Cham Island
Even though I spent nearly all of April in Vietnam, I somehow managed to miss out on the popular dive sites in Nha Trang. For one reason or another, I just didn’t make it there.
I did manage to squeeze in one day of diving while in Hoi An in between getting some shirts, dresses, and pants tailored.
I went out with Cham Island Diving and while it wasn’t the best dive company I’ve ever used nor was diving in Hoi An anything spectacular, it was still good to be out in the water again since it’s been eight long months since my trip to Roatan, Honduras.
Cham Island Divers
I did two dives and froze by butt off on the first dive. I miscalculated the temperature of the water.
Note to self: Use Google next time instead of doing any calculations in my head! If I had Googled “22C to F”, I would have gotten “71.6 degrees F” instead of an erroneous 80 F derived from fudged up brain math and I would have brought my thicker wet suit instead of a thin 3 mil meant for more tropical waters. It was the first time I ever had to end a dive due to being cold.
On my second dive, I borrowed another 3 mil to go over my own and was much more comfortable.
The visibility was pretty low at 25 to 30 feet (8 to 9 meters). This was due to a storm having just passed by the day before and something about the dive season having just started.
After our two dives, we were taken ashore to Cham Island for a lovely lunch and a bit of chill time on the beach and relaxing on hammocks.
Cham Island lunch
Between the crappy visibility, forgetting the flash diffuser for my underwater camera, and issues with my ears equalizing, this might have been the best photo I took:
Diving Hoi An
Oh! The cool thing about these dives, and it took me awhile to realize it, was that the coral was all alive!
Not that they were dead to begin with. But during day dives, you usually only see the hard structures of the coral, not the soft polyps that emerge from the many holes of the coral as they normally only come out at night to feed – a sight that makes night diving so spectacular.
I leave you with this short video which gives a better sense of the dive experience and the live coral!
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Abigail-mynappytales says
Wed, May 23, 2012 at 8:25 amI miss diving, oh well I’ve been only to 3 intro diving trips back in Davao. The last I didn’t enjoy I kept on hearing V crying while I was underwater.
ginger says
Wed, May 23, 2012 at 11:44 pmI had to google where Davao was! I hope to one day make it to the Philippines and do some diving there as well.
IshitaUnblogged says
Tue, May 22, 2012 at 8:56 pmThis is awesome, super awesome! While I haven’t done Scuba diving, I have done snorkelling (pls don’t laugh!) and my friends have always tried to convince me that I should go forScuba once… and then I’ll be addicted. Is the video taken by you? Wow!Wow!Wow!
ginger says
Wed, May 23, 2012 at 11:40 pmYes, the video I took myself with my underwater camera – just a canon point and shoot.
I hope you get the chance to try Scuba one day and I would never laugh at snorkeling – when I was in the British Virgin Island, I saw more spectacular things snorkeling than I did Scuba diving.
Devina Divecha (FooDee) says
Tue, May 22, 2012 at 9:05 amThat’s really cool! Now I really wish I could swim…I think it’d open up so much more to explore whenever I go somewhere like this on holiday.
ginger says
Wed, May 23, 2012 at 11:38 pmScuba diving is great – I really enjoy it and I hope you get the chance to try it out one day 🙂