The third largest island in the world, Borneo divides its land between three countries: Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei, with the Malaysian territories forming the states of Sabah and Sarawak. Malaysian Borneo is renowned for offering some of the island’s best dive-sites but quality encounters can be experienced in all three countries. For a quick guide to the regional highlights, read on…
To dive Chuuk Lagoon is to enter, quite possibly, the greatest underwater museum on the planet.
Chuuk State (formerly known as Truk) lies in the Western Pacific, somewhere between Hawaii and Papua New Guinea. You have to zoom right in on Google-maps to realise that this clutch of coral islands even exists, but they actually form one of the biggest atolls in the Pacific.
Bunaken is one of those exceptional patches on the planet that seems as if it was tailor-made for scuba-diving. A small island just off the coast of Sulawesi, in the Indonesian archipelago, divers from all four corners of the planet flock here throughout the year to indulge in its underwater treasures. Just what is it that makes it so spectacular?
To discover the largest collection of WWII wrecks on the planet, head over to the Western Pacific and book yourself on a Chuuk Liveaboard.
Northeast of Papua new Guinea lies one of the world’s largest lagoons, where 822 square miles of tropical waters are enclosed by a circle of barrier reef. Within this safe-haven, an entire fleet of Japanese war-crafts lies submerged.
Just a few hours’ flight time from the UK, the Mediterranean is home to a unique ecosystem of underwater life and some of the most famous shipwrecks on the planet. Spanning the southern edge of the European Union and covering an area of 2.5 million km², the Mediterranean Sea holds nine per cent of the world’s marine biodiversity.
Most of us take our able-bodies for granted, grumbling when we feel a twinge of backache and feeling miserable when an injury prevents us from getting on with daily life. But for individuals who suffer long-term disabilities, certain aspects of daily life can present significant challenges.
With their plunging depths and fascinating features, wall dives present some of the most colourful and breath-taking scuba experiences going. There are simply stacks of spectacular wall-diving sites located throughout the globe and, from Red Sea liveaboards to Caribbean cruises, touring some of the planet’s best underwater walls should take high priority on any diver’s ‘to do’ list.
For the majority of us, enjoying the wonders of scuba means marvelling at colourful coral reefs in the Caribbean, diving with hammerhead sharks off the coast of Costa-Rica or experiencing one-in-a-lifetime Maldives Liveaboard adventures. But, for a strange few, sinking down to unknown depths and diving so deep that their lives are put under serious risk is where they get their kicks.
Apart from your Open Water, or beginner’s diving certification, you don’t need any special qualifications in order to start boat diving but, if you’ve splashed out on a Red Sea or Maldives Liveaboard adventure this year, for example, and don’t feel confident about diving from a boat, you could consider taking PADI’s Boat Diver speciality course before you leave.
Your BCD, or ‘buoyancy control device’, is what keeps you bobbing at the surface and helps you maintain a comfortable level of buoyancy underwater. Essentially, it’s a jacket that fills with air and works by the diver controlling the air ‘bladders’, or ‘cells’ inside, using the automatic or manual inflation hoses.
If you’re thinking about buying your own BCD, there are two main types to choose from: jacket or back-mounted.