AndyNZ, I'm going to do some skiing at Mt Hutt (south island) next week and was wondering whether or not to do a dive. Is it too cold to dive around this time of year without a drysuit?
As a rough guess, I'd say water temperatures down south would be 10-12 degC at the moment.
Too cold for me (I'm soft) without a drysuit, but I know plenty of people who dive wet all year around down south.
It would kinda depend on where you think you would go and what you'd get from it - I'd think about a dive or two on the Lermontov in a wetsuit, just 'cause it's so good. But a lot of the general coastal diving wouldn't appeal - I'd rather have an extra day on the slopes.
There's about a metre of snow at Mt Hutt at the moment - if the weather comes good, that should be more than enough to have a great time. Have you been before? A lot of the slopes down south are just over tussock, so are perfectly skiable on 30-40cm snow - unlike our volcano up here, which is a nightmare unless there's nearly 2m of snow. Snow currently looking good, but weather a bit so-so.