Diving Vanuatu Beginners

Are you planning a holidaying in Vanuatu and you would love to go for a dive and explore the pristine waters but have never dived before then why not let Diving Vanuatu take you diving Vanuatu  for beginners.

Diving Vanuatu Beginners

It is as easy as one, two, three, as a beginner diver you need to be 10 years or older and in good health your instructor will take you not deeper than 12 meters or approx 40 foot.

After complete a bit of paperwork the staff an Diving Vanuatu will then go through a flip chart which explains how to use the dive gear, how to breath and equalize your ears from there in to the swimming pool to learn a few basic skills, once you have mastered these skill on to the dive boat and out for a short boat trip to one of Vanuatu’s magical reefs, Twin Bommies is an ideal dive site for beginners with plenty of fish and coral life.  As you go down the mooring line you will be greeted by our friendly Clown Fish or as many people know them as Nimo. You dive instructor will be with you at all times on your magical underwater adventure.

Diving Vanuatu Beginners

So while on holiday in Vanuatu don’t forget to put scuba diving on your list of things to do as we know you will not be disappointed.

So don’t forget diving Vanuatu beginners is as easy as one, two, three and our friendly staff here at Diving Vanuatu would love to take you out on an experience of a life time.
For more information please email: Diving@vanuatu.com.vu

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Rating: 9 out of 10 (from 71 votes)

Diving Vanuatu Cathedral

Planning on a scuba diving while on your holiday in Port Vila then what better dive site to experience than diving Vanuatu Cathedral.

Nautilus Watersports would love to take you out to explore the Cathedral a spectacular cavern dive that is located at the tip of Pango point a vast cavern has formed which makes a spectacular dive, maximum depth 26 mtrs inside the cavern with shaft of light creating an unusual effect. It is possible to swim right through to the back of the cave to be amazed by the light display, don’t forget to explore the walls as your are traveling in and out of the Cathedral as you will be surprised at what you will find, hidden in the crevasses of the walls some of the wonder underwater life you will come across are fire clams, plantar shrimp, nudibranchs and plenty of other amazing critters.

Diving Vanuatu Cathedral

After coming out of the Cathedral explore the outside and along the wall and look out in to the depths of the ocean. Again you will be amazed at what you will find as you travel along the wall, quite often you will come across schools of Maori wrasse.

Diving Vanuatu Cathedral is a must do dive for both the recreational dive and also the hard core dive, so why not come and visit Nautilus Watersports next time you are wanting to go scuba diving in Vanuatu.

Diving Vanuatu Cathedral

For More Information Diving@vanuatu.com.vu

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Rating: 7 out of 10 (from 64 votes)

Diving Vanuatu Sites

Scuba diving in Vanuatu has never been easier with so many diving Vanuatu sites to choose from. Nautilus Watersports have the only purposely build dive boat here in Port Vila with a sundeck, toilet on board and a great dive platform, what better way to travel to so many dive sites. With so many diving Vanuatu sites to choose from where does one start?

Diving Vanuatu Sites

Nautilus Watersports is able to offer wreck dives, reef dives, cavern dives & drift dives, a different dive site each time you come for a dive.

So why not check out the Star of Russia which is 83 mtrs in length and 13 mtrs in breadth, this grand old lady now rests in Port Vila Harbor. Follow the buoyed line to depth of 33 mtrs take a leisurely swim through the body of the ship which again, due to the rotting away of the teak decking, is perfectly safe for penetration. Build of bolted iron plates (shiplap style), this hull is intact with a romantic shapely bow. A great shipwreck to enjoy and quite definitely of historical interest, the “Star of Russia” was built by Harlan and Wolff of Belfast (also famous for the construction of the Titanic).
Or if you are not in to wrecks then another diving Vanuatu sites would be the Cathedral a spectacular cavern dive that is located at the tip of Pango point a vast cavern has formed which makes a spectacular dive, maximum depth 26 mtrs inside the cavern with shaft of light creating an unusual effect. It is possible to swim right through to the back of the cave to be amazed by the light display, don’t forget to explore the walls as your are traveling in and out of the Cathedral as you will be surprised at what you will find, hidden in the crevasses of the walls some of the wonder underwater life you will come across are fire clams, plantar shrimp, nudibranchs and plenty of other amazing critters.

Diving Vanuatu Sites

So remember next time you are planning to go scuba diving in Vanuatu check out our friendly staff here at Nautilus Watersports.

To Check Out Our Diving Vanuatu Site Click Here

For More Information: Diving@vanuatu.com.vu

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Rating: 8 out of 10 (from 61 votes)

What an amazing January we had, perfect weather, great people plus our dive staff certified the highest amount of PADI course to be completed ever for the first month of the year in our 10 years that we have been here at Nautilus Watersports Vanuatu, Amy and Luke hit 32 course’s for the month bearing in mind 12 days during the month were take up with cruise boat commitments, pretty amazing effort guy, well done.

During the course of January we have seen some great families and couples complete either a Padi Openwater or Advance Openwater course and we can’t forget the certified divers that come and dived with us as well.  We would like to thank David, Peter, Paul & Michelle out of Nautilus Scuba Center in Brisbane that completed 62 dives with us during the week stay, here is a quote from David’s email.

“Just a quick note to thank you both for your efforts during our recent holiday.  We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and the weather gods were kind to us to make it close to perfect.  Could you also pass on our thanks to Jim, Luke and Amy – their efforts were appreciated as well. The diving and boat were great. I’ll be an advocate of Nautilus Watersports for anyone that will listen to me”

We can’t forget Bobbi and Neil for coming and diving with us also and for introducing Dave to the wonderful world of diving and also your family and friends. Great fun had by all that were here while these guys were diving with us there was lots of laughs and a few bad Kiwi jokes, not only did they manage to also knock off quite a few dives while here at Nautilus but Neil and a few of the boys manager to also get a day’s fishing out with us on Shogun and were able to come back and provide everyone with fresh fish for dinner. Here is a quote from Neil facebook comment

“Thanks for a wonderful weeks diving and days fishing guys! Consider yourself thoroughly recommended”.

While we had a great family of five; Michelle, Murray, Sarah, Alex & Jasmine here completing their PADI Openwater course along with several couples Ash & James along with Stephanie & Ernst also completing their PADI Openwater course at the same time, we were able to get a few happy snaps of the their pool training and also some underwater snaps of them all relaxing on the 6mtr safety bar.

Once again the management and staff would like to thank everyone that comes and dives with us here at Nautilus Watersports, Vanuatu.

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Rating: 8 out of 10 (from 67 votes)

Last month I commenced an article on our dive experiences in Vanuatu while on a recent holiday. This month I wrap up the story with a report on the other three Dives that we did on ‘Ollie’s Lolly’, ‘Mele Reef’ and ‘The Twin Bommies’.

Day two commenced the same as day one with an 0730hrs start at Nautilus Watersports. We were ‘old-hands’ now and knew the drill. Nautilus Watersports offers a secure lock-up for your dive gear if you are doing multiple dives over several days and after rinsing our gear the day before we had taken advantage of this ‘free’ service. So after finding a staff member to ‘unsecure’ the secure lock-up we proceded to load the ‘Cowrie’ with our gear. While we were doing this, the company shuttle turned up after its run around the resorts to pick up the days customers. There were a couple of familiar faces from the day before, as well as a couple of new faces, giving a total of seven divers for the day.

Day Two

Dive Three − ‘Ollie’s Lolly’

It didn’t take long to load the ‘Cowrie’ and we were soon on our way, steaming out of Port Vila harbour into Mele Bay. After the now familiar safety and dive briefs, we were left to our own devices to fill in the half hour or so it was going to take to get to our first dive site. I elected to head up onto the roof to get some vitamin D and it wasn’t long before we were advised to get ‘suited and booted’ and prepare to enter the water.

Our first dive site of the day was named ‘Ollie’s Lolly’ which was a large reef that starts at 10 metres and heads down to a maximum depth of 25 metres. As we were a smaller group than the previous day we went as a single group with one of the staff leading and the rest of us following and another two staff members following behind. We initially dropped down onto the top of the reef at 10 metres and then followed a rift in the reef down gradually getting deeper until we were around the maximum depth. The first thing I noticed was the large expanses of dead coral. I found out later that a tropical cyclone had ripped through the area back in February which killed off most of the coral. It was amazing to see the new re-growth coming back.

It was during this dive that I finally ‘found Nemo’. This was the third island holiday I had been on in recent years and the first two (Rarotonga and Samoa), ‘Nemo’ was nowhere to be found. So I was rapped when our guide pointed out the small fish hiding in the anemones. Initially I didn’t recognise them as they were a brown colour not the orange that I was expecting, this was due to the loss of colour perception at depth. After seeing our first Clownfish they were a regular appearance on future dives and even when snorkling.

I wasn’t paying too much attention to navigation, relying on our guide to keep us on track but it wasn’t long before I noticed we had somehow made it back to the top of the reef and our guide was signaling us to head up to the 5 metre safety stop bar attached to the boat. While undertaking the safety stop an alarm on my dive computer went off and when I checked it I was surprised to find that 45 minutes had elapsed.

Dive Four − ‘Mele Reef’

Once back aboard we slipped the mooring and headed to our next dive site, Mele Reef. The transit time was taken up with the now familiar roll call, swapping tanks and a hot cuppa and cake. There was a bit of a delay when the boatman couldn’t find the right buoy to indicate the mooring, but this wasn’t a problem as it increased our surface interval, thereby giving us a longer bottom time for the next dive. Maybe a chartplotter would be a good investment.

The Mele Reef dive is described as an extensive reef that rises up in the middle of Mele Bay to around 8 metres from the surface. The plateau is host to a large vareity of reef life including batfish, clown triggerfish and white tip reef sharks. The verticle wall descends to at least 35 metres and has interesting gullies and alleys to investigate along the way. I would have to say the description is accurate although we didn’t see any white tip reef sharks on any of the dives we did in Vanuatu. I have come across them on dives in Samoa and Rarotonga and they are nothing to worry about when you do see them as they usually keep their distance. As with ‘Ollie’s Lolly’ there was more evidence of the effect of the February cyclone. Despite this there were still some stunning examples of fan coral to be seen.

On all the previous dives I had done on this trip, all the ‘items of interest’ had been pointed out by our guide, so I was over the moon when I noticed (I almost typed spotted) a moray eel peeking out from a crevice in the coral before anyone else had. I hadn’t seen one of these before and it didn’t seem to be perturbed by my presence. The markings are quite stunning and despite those razor sharp teeth they are still a beautiful fish.

As with all of the other dives we had done in Vanuatu, this one achieved a maximum depth of around 25 metres and was followed by a two stage safety stop regime. Once back aboard and all divers were accounted for we slipped the mooring and headed back to Port Vila. The ‘Cowrie’ isn’t the fastest vessel around and we had plenty of time to reflect on another great days diving before it was time to unload and rinse our gear.

Day Three

Dive Five − ‘Twin Bommies’

Nautilus Watersports do their two tank dives in the morning and their single dives in the afternoon, so our fifth and final dive of the trip started at a leisurely 1230hrs. When we turned up there was a group doing a ‘Discover Scuba’ course in the pool so we busied ourselves preparing our gear for the dive. The crew were putting a few sets of gear on board as well and as soon as we were ready, the ‘Discover Scuba’ course got out of the pool and straight onto the boat. The ‘Twin Bommies’ was not far from Port Vila harbour and our transit time was taken up with the now familiar safety and dive briefs as well as getting suited and booted. The site is described as featuring a sheer wall as well as two ‘bombora’ formations riddled with grottos with the depth ranging from 10 to 25 metres over the edge of the drop-off. Most species of tropical fish can be found at the site and they are comfortable with divers and not afraid of flash photography.

After dropping into the water we descended down the mooring line to the top of the reef at 10 metres. This was where the ‘Discover Scuba’ crew would spend their time but we headed over the side and made our way slowly down the sheer wall to the now familiar 25 metre mark. This provided an awesome feeling of freedom as in places we could not make out the bottom below us. This is where the true feeling of floating in space comes from and is something that I have not experienced often while diving as we made our way along the wall our guide pointed out items of interest such us some delicate soft corals and other marine life.

At one point my son got my attention and was pointing to something. I couldn’t work out where he was pointing until I just about swam into a Hawks Beak turtle feeding on something in the coral. The turtle was totally oblivious to us as he devoured its meal and we must have stayed and watched it for at least five minutes

.

We soon ascended to the top of the reef again and made our way to the two Bommies that give the site its name. There certainly was a large variety of colourful fish and marine life around them and although I asked the guide what they all were when we were back on board, I can’t recall what they were.

All too soon the dive came to an end and we were making our way back to Port Vila harbour. On reflection, I would have to say that the variety of dive sites and marine life around Port Vila far exceeds that of any of the other islands that I have dived. The value for money was excellent and we barely scratched the surface of the diving opportunities in Port Vila itself let alone the rest of Vanuatu. I would also have to rate the safety systems and procedures used by Nautilus Watersports as the best I have experiences overseas and would thoroughly recommend the to anyone holidaying in Vanuatu.

By Mike Black

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Rating: 8 out of 10 (from 77 votes)

Diving in Vanuatu

During a recent holiday to Vanuatu, I (along with my son and brother-in-law) took the

opportunity to do five dives with Nautilus Watersports in Port Vila. While most people who go to Vanuatu for a diving holiday target ‘Million Dollar Point’ and the ‘President Coolidge’ on Espiritu Santo as ‘must do’ dives, our budget (in both money and time) did not permit such a luxury. I am happy to say that there is plenty of excellent diving in and around Port Vila that will satisfy most eco-tourists.

Prior to departing for Vanuatu I had been in contact with Nautilus Watersports and after an exchange of emails over a period of time we agreed on a dive program of five dives over three consecutive days which allowed us to complete the dives and fulfil our no-fly penalty with plenty of time to spare. The total cost per person for the five dives equated to NZ$300.00, so at NZ$60.00 per dive it provided good value for money. Additional costs included $50.00 per person for the Air New Zealand additional sports baggage allowance and another NZ$35 for the obligatory polo shirt.

Day One

Dive One − ‘The Cathedral’

If you are staying at one of the resorts in or around Port Vila, Nautilus Watersports will pick you up, but as we were staying at a private holiday home some distance out of town we had to make our own way to the dive shop by 0730hrs (FGS − don’t they know we’re on holiday).

After filling out the usual paperwork (Liability Disclaimers and Medical Questionnaires) we headed down to the gear shed to grab a wetsuit and some lead. I had already told them that my brother-in-law was a notorious air hog, so they had a couple of 15 litre steel cylinders ready for him.

We then boarded the ‘Cowrie’ (the ugly-as-sin but very functional dive boat) along with seven other divers, four dive guides and the boat master who would be accompanying us for the morning. As we headed out to our first dive site, ‘The Cathedral’ about 40 minutes away we were given a safety brief and a dive brief. We were told to be ready to hit the water as soon as we arrived as there was no mooring available and it was likely there would be a bit of a swell and we would be dropped close to the exposed shoreline.

Despite the 27_C water temp, it was recommended we dive in 3mm full wetsuits (the guides were in 5mm but three of our group decided to dive just in their boardies). I made sure I was ready to go as soon as we got to the dive site and was one of the first into the water to cool off. The was quite a current running so by the time the rest of the divers had entered the waterwe had a bit of a surface swim to the descent point.

As soon as we started our descent I saw a ray swimming along the bottom which was 26 metres below us − awesome viz. Once we got to the bottom we met up with our assigned guides, however our group ended up getting reassigned as one of the others had difficulties during the descent and ‘called’ the dive, so our guide returned to the boat with her. By now the current that we had encountered on the surface had taken us off target so we had quite a swim along the bottom to the cavern entrance all the time sucking up our precious air supply. We entered the cavern in separate groups waiting for the previous groups to come out before we went in. Although it is called a cavern, it is better described as a rift and my immediate thought was how it reminded me of Sawcut Gorge back in Marlborough. The cavern was probably 30 to 40 metres deep (from front to back) and the sunlight filtered through from the surface creating a surreal effect, the photos do not do it justice.

All too soon our guide was motioning for us to exit the cavern and commence or ascent. As we made our way up the near vertical wall he pointed out items of interest including small coral growths and marine-life that would have otherwise gone unnoticed. We performed two safety stops, the first for 3 minutes at 5 to 6 metres and the second for 2 minutes at 2 to 3 metres, then made our way to the surface where we were picked up by the ‘Cowrie’.

Once back on-board the roll-call was taken and we headed off to our next dive site which was the wreck of the ‘Konanda’ about 25 minutes away.

Dive Two − ‘The Konanda’

The transit time was spent having a complimentary hot drink and piece of cake while

discussing the various sights we saw on the dive. Those who had decided not to take a wetsuit appreciated a hot drink as they were feeling the effects of the water temperature towards the end of their dive. As we neared the site, we prepared for the next dive, changing cylinders and getting ‘suited and booted. There was a slight delay once we arrived at the site as another dive outfit was tied up to the mooring.

The ‘Konanda’ was a 45 metre long inter-island trader which was damaged in a vicious cyclone. She was sunk in 1987 in 26 metres of water on a flat sandy bottom after being carefully prepared so that penetration dives of the wreck into the cabins and holds are safe. The mast, derricks and rigging reach up to within 10 metres of the surface. After entering the water we followed our guide down the mooring line which was attached to the top of the mast. We then followed the mast down to deck level and headed to the bow. After the girls had done the cliche ‘Titanic’ poses at the bow we head back to the forward hold and made our way through the holds to the accommodation area. We then checked out the bridge and made our way through the corridors and cabins to the back of the ship.

During the dive brief, our guide mentioned that we would meet on the top of the bridge and have a cup of coffee. True to his word, we made our way forward again and made our way to the top of the bridge and sure enough, there was a setting of cups, saucers, plates and a teapot waiting for us. As we were now nearing the end of our dive we headed back to the bottom of the mast and slowly ascended up it. Once again, during the ascent our guide pointed out marine-life that otherwise would have gone unnoticed.

We then headed back to the surface completing the 5 and 2 metre safety stops.

Once back aboard, a roll call was held again and we each signed a dive-log proving that we had surfaced safely.

Note: The photgraphs were kindly provided by Nautilus Watersports and the article was written by Michael Black

To be continued next month…

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Rating: 9 out of 10 (from 60 votes)

Well another week has come and gone and we are half way through July and before we all know it it will be Christmas once again so have you thought about come for a visit as  everyone here at Nautilus would love to have you come diving  in Vanuatu with us.

We have had a great week with both the weather and sea conditions and we have had a couple of great families scuba diving with us, the Umbers family have introduced there 2 daughters Kelly and Gemma in to scuba diving and the girls have now both completed their Padi Openwater Course, we have also had the  Heap family diving  and James,  Stuart and Alyce have also completed there Padi Openwater Course, James went on to complete has his PADI Advance course while dad completes his PADI Wreck Specialty course, so well done to everyone that has completed the diving course while diving with us this week.

It has been a good month of diving with dugong sightings, hump back whales, cuttle fish, manta rays, Leapord sharks  and the list just goes on, the water temp is still around 25 to 26 degrees which is very nice and the days have been just perfect with blue skies and cobalt blue waters so don’t be a stranger we would love to see your smiling faces here.

Check out this link I am sure you will love it.  Diving with a Dugong

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Rating: 10 out of 10 (from 84 votes)

Not a very common occurrence seeing a good size leopard shark on our dive sites but this one would have been a good 10 feet long.

A couple of our guest were lucky enough to have this opportunity.  Malcolm was out with one of our research dives at the depth of 40mtrs on completing the research they had a bit of time to spare and were heading back to the surface when they can across this beautiful creature she/he was quite happy to just to hang around and have its photo taken.

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Rating: 8 out of 10 (from 27 votes)

We were on our honeymoon when we met the team from Nautilus and Leanne asked ‘has anybody ever wanted to jump off the back of a boat but hasn’t tried it yet?’ Of course Michael instantly jumped at the idea, dragging his new bride along! But the second we got wet, we were hooked! Our introductory dive took us to Twin Bommies which has become our loving friend, spending many hours exploring the reefs and playing with the fishes.
As soon as we arrived back at Nautilus, we booked our open water diving course. After studying our theory (over cocktails by the pool at our resort), Sonja (the middle one) was able to teach us many skills while we enjoyed the crystal clear waters of Port Vila.

After we got our open water ticket (see us celebrating in pic), we enjoyed a number of great dives including the Konada Wreck, where we discovered the loo, the wheelhouse and stopped for a cuppa tea on the wheelhouse roof.

We enjoyed our diving so much, we returned to Vanuatu the following year and went on more than 10 dives with our friends at Nautilus (with our instructors Lucy, Drew and the always helpful captain Freddy – see pics).

How can you beat two beautiful dives with 20 metre + visibility with homemade cakes in between (see pic of instructor Lucy and friend below).

Some of the highlights of our dives include: scaling the wall and going under the staghorn at Twin Bommies; the phenomenal wrecks of Semle Federsen, Star of Russia and Konanda; and the amazing viz and colours of the tropical reefs and sea life.
We’ve already booked our third trip in less than 2 years and our mission this trip is to do a night dive to see the turtles!

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Rating: 9 out of 10 (from 54 votes)

VILA DIVE ADVENTURE

Soon after arriving in Port Vila we made our way down to Nautilus Watersports, being keen divers from Sydney and having just dived the Coolidge we wanted to see some reefs, we found the staff very helpful and were able to do all the dives that we requested including the Tasman a plane wreck and two other wrecks as well, the reefs were just amazing with heaps of fish and other critters.

After doing the Tasman plane wreck dive we decided to snorkel back to the dive shop, on the way we saw a seahorse and a really strange looking worm on the wall just in front of the jetty of the dive shop. I have put together some photo’s to view as this is a photographers paradise. With so much to see it’s great to know that the staff are safety conscious and very knowledgeable of the local area.

Regards Grant and Suzi (Sydney, Australia – 30th Dec 2008)

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Rating: 8 out of 10 (from 90 votes)