WellingtonNZ.com,
New Zealand 

Located at the southern-most tip of the North Island of New Zealand, and surrounded by coastline, Wellington boasts a large number of excellent and diverse scuba diving and snorkelling sites. While these sites are well known to the local dive community, Wellington’s unique underwater world remains unknown to the vast majority of Wellingtonians, and national and international visitors.

So why dive in Wellington? Because it is easy! Most of Wellington’s unique and diverse sites are accessible from the shore. This means less expensive and more accessible diving as you can simply drive up and dive in, instead of paying for an expensive boat charter to get to a dive site.

The best known dive sites in Wellington are on the South Coast and include sites within the Taputeranga Marine Reserve. These sites are made up of rocky reefs. Bottom compositions are either weedy (in the protected bays) to pebbly then leading to heavy sand. Depths go from shore to about 20m with the average dive being about 12m deep. The South Coast has an average water visibility of about 8m but the visibility can be as good as 15m if the conditions are right.

Diving here does present some challenges and there are places you can’t go, so always go with an experienced guide. Inner Harbour sites also have good archaeology pointing to Wellington’s rich maritime and port history.

Creatures you might see include Red and Blue Moki; Kahawai and King Fish; Banded, Spotty and Scarlet Wrasse; 18 types of Triple Fin; Butter Fish and Blue Cod; Eels; Hagfish; Sting Rays; Octopus; Crayfish; Paua and if you are very lucky Trumpeter and Carpet Shark. As well as a huge variety of fish and plant species, several times a year Orca, dolphins, and the occasional Southern Right Whale are seen in and around the harbour and coastline.

Then there is the weather. It is pretty unusual for a dive to have to be cancelled in Wellington. This is because dive sites on our South Coast are protected from the northerly wind, and sites in the Inner Harbour are protected from the southerly wind. In Wellington, water temperatures in the colder months (May – August) range between 8˚C and 13˚C and, in the warmer months (September – April), from 13˚C to 19˚C.

For more information visit www.thediveguys.co.nz