The wet season is well and truly upon us here in the
Philippines, this makes planning diving trip a little more tricky – local
typhoons are pretty easy to tracking coming and going but strong winds,
normally induced by further afield storms can still result in rough seas even
though the rest of the weather can be great!
We've tried a lot of different ways to track the weather
conditions in the past few year – by far the most accurate and successful to
date has been the use of the Wind Guru website.
Wind Guru gives a simulated forecast for pretty much every
major costal location in pretty much every major landmass with a
coastline. Our regular ‘home’ dive spot
in Anilao has it’s own dedicated forecast which can be found at the link below:
The most useful features we find are the wind and wave
direction arrows, and the wave height estimates.
One of the real hidden gems of Anilao is the ability to
dodge the winds and waves by choosing the right locations. The Anilao landmass is basically a peninsular
with three coast orientations; unless there’s a storm very close it’s normally
calm on at least one of these orientations.
The wave heights given are swells out at sea, so don’t
expect to see shore waves quite that high!
Our quick guide for the wave heights is as follows:
0 to 0.5m – Flat and calm
0.5 to 1m – A little choppy in the afternoon, can make boat
rides bumpy in one direction
1 to 1.5m – Rough!
Still divable but expect bumpy boat rides and some sites to be
un-accessable
1.5m to 2m – Very Rough, diving may be possible from the
shore or in sheltered locations by boat but elsewhere will be too rough to dive
safely.
Over 2m – Very, Very Rough.
In short, don’t dive – it’s not worth the risk.
Next time you are planning a dive give it a try, Wind Guru
plans a full week ahead and is updated several times a day so gives a good idea
of what to expect before arriving at the dive site!
