Diving in Lake Zurich, October Edition

Yes, you can dive in Lake Zurich in October. Yes, it is cold. No, there's not a whole lot to see down there. Surprisingly, it's only about 15 Celsius (all year round, apparently), and a 3mm wetsuit with a hood kept us warm enough for two back-to-back 30-minute+ dives at about ~5m. So why were we doing this, in October, on a cloudy day with < 3m visibility underwater?

With today's dives, Ramya and I finally managed to get the PADI OWD certification out of the way, and can now just go somewhere, rent gear and dive without needing to arrange for a special instructor for ourselves. After 7 dives in different countries, it was about time.

So what's under the surface in the Zurisee? Aside from tyres and old shoes, you mean? There are _really_ old trees still rooted in the ground, back from the day when some parts of the lake were above the surface of the water. And a _lot_ of plants. Here's a nice article on the kinds of underwater plants one can find in the Zurisee: http://www.psteinmann.net/bio_wasserpfl.html And of course, there are tons of European Perch ("Egli" in Swiss-German) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_perch swimming around. It's not an orgy of psychedelic colours like a coral reef, but like with most places (even those not underwater), there are interesting things everywhere if you go look for them.