Diving in Croatia

Some notes and thoughts about diving on Hvar, Croatia in June, 2008.

Went diving out of of the city of Jelsa on the island of Hvar in Croatia.

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I used the Divercenter Jelsa in Jelsa. They took me out in their Bombard Explorer with a pair of Yamaha 100's on it. It got you to the dive site pretty quickly. The visibility was great and the water was very blue. The first dive (6/24) was to an island called "Nudist Island". The name comes from a nudist camp on the main island across the channel.





The dive was to a max depth of 111' and had a bottom time of 0:42. I started out with 225 Bar and ended with ~25 Bar. The visibility was easily 50'. There was several neat things to see. It was only me an Wolf, the dive master. I was a bit too excited and used a lot more air then I expected. The dive went deep early and then gradually up the incline to the shallower water. Spent the last 15 minutes or more at 30' or less.





More photos from the dive are here



The second day (6/25) was 'plan raut' (not sure of the spelling). It was just me and Wolf again. This dive was to 107' and had a bottom time of 48 minutes. Again, the last part of the dive was at 30' or less. My camera locked up on me once on this dive. The auto-shutoff turned the camera off and Wolf found a nudibranch. I pushed the power on, and then pushed the 'close up' setting (probably too quickly) and the screen went 'pink'. I was bummed. I held the power button down for 5 seconds and it came back to life, but we had moved on from there by then.



The 2nd dive of the day was to Steenova.... I might have the name wrong, I'm trying to find a map so i can find the exact spot. At any rate, there were 4 divers on this trip. Not speaking German was a real detriment on this dive. The cove has straight rock walls and the water was as blue as you can imagine. The walls were full of holes and over hangs with lost of things to investigate. The dive had a max depth of 89' and a bottom time of 46 minutes. I had a squeeze in my right ear that made me miss a nice photo of a lobster. Got another shot at a nudibranch though

More photos from the dive are here

The last dive was to Zala Luka. It was another awsome dive. The water was clear and the sun was shining bright, so the vis was incredible. It was to a max of 92' with a bottom time of 54 minutes. A lot of the dive took place at 30' or so. Lots of Anenomes and schools of fish everywhere.





It was a great diving experience and I'm so glad I went. If you're ever in the area, you have to go diving. It's incredible.

Update (12/2/2008): Added gallery links to individual dive photos for dive 1 and 2.