Celebrating number 100th with Andrew

Comment: Deep, DUP and Wreck dives with Alex & Alla. Andrew came along to play the difficult student, and also logged his 100th Dive. Lucy's Reef was spectacular, especially out in the artificial reef at 22m. A beautiful Yellowtail Seahorse hung out in the sand for over 2 months now, bent stick pipefish, seamoth, Indian Walkman, school of baracudas, batfish etc. are all in just a small area. Condition for the 2 days were incredible, flat seas, 30-40m viz, and no one come to dive... Great Summer Dive Season! See Alla's photos here, and Alex's photos of the Andaman Eagle Wreck here.

Tuesday, 25th August
Dive 090: Bay 1, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 21m ; Bottom time: 45 min
Water Temp: 29c; Visibility: 30m; EANx32

Dive 091: Lucy's Reef, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 22.8m ; Bottom time: 44 min
Water Temp: 29c; Visibility: 30m;

Wednesday, 26th August
Dive 092: Andaman Eagle Wreck, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 25.6m ; Bottom time: 38 min
Water Temp: 29c; Visibility: 30m, EANx32

Dive 093: Bay 4, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 21.9m ; Bottom time: 52 min
Water Temp: 29c; Visibility: 20m

Kids & Family Day aboard MV Aquart III

Comment: A great day with the kids at Raya Yai Island, taking Laura, Jack & Elliott for a couple of DSD dives. They were natural, finning and buoyancy control like an Open Water Certified diver. I'm looking forward to see them getting back into the water on their next holidays. Should be a blast for me to introduce three more super cool Aquakids into the wonderful world of Scuba. Thanks Johnathan for the photos, since I got my hands full :-)

Dive 088: Bay 1, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 3.9m ; Bottom time: 33 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 20-30m

Dive 089: Bay 2, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 5.4m ; Bottom time: 39 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 20m

August IDC Open Water Sessions

Comment:Alex, alla and Rico fine-tuning their teaching and control skills for 2 days in Raya Yai Island. Dive conditions for the 11-12 August were fantastic, flat seas, little wind, and great viz. Click here to see more pictures on Rico's facebook album.

Tuesday
Dive 085: Bay 1, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 7.6m ; Bottom time: 50 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Dive 086: Bay 2, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 10.3m ; Bottom time: 43 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Wednesday
Dive 087: Bay 2, Raya Yai
Max Depth: 7.9m ; Bottom time: 44 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

king Cruiser - Shark Point Area

Comment: An almost perfect day in Phuket, sunny skies, calm seas, and super nice cool breeze for our boat ride to the Shark Point Area. The king Cruiser has sunken a little bit deeper. On Nittrox 32%, Matt J and I spent the majority of our dives between 30m-19m, with the only shallow area at about 15m, where the wheel house used to be. Soon, this dive site is going to be an advance level,with Nitrox require to get any decent dive time on it, CooL! Shark Point and koh Doc Mai were nice as usual. I saw 3 swimming leopard sharks at shark Point, first time in a long time that happened. The beautiful red Frogfish is still at the same coral, at 13.3m, 3om from the second cave :-) See some photos during an Advance Course here.

Dive 082: King Cruiser Wreck
Max Depth: 30.7m ; Bottom time: 38 min; EANx: 32%
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 5-10m

Dive 083: Shark Point
Max Depth: 18.5m ; Bottom time: 60 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Dive 084: koh Doc Mai
Max Depth: 19.2m ; Bottom time: 55 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Raya Yai Island

Tuesday, 21st July
Comment: A windy day stirred up the sea that rocked the boat during the our crossing from Chalong Bay to Raya Yai East Coast. We were alone on the Andaman Eagle Wreck for the entire dive. We also had Lucy's reef all to ourselves for the second dive. Bent Stick pipefish were all over in the sand near the artificial reef.

Dive 080: Andaman Eagle Wreck, Bay 2
Max Depth: 27.7m ; Bottom time: 51 min; EANx: 32%
Water Temp: 29c; Visibility: 15-20m

Dive 081: Lucy's Reef, Bay 3
Max Depth: 23.7m ; Bottom time: 52 min; EANx: 32%
Water Temp: 29c; Visibility: 15-20m

Phi Phi Islands Overnight Trip

Comment: Great idea to go to Phi Phi with Alex & Matt, doing some dives, hanging with the cool people in Tonsai Village, meeting some new friends. Well, Seasick was the norm for our 2 days, huge waves, and Greta was rocking all the wrong way! However, Leopard sharks, turtle, seahorses & frogfish at KDM made up for the rough boat ride. Click on the photo to see Alex pictures, posted at his FB page.

Wednesday, 15th July
Dive 074: Shark Point
Max Depth: 18.9m ; Bottom time: 50 min; EANx: 34%
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 15-20m

Dive 075: Koh Bida Nok
Max Depth: 20.7m ; Bottom time: 43 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Dive 076: Phi Le Point
Max Depth: 16.7m ; Bottom time: 52 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Thursday, 16th July
Dive 077: Koh Bida Nai
Max Depth: 20.4m ; Bottom time: 49 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 10-15m

Dive 078: Koh Doc Mai
Max Depth: 22.5m ; Bottom time: 52 min
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 15-20m

Dive 079: Koh Doc Mai
Max Depth: 20.1m ; Bottom time: 53 min; EANx: 33%
Water Temp: 30c; Visibility: 15-20m

Cu Lao cham Island, Viet Nam

Thursday, 9th July
Dive 072: Signal Point
Max Depth: 23.4m ; Bottom time: 65 min
Water Temp: 28c; Visibility: 15-20m

Dive 073: Undersea Island
Max Depth: 17.6m ; Bottom time: 60 min
Water Temp: 28c; Visibility: 15-20m

Comment: Hoi An is located about 45 minutes south of central Viet Nam's largest city, Da Nang. It is my favorite place to visit when I come home for holidays each year. With dive gears already with us, Miz and I finally plunged in and do a dive trip in between our feasts and shopping excursions in the Old Town. If you have been following with my log of our latest dive excursion, you would have known that my camera photo mode was fried in Sipadan. So, for the rest of the diving, it was video mode only. Dive condition for our day was practically perfect, flat sea, sunny skies, and pretty good visibility. Topography of the 2 dive sites we visit is similar to what we have in the Raya Islands in Phuket. There were fish life, though not as densely as you might see in the Andaman Sea. Some videos from the dives can be viewed at my YouTube page.