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Alderman & Mercury Islands: The Facts...
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to jump to the relevant area):
Where is it? About the Aldermans and the Mercury Islands and Why it's worth a visit? Recommended dive sites? The Aldermans and the Mercury Islands Gallery? Local operators? The Aldermans and the Mercury Islands Web Sites and further reading?
The Aldermans and The Mercury Islands are situated in the Bay of Plenty with the closest town being Tairua for the Aldermans and Whitianga for the Mercs.
See
Map 
About The Aldermans and Mercury Islands and Why it's worth a visit.
It's nice and easy to get to! It's about a two hour drive from Auckland and the islands are fairly close to shore. Neither are Marine Reserves and there fore are both popular and very productive hunting grounds, if you are that way inclined!
The islands offer some exciting, interesting diving, usually with fairly clear water. The Aldermans has some fantastic pinnacles and drop off's if you have an experienced group.
The diving is often compared to that of the Poor Knights but definitely lacks the amazing above and below arches and features despite being in the same volcanic chain of islands. Underwater the life is productive and there has been some unusual sightings over recent years (see Wadedoak.com divers discussion, regarding Queensland Grouper!!).
Great
Mercury Islands is privately owned, the remaining islands in the group are managed
by DoC. and are popular diving and fishing spots. There's often good scallop
beds around the islands and these can easily reached with a suitable boat from
Whitianga, Opito Bay and other near by beaches. The owners of the Great Mercury
Island are quite reasonable and will allow people on their island as long as
some basic rules are followed, the islands owned and managed by DoC vary and
are protected, landing is prohibited in some locations, check on Doc website
for details.
Sea Things Favorite Dive Sites
The Mercury outer islands on the Eastern side seem to hold the most exciting dives but other sites are great too. The Aldermans have many options available including some deep pinnacles and some secret spots only revealed occasionally by skippers.
Out past the Mercury Islands lies Cuvier Island. This island is difficult to reach and and is adversely effected by weather conditions due to the shape of the island (round- little protection). Diving this far out can be quite wild and anything can occur here. There has been reports of Oceanic White Tips not far from here at the Northern of the Coromandel Peninsula in the past! Many divers travel out to Cuvier to retrieve World War 2 hardware that was dumped in the area. Diving in certain areas can reveal a huge number of discarded items including bundles of cordite-remember collecting live ammunition is both dangerous and illegal!
Want to recommend your favorite site (please do!), comment on a dive site or add to the description- e-mail the details and ideally GPS coordinated to: myfavedivesites@seathings.co.nz
The Aldermans and Mercury Islands Gallery?
All Photographs by Crispin Middleton, permission must be sought before using any of these pictures.
Please click on the image to open a larger image in a new window.
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Superb Blow holes on Great Mercury Mercury Islands |
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Alderman Islands
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Looking out to Cuvier Island
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The Group on Taranui |
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Eagle Ray Alderman Islands |
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Jim heading into bay Mercury Island |
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Firebrick Starfish Mercury Island |
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Taranui Mercury Island |
Sea Things Favorite Operators:
Taranui Charters Run by a local character called Jim. The boat is great and there is accomadation for over nighters or single days.
Other operators
The
Aldermans and Mercury Islands Web Sites and further reading?
Please e-mail any web-site or book suggestions to: suggestions@seathings.co.nz