Best diving in Western Australia?

[gabyne]

Hi Gabyne,
There is some great diving at Rottnest and if you don't have much time the Charter operators are a good option. If you are on a more relaxed schedule and don't like a crowd I may be looking for buddies mid-week ...

Thanks for the offer! I'll let you know when we've fixed our schedule - would be fun to meet!

 

[gabyne]

I will put on a vote for the Navy Pier out of Exmouth - a shore dive with no coral or pretty stuff to see, but incredible variety of life in 12m of water. The twilight dive there was absolutely awesome!

Heard about the fantastic diving at the Navy Pier... Is it true that there's just one operator allowed to dive it and it's therefore very expensive?

 

[blacklatexozdiver]

Fishing certainly was great off the pier when I was there as a kid. (Don't ask how I got on there though )

 

[Roz Amos]

Yup, when I was there two years ago there was only one operator, Coral Coast Dive, with a licence to dive it, and it was something like A$60 for a go excluding gear - was about A$100 inc gear - pretty steep for a shore dive! You need photo ID, and had to go through a checkpoint to get to the site. It was incredible in terms of life though - if I went there again it would be the number one site for me to dive, even given the cost.

 

[alcina]

At this time the pier is not being dived at all. Coral Coast Dive has closed their doors completely. As things develop, I will post a reopening of the Pier & details.

The Pier is a great fish dive. There's no corals and no reef structures (though there is a lot of neat, colourful stuff on the pylons) and you pretty much never see turtles and such. But there are a ton of fish all in one little area. There isn't much there that you wouldn't see on the reef, but on the Pier is it more concentrated and very predictable. The vis, like anywhere, can be great or crud...but it doesn't matter much (same as on the reef as long as you have a good guide or go nice and slow on your own!) as there is always something to see.

The Pier is pretty expensive $95/single dive during the day - max time is usually 50 minutes. Three years ago it was about $50. It has had the most severe price increase of all the diving/tours offered on the Ningaloo & surrounding areas. i would not expect much of a price change when the Pier reopens, but there might be one.

If I only had one day to dive from Exmouth, I would not choose the Pier - I'd dive the reef for sure. But if I had three days... On some days you can actually head out in the morning and do the reef and then do an afternoon one on the Pier when you get back...the depths are good for three dive/day but you have to choose your day as the Pier is tide dependent.

Anyway, I am rambling...happy to help and will post as soon as I know anything.

 

[alcina]

I've only been to Rottnest last year, but it is excellent temperate water diving. Very colourful in the caverns. I went with Malibu Diving as they are the only shop on the island (the others do charters out of Fremantle). They picked us up with a bus in Perth/Fremantle and took us out with their boat. Between dives, we spent a couple hours on the island. Very nice place. This link has my pictures/comments on the trip.ROTTNEST ISLAND

Nice page! Perth & Rotto are often overlooked by divers who visit WA and I think it is a shame...there's so much fabulous stuff down there.

BTW - when I went to that page suddenly I was swamped with popups, not sure if that is normal.

 

[MarkH]

BTW - when I went to that page suddenly I was swamped with popups, not sure if that is normal.[/QUOTE]
Yes it's "normal". I guess it's one of the evils of having free website hosting. When I first set it up, there was only a tiny banner ad at the top. Now the banner ad is twice as big and the site's been invaded by popups. My browser minimizes popups automatically.

 

[alc16]

At this time the pier is not being dived at all. Coral Coast Dive has closed their doors completely. As things develop, I will post a reopening of the Pier & details.
QUOTE]

Oh really? Wow. I was there back in July (thanks to your advice) and they had only just reopened the lower portion of the pier thus allowing a huge giant stride entry (close the legs on entry ha ha ha!). Is the closure part of any plans to stop the diving there or just a temporary measure?

I'll always remember the sheer variety of stuff there! And my first nudibranch big, ugly frogfish encounters! The Navy Pier was very good!

 

[gabyne]

Thank you, Alcina, for all the detailed info! Maybe I'll have a look when I'm there to see if there are some news on the Navy Pier... It really sounds great but AUD 95 for one dive is .... :11: Anyway, as long as it's closed, we don't have to care about diving there or not...

By the way, I just checked out some pages of your gallery - great!

C U,
Gaby