April
29.4. 2013
Quick summary of this month:
Our Mozambique Trip was magic. No, we did not get to see a manta nor a whale shark. But this is not the only reason one goes to Mozambique. The country is exciting, primitive but warm in climate as well as spirit.
Barra Lodge is always the best place to be in Mozambique. Dom and his team from the dive centre are amazing and spoil us.Accommodation is perfect. Food is delicious. Diving is amazing. Weather is excellent. We love this place.
On our way back from Barra we stop over at Hlane Game Reserve in Swaziland. After two days in Swaziland it’s time to drive to Shelly Beach for the tigers !!! Before we leave Swaziland we hear about the bad weather coming to our East Coast. Real bad. Damn.
We get home and it is raining like hell. The weather office expects dangerous downpours. Wow. Winds of over 50 knots !! In the end we manage to do 2 out of the 8 planned dives on Protea Banks. We do 4 Baited Dives on one day. On 3 Baited Dives the divers see tigers. On the Baited Dive the Mozambique Guys are on there is no tiger shark…..Now we’re waiting for the day after the bad weather. Vis is as expected. Amazing. But no sharks……. We simply have to do this whole thing over!!!
After this we had a couple of dives in real bad vis. But even though the vis was around 5m we still had some interesting dives. Saw a Marlin on one.
Lately we have screaming current. I mean really extreme. While kitting up we drift over one Kilometer . Therefore the visibility is improving fast. We take a look at the caves. Raggies are not yet here. Maybe tomorrow ?
Baited dive today was magic. 8 Black Tips, 4 Zams and the good old tiger came in the 71st minute. Great day. We’ll do that again tomorrow…..
6.4. 2013
Bad visibility today and only two black tips on the bait. We have the weirdest conditions this year. Having said this, yesterday the divers had a stunning dive with Holey Moley the fearless tiger shark playing games with them for almost an hour.
4.4. 2013
Beulah’s great big yacht of 1. April was a great success. We received a lot of funny remarks on Facebook.
In the meantime however, the diving was not as much fun. Torrential rains over the Easter weekend have caused a lot of muddy river water to find its way right out to Protea Banks. The visibility was down to below 3m. As diving should always be fun, we decided together with all our divers to give it a miss for two days and waited for the big wind to stir things up a bit. Two days ago we did get the promised SW’ly which carried on the whole day yesterday as well. On our Baited Shark Dive yesterday we got a tiger, two zams and four black tips at a lovely 15m vis.
Today, while JP and Gregg are out baiting I am sitting at the Moz embassy waiting for my visa. Our trip to Mozambique, Swaziland and South Africa is starting on Tuesday. We are all excited and are running around for the final preparations.
Looking forward to being at the lovely Barra Lodge, diving in tropical paradise waters and having a good time with a magic crowd of people. There will surely be some great and unforgettable adventures waiting for us…..