Diving at BlueBay DC, Pag, Adriatic, Croatia September 2005

Introduction

This was a series of six dives at the BlueBay Dive Center, island Pag, at the Adriatic sea in September 2005. I joined the Dive Club of the company I work for (T-Mobile Hungary), so I was accompanied by people I knew and like. In addition to that my wife and one of my sons also joined me though they did not dive.

BlueBay DC is located at Stara Novalja on the island Pag. This is a small village with many dive centers. BlueBay is operated by Hungarians and is member of UEF. The lodging is at an apartment house five minutes from the DC. The village is quiet and peaceful.

Getting to the village from Budapest was relatively easy. It took 600km mostly highways. Traveling through Croatia was fun and not too alerting. During the summer I visited Greece - if you recall my report from Aegean Dive Center – where we got through Serbia and Bulgaria by car. That was an alerting drive. I did not feel safe there due to the bad roads, poor surrounding. I was prepared for something similar in Croatia, but I did not get what I expected, which in this case I liked.

Croatia is much closer to the European culture than Serbia at the moment. At least the highway and the coastline have good roads, toilets are clean, people are kind. There are, after all, bad things, but generally they are minor. I have purchased two brand new AA batteries to my second camera, and they were totally worn out. At a restaurant I had to wait 20 minutes for a bill and the waiters were not kind. But this latter one may happen anywhere.

We traveled from the main land to the island Pag on a ferry boat that runs every hour. We arrived early night just after sun set seeking the dive center. I believed that BlueBay is the only DC at the village and was happy to see the first scuba flag, but soon I could realize that there are plenty DCs there. Even though after a while and after two kilometers on the main road of the village I could spot the small van in front of the DC bearing Hungarian text on it and the UEF logo. That was a sign for us.

The first dive day was Friday. The morning started 9 making all the administration. I had to fill in the papers stating my responsibility, to hand my OWD card to the DM, who was also an instructor, and also to pay 100Kuna to purchase an annual dive permission of the state Croatia. (That is approximately 13.5EUR) Administration was followed by packing. Everybody has got a plastic box to pack all their stuff into and then put the traveling dive baggage away. This helps the things remain organized and not to waste time seeking your own things. The boxes have labels where you write your name, and they also have different colors. There were also separate hangers for the clothes and for the boots.

I will not detail all six dives in a single report. It would be boring as opposed to the real dives, which were interesting and exciting. The first dive was a kind of intro dive with the deepest point 19m for me and something similar for the others. This one was started a bit late because of the administration, but even this delay did not prevent József Serfel, the DM to perform a through full briefing first. During this dive he gained some more information about our skills that helped him to plan the following dives.

Dive places were located near the DC and there was a boat to ship us there. The night dive was the only exception, when we started to sink from shore. But this time let me say some few words about the boat first.

Generally there was nothing special about the boat, and I believed that each dive boat should look and equipped like this one. However my company told me that this boat was equipped exceptionally well so that I won't be surprised later when I meet some other boats.

The boat was designed for 12 person plus two crew stuff. It had two benches on the sides and one in the middle. The middle one was for the tanks made of steel, painted. It had cylinders on it welded so that we could set the tanks with the BCDs already fixed on into those securely. At the end of the boat there were two dive ladders helping us to climb up after the dive. The rails at the side of the boat helped stand up from the bench all equipped; fins in hand. I also had a good use of the rails attaching my 3m rope to slowly immerse my cam and not have it on my hand when doing the big A step into the water. This boat is a perfect dive boat.

We have seen typical Adria sea life during the dives. Fishes were swirling around, sponge and gorgonia patches were on walls, shark egg was laid, octopus was sleeping in its cave, rock fish was sleeping. We were diving in separate dives along walls, over reefs, some underwater canyon and a small cave.

To be honest, and to calm those down, who know I am a beginner OWD: the entry of the cave was only 2m (6feet) long, it was wide having plenty room for two divers and was lit well so there was no chance to miss the exit when we were going to return. This setup is something that does not need cave diver equipment nor qualification. Inside the cave the air was not breathable, so we kept the second stage in place in our jaws and using our lamps we could see magnificent dripstones. There are some pictures of these below.

Having a look at the diving profile some weeks later I realized that we have spent two minutes inside the cave. It seemed like I was there just 10 seconds gazing amused. I had a sensational feeling of the untouched beauty of the place. This was something special even though I have seen many dripstones at several caves before. We were tourists at those places walking along crated safe pavements in troops. Those dripstones were seen by tens of thousands of people during the recent years. This place however was available only for a few people, who I feel close myself: for the divers' community. I will sure dive to Hévíz next year. Stay tuned for the report by then.

I just realized at the moment I write this that the lamp I used in that cave is resting somewhere in the lake Dorog, where it was lost by Tamás Patkós yesterday. (I am lagging with these reports.)

During the three days I took part in a night dive. This was my first and as such József delivered a short education. He delivered the subjects of the standard theory of night dives even talking about sharks and barracudas, which are not existent in Adria. Well, there are sharks, but we did not have that luck.

This dive started from the shore each of us having two lamps, one in hand and a reserve. My wife was sitting on a bench at the beach seeing our underwater activity for a long time. She told me that except the deepest part, which I know we did behind a reef, she could see the lights all the way along we moved.

József demonstrated his technical jacket capable lifting 40kg. He lifted the anchor of the dive boat swimming five meters away. The depth was only 5m. I realized that he did not do it frequently when he released the anchor racketing himself to the surface. No problem: he came down in no time and we continued.

This time I could see animals awake. Crab was moving along, octopuses were crawling on the see floor, a seastar was walking on its thousand feet, and most of all we could see two giant congers.

Congers have huge eyes that are very sensitive. They hunt their preys in the light of the moon and stars filtered by 20 meters water. I did not know that. Facing our lights the huge conger withdrew to its cave. József tried to hide his lamp so that we could still see it but the conger feels a bit safer and peeks out. However I and the other divers did not follow his act for a while until we realized what he wanted. When all the lights were switched off but József's light dimmed only the conger poked out it's giant head. Even József was amazed. After the dive climbing to shore he was explaining the adventure to his friends with full of enthusiasm though he dives three to six times a day in that harbor.

During the dives I have made a few diving mistakes. However I feel ashamed of those, to discuss here; they were not serious to cause DCS or even close to that; and luckily this report is long enough without analyzing them. To have it short: "no-fly" also means do not climb 600m above sea level.

The pictures that I made in the water and on shore are listed here.