When diving in Oz is mentioned, most people think of the Great Barrier Reef. Australia is massive though, and has plenty of other diving to offer. Perth has a lot of diving in the surrounding area, I only dived in the Marmion marine park and off Rottnest Island, but it was all good.
I dived with Diving Ventures SC, who operate out of Rottnest Island. They pick up divers on the Swan River, near the centre of Perth (I was there in 1992 though, so don't take this as gospel). They didn't have anything I'd report as a bad point, its too long ago to remember if they were particularly good either though.
None of the diving was particularly deep, The maximum depths we were in were around 20m. This was good as I did a couple of dives that lasted over an hour. The visibility ranged from 10-20m and the coral was pretty good - offering plenty of cracks, arches and small caves to explore. Life included Stingrays, Napolean Wrasse, Angelfish, Rockcods, Nagging Wives, Damselfish and giant Crayfish (Someone bagged an eight pounder on one of the dives).
There are a couple of shallow wrecks near Rottnest (Nice place for lunch between dives), The Denton Holme and The Macedon. If you hang around on them for long enough you’ll get buzzed by the tourist submarine. I wouldn’t travel to Perth solely to dive (It’s a fantastic place though), but if you go there don’t miss out.
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