Tourists flock to dive in and swim with seals off NSW south coast

Move over whale sharks, sea turtles, manta rays – seals are the kids on the block everybody wants to go diving with.

Swimming with seals at the Barunguba/Montague Island Nature Reserve near Narooma, off the south coast of NSW. Picture: Alex Coppel

Move over whale sharks, sea turtles, manta rays – seals are the new kids on the block everybody wants to go diving with.

Francois van Zyl, who runs Underwater Safaris with his wife out of Narooma on NSW’s south coast, said demand for their diving with seals experience had grown in the past few years.

“We’re getting tourists from all over the world who drop into ­Narooma specifically to do this ­activity,” he said.

“We got people from South ­Africa, Russia, the United States.”

At the Barunguba/Montague Island Nature Reserve. Picture: Alex Coppel

The naturally inquisitive seals made good diving companions, he said.

“They’re very playful, they’ll come and interact with you,” he said. “They want to come and see what you’re up to – they’ll swim around you.

“Sometimes they’ll quite happily lounge in the water and just stare at you.”

Mr van Zyl said he took out two or three groups a day from Narooma to Montague Island, a small island just 9km off the coast of NSW.

The island has popular “haul-out” spots for the seals, where they go to sun themselves on the rocks. The local species are the Australian fur seal and the New Zealand fur seal.

Swimming with seals on Barunguba / Montague Island Nature Reserve near Narooma, on the South Coast of NSW. Picture: Alex Coppel

“My wife and I come from Cape Town in South Africa and we used to do a lot of seal diving over there,” Mr van Zyl said. “When we came over here and spotted the seals, we obviously jumped in and cruised around with them.”

The Australian fur seal and New Zealand fur seal – aka the long-nosed fur seal – are classified as species of least concern. Their respective populations recovered after being heavily hunted for their coats during the 1800s.

Swimming with seals on Barunguba / Montague Island Nature Reserve near Narooma, on the South Coast of NSW. Picture: Alex Coppel

“Usually the best times of the year are from, let’s say, February until the end of April,” Mr van Zyl said. “That’s when the water’s generally the warmest and you get to jump in with some seal pups, which is unbelievable.

“A lot of seals born in November, December are now in that four-month age bracket where they’re swimming out of the nurseries. They have a tendency to come a little bit closer.”