Chowder Bay Archives - Baha Adventures

19Aug 2023 by Warren Prior No Comments

Blue-ringed Octopus at Clifton Gardens

Diving

Saturday morning got off to an early start as I headed down to Clifton Gardens to lead one of Frog Dive's shore dives. It was a beautiful morning, with an orange glow coming off the sun, not a cloud in the sky, and absolutely no wind to speak of. The sea was dead flat, and judging from the surface, visibility looked good for Clifton Gardens. I was expecting 7 divers, but the group grew to 9 when the shop's boat dive was cancelled due to poor conditions. Thankfully Cec had offered to help out, and arrived shortly after me. The group group geared up in the parking lot, and once everyone was ready, I gave the dive briefing around one of the many tables scattered around the field. I opted…

02Jun 2023 by Warren Prior No Comments

Underwater Statues at Chowder Bay

Diving

Clifton Gardens (also known as Chowder Bay) is a polarising dive site located in Sydney Harbour. Talking to divers, they tend to either love it, or hate it. Regardless, all Sydney-based divers have dived it at least one (well, almost all). So why is it so polarising? Well, for a variety of reasons. To get the negatives out of the way first: visibility is generally poor (especially if your buoyancy is poor and you kick up the bottom), there's definite friction between the fishermen and divers, and it can be dirty due to people throwing all sorts of objects off the wharf. Another reason people may not enjoy it is that you don't see much if you move too quickly. On the plus side, if you have good buoyancy and…

17Dec 2022 by Warren Prior No Comments

Taking Someone For Their First Dive

Diving

The other day I had the privilege of taking someone on their first ever dive after completing their open water training. We opted to head down to Clifton Gardens as they'd done one of their training dives there, and had absolutely loved the site. We arrived arrived at Clifton Gardens just after 3pm and got straight down to kitting up. It was surprisingly quiet for a warm summer's afternoon, but I certainly wasn't complaining. Walking along the wharf, the water looked decently clear from the surface, which was more good news for us. We did a giant stride off the wharf, and did a quick buoyancy check before descending to the bottom. Being with a first timer, we spent the first couple of minutes getting comfortable, and then headed off…

05Jun 2022 by Warren Prior No Comments

Underwater Cleanup at Clifton Gardens

Diving, Event

One of the things I've learned (or finally got to witness) as a diver is that a large percentage of our waste ends up in our oceans, which damages both the fauna and flora. However, despite how large this problem is, even the smallest of gestures can help. If not us, then who? So on Sunday morning I headed down to Chowder Bay where I met up with the Frog Dive crew to clean up the area under the Clifton Gardens wharf. Clifton Gardens is one of New South Wales premiere muck diving sites, with incredible macro photography on offer for those willing to put their eyes to the test. We split up into buddy pairs, and allocated areas to clean. My buddy and I focused on the area inside…

29Dec 2021 by Warren Prior No Comments

December Diving at Clifton Gardens

Diving

December was a dive heavy month for us. Nick (and family) travelled down from Brisbane, which meant a week of near daily diving as we explored Sydney's plethora of shore based dive sites. And as with many Sydney divers, their journey began at Clifton Gardens. Clifton Gardens from the air Looking down on the Clifton Gardens dive site Nick and I made a last minute decision to do a night dive at Clifton Gardens on Christmas day. We arrived at around 7pm, and were immediately disappointed by the amount of rubbish left lying around from the Christmas day celebrations. After making a few weak excuses, and ensuring Nick things weren’t normally like this, we geared up and headed down to the water. We dropped below the surface at last light…

22Dec 2020 by Warren Prior No Comments

Getting My Open Water Diver Certification

Diving

My life has always include the ocean. Growing up, our family holidays were spent surfing, snorkelling, and fishing at Cape St. Francis (South Africa). And when we weren't holidaying there, we were often rock fishing in the Transkei. I have many a fond memory of free-diving for abalone with my father in the cool Atlantic waters of Cape Town, before we moved to Durban. I then got into fly fishing, and spent many a year targeting trevally (and multiple other game species) in the salty water of Cape Vidal. And then, after arriving in Australia, one of my first purchases was a Hobie kayak to get me out onto Sydney Harbour. I just can't seem to escape it. So when an excuse (finally) landed on my doorstep (in the form…

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