south)east Asia and India. She was carrying a cargo of cotton and sandalwood from China back to Britain when she was captured by some French vessels off Sri Lanka, and brought to Simon’s Bay. In September 1805 her anchor rope parted, and she ran aground during a south easterly gale. Most of her cargo was salvaged, as she lies in shallow (less than six metres deep) water.
Shot line on the sand
The boat from below
An encrusted iron knee
An iron knee in the wreckage
Planking on the Brunswick
Kelp grows on the wooden remains
Puffadder shyshark
Octopus hole
Hermit crabs swarm over the wood
Cape rock crab
Craig looking underneath
Bolt sticking out of the wreck
Tags on the wreck from a prior archaeological survey
Tags on the wreck from a prior archaeological survey
Starfish attached to a bolt
Copper bolt next to a rock lobster
Starfish and copper drift bolt
Pointy bolt
Some of the metal is worn smooth or recently uncovered
Drift bolts in the planking
Corroded iron driftbolt
Side view showing how thick the planks are
Much of the wreck lies under the sand
Another concreted metal item
Octopus surrounded by hermit crabs
Wooden remains from the Brunswick
Christo approaches the boat after the dive
We found the dive site to be similar to HNMS Bato, which was also a sturdily built wooden ship of similar vintage. The Brunswick was 1,200 tons, and her wreckage is spread out quite extensively. There are many thick, wooden planks, laid out as they would have been to form her decks, as well as much evidence of the bronze bolts that secured parts of the ship together. There are also many copper bolts, rivets and what could be small amounts of rolled up copper sheathing in evidence on the site.
Anemone among feather stars and papery burnupena
The highests parts of the wreck are covered with feather stars, anemones, sea cucumbers, and kelp. There are many octopus, and peering under the wreckage with a torch yielded a couple of very large pyjama catsharks. We were lucky to dive the site most recently on a day with lovely visibility, and the shallowness of the water means that there’s a lot of light penetration which improves things enormously.
The highest parts of the Brunswick wreck
Before diving this site, you should call the SA Navy Ops Room on 021 787 3818, to ask for permission and to tell them how long you’ll be. Same procedure as at Long Beach.
The MV Katsu Maru is a 40 metre long Japanese trawler, now lying approximately 30 metres south west of the MV Aster in Hout Bay. On days with good visibility, which has been the case both times I’ve dived her, you can sometimes see both wrecks at the same time.
Unfortunately both dives I’ve done on the Katsu Maru featured misted up camera housings. This was connected to the excellent visibility; the sea was icy cold thanks to the upwelling that follows a south easterly wind, and the air was hot. My camera didn’t like it and I am used to the easy conditions in False Bay that allow me to be fairly cavalier about keeping my housing cool between dives. These photos therefore don’t show the ship in quite the same way as I saw it. But hopefully you get the idea.
The keel of the Katsu Maru
The wreck lies on her side, with her superstructure half buried and the bottom of her hull angled slightly upwards. There is a distinct keel strip running the length of the ship. To me she looks like nothing so much as a submarine when viewed from behind. When one swims around the wreck, the remaining superstructure can be seen and her funnel is revealed.
The hull is covered in brittle stars and urchins
There is a large tear in the hull
Rounding the stern of the Katsu Maru
Rounding the stern
Urchins crusting the wreck
The funnel of the Katsu Maru
Swimming along the hull
Part of the superstructure
A hatch on the superstructure
The trawler sank after sustaining a hole on her port side, which is visible as she is resting on her starboard side in the sand. The wreck has been there since 1978; about sixteen years later the Aster was stripped and scuttled nearby to join her. The relative positions of these wrecks makes them ideal for a rebreather dive (in drysuits) or a navigation dive from one to the other. I’ve been on the boat with divers who have attempted to cross the 30 metre gap from the Aster to the Katsu Maru in poor visibility, and have spent a delightful dive on the sand. The proximity of a sewerage outlet pipe adds a delightful element of risk to this strategy.
Anemone on the Katsu Maru
If you swim into the scour at her stern, you’ll get about 28 metres. I spent most of the dive on top of her hull, at about 16 metres. Limited penetration of the wreck may be possible, but it is probably a stupid idea (and if you’re not trained to do it, it’s definitely a stupid idea).
There isn’t an enormous amount of striking sea life on this wreck, but I think it’s my favourite one in Cape Town simply for the way she’s lying. Nothing makes me feel as though I am really taking full advantage of the three dimensional movement that diving offers as much as swimming along what is actually the bottom of a ship.
