Welcome to Dive Log Australasia

Dive Log is the premier scuba diving monthly magazine that provides all the latest scuba news and information from across Australia and the Asia/Pacific region. You can read our monthly magazine free by clicking on the Latest Edition tab, HERE or find it at your nearest Newsagent for $4.95. Dive Log is also available at selected dive stores and on your tablet or mobile phone by clicking HERE . Each month we look at the key issues that effect us all as divers as well as look at great diving locations in the region as well as the perfect scuba diving holiday destinations. We also review the latest diving equipment and gear and scuba courses and certifications, to ensure you are always up to date with the latest and best things happening in the scuba diving industry.

ARENUI CORAL EXPLORATION
By MIKE SCOTLAND

TALKING TAWALI 
By KEN HOPPEN

HMAS TOBRUK EXPERIENCE
By PAUL ADAMS

EVERYONE knows the SS President Coolidge
The Arenui, the luxury Phinisi dive operation from Indonesia, spends the months of June to early October in Komodo Marine Park. Its itinerary allows divers to sample more than a dozen very different coral ecosystems. As a result, the marine life encounters are many and varied. There are regular Manta Ray sightings in the far south at Manta Alley, Giant Frogfish at Horseshoe Bay and other locations and Mandarin Fish at Wainilo Island.

Powerful currents feed the coral gardens. There are plenty of times when the current is so strong that divers have to wait until it slows a little to make it safe enough to enter the water. Alternatively, when the current is raging, you often dive in the lee of a tiny islet where there is some protection from the current and where you can be protected from the worst of the current. On these dives as you venture away from the pool of calm water, the current rapidly takes hold of you and you have to retreat into the safety of the protected water.

The manta ray came in from the distance, barrel-rolled several times in front of the small group of divers, went out of viz, came back, posed for photos, and did everything except shake hands at the end.  Of course, I was back on the boat having completed my dive.
But for those lucky two who weren’t, they were treated to a spectacle few have had the privilege of viewing.  What a difference a few minutes can make!
Located on the northern part of the tip of the Papua New Guinea mainland, Tawali is the stepping stone to several dive areas in the Milne Bay Province, not the least of which is the ones just off their doorstep.
Straight off the wharf here is a vertical wall dive that descends into the depths.  In the shallows, staghorn corals are home to mandarin fish, saron shrimp and the like.  In the depths you can find anything.  Whilst we were standing on the wharf here a small pod of pilot whales passed by, so I think I’m justified in saying ‘anything’.

 

At 127-metres in length Queensland’s ex-H.M.A.S Tobruk L-50 could comfortably rest in a cricket field from boundary to boundary. Instead, on the 29th June 2018 the ex-H.M.A.S Tobruk was scuttled as an artificial reef in Wide Bay waters between Bundaberg and Hervey bay. The sinking naval vessel floundered, rolling to the right of starboard and coming to rest on its side. The disaster was averted with the knowledge that the ship became more accessible to novice divers without affecting the advanced divers’ experience.
Geared up, buddy check complete, I sit expectantly waiting for the dive brief to finish, and I can giant-stride out into the blue waters with the ex-H.M.A.S Tobruk and discover all its surprises that await me between depths of 12- 30 meters.
Bundaberg Aqua Scuba Instructor, James Welsh, acted as support diver for vessel safety construction and has seen the Tobruk become home to an abundance of marine life.
‘First came the turtles, then the Golden Trevally…

 

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