Hello from Chile

[Royan]

Hi, I'm Raul from Chile. I read these forums from many years ago, although never posted before. You have a really nice community!
I live in the capital Santiago, and travel to the central coast area where I love to dive all year long. Here the bottom sea water is always cold, 11-13 celsius (52-55 fahrenheit), varying not so much over the year thanks to our Humboldt Current

I'm glad to finally participate here, will soon ask for some advice with an equipment change I have to do.
Greetings and crystal clear waters for everyone.
Raul

 

[PR_SMITH]

Welcome!

 

[Lorenzoid]

Welcome to ScubaBoard! Ya po!

I have visited Chile, but the water would be too cold for me to want to dive there.

 

[jonhall]

Welcome to SB. I second @Lorenzoid about diving in cold water, but glad you enjoy it!!

 

[Royan]

Welcome to ScubaBoard! Ya po!

I have visited Chile, but the water would be too cold for me to want to dive there.

yes I'm afraid it's cold in almost all our coast, with the very exception of our northest border, Arica, wich is more like diving in Peru. Our sea is covered by a current called "Humboldt", wich go from south to north, traveling through Peru and ending in Ecuador. FWIK, this current carries water from deep sea, so it's temperature. But, at the same time, it brings so much nutrients that it feeds the marine life here. It also means that our waters are sometimes blurry, especially in summer, with greenish algae blooms.

But.... there is a increasing number of scuba divers here, some of them coming out of water shivering, cold but with bright eyes of happiness

 

[Chavodel8en]

Aside from the temps, hows the diving? What do you see?

51-55 deg F is just like my local diving in Monterey / Carmel.

Note that there are regional sub-forums, including a S. America forum. I dont think I've ever seen anyone describe diving in Chile, so your contributions would be unique.

Bienvenido.

 

[Royan]

Aside from the temps, hows the diving? What do you see?

51-55 deg F is just like my local diving in Monterey / Carmel.

Note that there are regional sub-forums, including a S. America forum. I dont think I've ever seen anyone describe diving in Chile, so your contributions would be unique.

Bienvenido.

I'm definitely biased, but I love diving in Chile. Plenty of colors from sponges, soft corals, kelp, seaslugs, starfish, crabs, urchins and so on. Fishes are not colorful here, but many of them group up in medium to large size schools. We also have "loberas" where you can dive with dozens of seals swimming and playing with you. In the summer, some days we jump in a bloom of a hundred of one-meter-long jellyfishes.

The thing is, in the mayority of our coast we have the heavy pressure of overfishing, mostly industrial, but also irresponsible artisanal practices. Even so, we have some places where local people have learnt to care for the marine resources/life, and those are the spots where scuba divers go to dive here.
My dives are 99% in Los Molles, in central coast two hours away from Santiago by car. Our top-tier dive place in the continent is Chañaral de Aceituno - Punta de Choros, a naturally full of life and well preserved place where we even have resident populations of dolphins and whales (though we are not allowed to dive with them). Our best dive spot all country around is, by far, the Juan Fernandez archipielago.

I do not take good photos (if any), but you can check some of the well known chilean underwater photographers, a friend of mine https://www.instagram.com/mauricio.altamiranoo, and of course our world champion last year: https://www.instagram.com/tomysub

 

[Eastwest]

Hello and keep us posted about anything Chile , how about Robinson Caruso Island those are memories from my past .

 

[Chavodel8en]

I'm definitely biased, but I love diving in Chile. Plenty of colors from sponges, soft corals, kelp, seaslugs, starfish, crabs, urchins and so on. Fishes are not colorful here, but many of them group up in medium to large size schools. We also have "loberas" where you can dive with dozens of seals swimming and playing with you. In the summer, some days we jump in a bloom of a hundred of one-meter-long jellyfishes.

The thing is, in the mayority of our coast we have the heavy pressure of overfishing, mostly industrial, but also irresponsible artisanal practices. Even so, we have some places where local people have learnt to care for the marine resources/life, and those are the spots where scuba divers go to dive here.
My dives are 99% in Los Molles, in central coast two hours away from Santiago by car. Our top-tier dive place in the continent is Chañaral de Aceituno - Punta de Choros, a naturally full of life and well preserved place where we even have resident populations of dolphins and whales (though we are not allowed to dive with them). Our best dive spot all country around is, by far, the Juan Fernandez archipielago.

I do not take good photos (if any), but you can check some of the well known chilean underwater photographers, a friend of mine https://www.instagram.com/mauricio.altamiranoo, and of course our world champion last year: https://www.instagram.com/tomysub

Pics look interesting. The kelp, nudibranchs, crabs, jellyfish swarms & seals sounds a bit like California diving.