The Red Sea is one of the most famous locations for the scuba diving tourism. It is the result of a gradable separation of the African and Arabian tectonic plates. Its salty and warm waters and its stunning, diverse and colorful marine life, as well as its historical wrecks and its incredible and surprising reef topography, form an idyllic destination for every enthusiast of the underwater world.
A liveaboard is a well-known option for those looking for a dedicated dive holydays in the Red Sea since it makes possible to get also interesting but further spots from coast; but maybe a wavy ground during days does not sound appealing for everyone; or few in-a-row dives already saturate you; or maybe you lack of money or time.
There is no excuses for deprive yourself of relishing the astonishing reef gem that the Red Sea is. The shallower coastal region is certainly the most intriguing from a diver’s point of view and a good sample of Red Sea’s gorgeous and colorful life is the underwater around Sharm El-Sheikh where we encounter varied coral reefs in abundance. This Egyptian city is situated in the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula. Some of the most famous and top-rated dive spots in the world, its warm waters and an airport with low-cost airlines operating on it, make the city an ideal short-trip destination to break your diving cravings down during winter (or any other season).
Using the city as dive base, it is possible to access
places such as Ras Muhammad National Park or the Straits of Tiran in local
daily full day boat trip. These two areas contained some of the best rated
dives in the world. In two days diving, I went to Ras Ghozlani and Shark &
Yolanda reef in Ras Muhammad and Thomas reef and Ras Nasrani in the Straits of
Tiran.
Sharm El-Sheikh city has been subdivided into five homogeneous centers, namely Nabq, Ras Nasrani, Naama Bay, Umm Sid and Sharm El Maya. Often, the best dive places are just accessible by boat although the site off the shore gun emplacements at Ras Nasrani has now become an excellent diving area, situated opposite Tiran Island.
Flying to Sharm el-Sheikh is the best way to enter the emplacement, since I don’t recommend driving through the mountainous desert in the Sinai Peninsula. The airport is quite small and not so time-consuming for entering the country through the immigration enforcement. For EU people, a Visa that costs around 20-25 $ is needed and it is possible to be paid in the same airport or doing it electronically and online as the latest, one week before the flight. The way from the airport to the Naama area is around 20 min, and it can cost from 12 to 25 $, depending the chosen option and your skills in negotiation.
Naama Bay
Naama Bay is considered the main hub for tourists in the city and it is the perfect destination for backpackers, young people, solitary travelers or whoever expecting an easy, comfortable and not luxury resorts getaway. It is a tourist emplacement where the tourist industry has boomed and made the city a comfortable place plenty of cafes, restaurants, hotels and bazaars in pedestrian streets along the sandy beaches.
I was staying in an economical hotel with convenient rooms and installations, nice swimming pool and polite and friendly staff. Just the wifi was not working out of the common places and I had some problems with my transfer from airport to the hotel, since I couldn’t find my driver when I landed the city after one-hour delay (even if they say he was there waiting for me). Anyway, I took one taxi and the hotel didn’t charge me for the missing transfer.
In Naama Bay there are many restaurants, from Pizza Hut or Mc Donalds to seafood and barbecue local food restaurants. Hotels or trips operators –if you are enrolled in one full-day activity- often offer menu or buffet at meal time. Supermarkets leave a lot to be desired. It is perfect for chocolate, local deserts, chips and snacks, but not so good for real or healthy food options. Just fruits are appetizing –but they do not taste as well as they look.
Beaches are all private properties and the access is restricted to the area that your hotel or dive operator has as a private place for their guests. These beaches are totally sandy. They are pretty, comfortable to swim and relax while sunbathing. But forget about a good snorkeling in there… too much sandy, no reef, no fishes… In short, no charm that could be a good incentive to carry the snorkeling goggles and fins with you…
Diving centers and schools are all together in Naama Bay area. I booked with Emperor Divers. The club is really near the boat port. The experience with them was all perfect. The dive masters were nice and professional. They let you prepare your own equipment, you have drinks at all times in the boat and the meal they serve on board – but with previous charge – is really tasty and plenty of vegetarian options – something that can become a really handicap sometimes-.
I did two full days dive trips. First one, we
sailed south to the Ras Muhammad National Park and the second day we went
opposite direction to the Straits of Tiran.
Ras Muhammad:
Ras Muhammad is the National Park in the most southern
tip of the Sinai Peninsula, located 12 km from Sharm. The protected area
spans in land and sea. The area under water comprises more than two times the
surface land area and it is always at the top list of the dive sites in Red Sea.
The specific sites for diving are chosen
depending on the weather and, mostly, current conditions. The climate here is
very dry and temperatures are quite mild during the winter, with daytime high
temperatures averaging around 23 °C and water temperature do not go below
20 ºC.
Ras Ghozlani
The first dive was in Ras Ghozlani, one of the
less crowded dive reefs in the National Park but with enormous interest, both
for the quality of its coral and marine life and for the low influx of divers,
that help conserving better the reef. The bay was closed due to the turtle
laying beach close by, but it opened to scuba divers only a few years ago, but
maintaining a restricted access and only allowed on its outer sides.
The wall of the Ras Ghozlani reef drops off steeply along a sandy slope from 6 m to a depth of 15 m, after which it gently slopes down to 25-40 m. Due to strong currents, drift diving is often done along the wall.
This spot is home to almost all of the coral species that live in Ras Muhammad with incredibly large gorgonians and acropora table corals and branching corals. Coral pinnacles, often covered with red and pink soft corals and populated by dense schools of beautiful sea goldies, rise up from the sand, especially by the drop-off. This formation creates fantastic and fascinating landscapes that take over the aspect of a real coral forest, especially close to the entrance to the bay.
A representative image, that will repeat in every dive spot of this trip, is the sea goldies coloring vividly in red the blue waters over the coral reefs. These are the most common anthias fish in the Red Sea. They are seen in schools and present sexual dimorphism being males more reddish or pinkish-purple with a longer dorsal fin, while females are bright yellow-orange with a purple stripe behind the eyes.
The table and branching corals offer shelter to batfish, glassfish or pigmy sweepers and groupers, whereas on the sandy slope there are bluespotted stingrays, pufferfish (genus Arothron and Diodon) or triggerfish (genus Odonus and Pseudobalistes).
This beautiful reef is home to some of the most characteristic reef fish in the Red Sea, such as Red Sea bannerfish, napoleon and others wrasses, moray eels, blackback butterflyfish, raccoon butterfly and others butterflyfish, emperor angelfish, sulfur damselfish, Rea Sea clownfish or anemonefish, clearfin lionfish and scorpion fish.
Shark and Yolanda Reef
Most divers heading to Sharm el-Sheikh for the first time are here to dive these two reefs. It’s hard to miss the two towering coral towers that are Shark and Yolanda Reef on the Ras Muhammad cape, quite possibly ranking as one of the best dives in the world. The two reefs rise from untold depths to the surface creating stunning and spectacular topography.
Due to the currents, this is a major drift dive destination – heading through Shark Reef and ending at Yolanda Reef – which offers the best of both sea life and the Red Sea's renowned soft coral underwater landscape, as well as the wreck of Yolanda.
In this dive it is important to be quick
entering into the water after jumping, otherwise it is possible to move on the
surface and miss the most amazing wall. The strong current can drift you along
the 800 meters deep wall, full of barracudas and snappers.
The first step is in the anemone city, where
the endemic clownfish can be seen as well as the lyretail hogfish or damselfish.
Then, a saddle populated with lush corals and a wide plateau with a coral
garden and masses of pinnacles, each one a cleaning station teeming with fish. Sea
life spotting here is abundant, with large schools of a variety of small,
colorful reef fish species. We enjoyed looking out for scorpionfish,
crocodilefish, red snappers, batfish, blackside hawkfish, unicornfish,
barracudas, groupers, tuna, huge morays and napoleons that frequent this dive
site all the year around. The coral variety is just as impressive as the sea
life, with colorful coral pinnacles and walls covered in bright coral gardens.
In the summer, all focus changes to the water
away from the reef where schools of fish collect together for mating; Twin spot
snapper, red snapper, batfish, unicornfish, barracudas and more which of course
sometimes attracts the predators. Different sharks species can be often seen such
as silkies, grey reefs, black tips and even tiger sharks have been seen at this
dive site.
Even in this season it is recommended to look
into the blue, pelagic life often full your left, making this a truly
remarkable underwater experience. Nevertheless I have to admit that sometimes
it is not easy because you’re just astonishingly focused on the reef and, at
least me, I was forgetting to do it in; I just looked to the blue twice or
three times.
Straits of Tiran:
The Straits of Tiran is a world famous dive
site that features Red Sea diving at its best. The site was named after the
Tiran Island, and it is between the Tiran Island and the Sinai Peninsula where
the Straits of Tiran dive site is located. The dive site combines four reefs -
Gordon, Thomas, Woodhouse and Jackson. These four reefs that lined up in a row
became world famous for their extraordinary diversity of corals. Strong
currents that bring nutrients to the reefs and an abundance of small reef fish that
can invite numerous pelagic species to this area.
Diving the Straits of Tiran is possible all year round. The average
water temperature in summer stays between 28 °C and 30 °C and in winter it can
drop to its minimum of 18 °C. There are four Straits of Tiran reefs.
Gordon and Thomas reef sit at the most southern end of the reef system so are
often dived together on a day trip.
Thomas Reef
Thomas Reef is the smaller reef in the Straits of Tiran and the most popular dive due to its variety of colorful hard and soft corals.
The dive is ruled by weather conditions, as it is often impossible to pick up divers on the western side. The dive is conducted as a drift dive with strong currents at the southern and northern ends of the reef. If there are proper conditions, it is possible to go around the other side of the reef, which is a wall that disappears into the depths, but it wasn’t in our case-.
The reef walls feature steep drop-offs leading down to yawning coral garden plateaus. The drift dive begins amongst lush, whip corals, gorgonian fans and heaps of black coral. Following this, a plummeting east wall explodes with soft corals.
Finally, Thomas Canyon’s opening lays in waiting at 35 meters for tech divers to venture into. In short, this site practically engulfs you into the deep blue water but in standard dive you just go over it not far away. It is reserved for adventure and technical divers.
Ras Nasrani
Due to the weather conditions and strong currents in the Straits of Tiran, this day we move on to the plan B. The second dive of the day, it was changed to Ras Nasrani, a local dive of Sharm el-Sheikh, just in front of the shore and opposite to Tiran Island.
It has become a popular site as it has varied topography and an interesting coral plateau. The site genuslly dips in a northerly direction, but this is subject to currents. It is a fringing reef, what means that extend from the shore, with no deep lagoon backreef if any.
It has a wall that reaches to about 50
m and the fringing coral plate is combined with large sandy bays and then the
reef forms into an extended plateau with a dense layer of coral. The plateau is
a good place to watch passing pelagic fish and the large gorgonian fan corals
that grow perpendicular to the current.
The wall has small pinnacles and crevices where see life is abundant. The coral garden ranges from 5 to 14m with soft coral, Gorgonian Fans and Porite Coral formations.
For me, there is no doubt it is one of my favorite dives I have ever done. The underwater landscape is just breathtaking. The porites area, the stony corals characterized by a finger-like morphology, is just amazing and there is no possible picture or video that can catch the astonishing paradise that it has created. Looking up and see hills of corals made an indescribable impression on me. Furthermore, the perfect visibility and the just few meters deep draw this beautiful place full of colors because of the abundant marine life living in there.
Colorful and beautiful reef fishes such as the
yellow sulfur damselfish and red sea goldies; schools of yellow goatfish and
blue Suez fusiliers; pairs of scissortail goby –first time I saw them-,
angelfish, bannerfish, butterflyfish, parrotfish, Picasso triggerfish;
Fishes:
Arabian angelfish (Pomacanthus asfur); Bicolor cleanerfish or bicolor cleaner wrasse (Labroides bicolor); Bicolour parrotfish or bumphead parrotfish (Cetoscarus bicolor); Black and white snapper (Macolor niger); Blackback butterflyfish (Chaetodon melannotus); Blacktail butterflyfish (Chaetodon austriacus); Blue-cheeked butterflyfish (Chaetodon semilarvatus); Bluefin trevally (Caranx melampygus); Bluespotted stingrays (Taeniura lymma); Bluestreak cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus); Brown surgeonfish (Acanthurus nigrofuscus); Cheek-lined wrasse (Oxycheilinus digramma); Chocolate dip chromis or damselfish (Pycnochromis hanui); Clark's anemonefish and yellowtail clownfish (Amphiprion clarkii); Clearfin lionfish or radial firefish (Pterois radiata); Clown triggerfish (Balistoides conspicillum); Coral grouper (Cephalopholis miniata); Crocodilefish (Papilloculiceps longiceps); Daisy parrotfish or bullethead parrotfish (Chlorurus sordidus); Diagonal butterflyfish or red sea raccoon butterflyfish (Chaetodon fasciatus); Dogtooth tuna or White tuna (Gymnosarda unicolor); Elegant unicornfish (Naso elegans); Emperor angelfish (Pomacanthus imperator); Eritrean butterflyfish or crown butterflyfish (Chaetodon paucifasciatus); Eyeshadow cardinalfish (Pristiapogon exostigma); False stonefish, false scorpionfish or the devil scorpionfish (Scorpaenopsis diabolus); Freckled Hawkfish (Paracirrhites forsteri); Furious fish (chromis dimidiate); Giant Moray Eel (Gymnothorax javanicus); Glassfish or pigmy sweepers (Parapriacanthus ransonneti); Gold-saddle goatfish, blue goatfish or yellowsaddle goatfish (Parupeneus cyclostomus); Great Barracuda (Sphyraena barracuda); Green birdmouth wrasse (Gomphosus caeruleus); Green chromis (Chromis viridis); Half and half chromis (Pycnochromis iomelas); Hooded butterflyfish or orangeface butterflyfish (Chaetodon larvatus); Indian mackerel (Rastrelliger kanagurta); Klunzinger's wrasse (Thalassoma rueppellii); Lined butterflyfish (Chaetodon lineolatus); Lionfish or Turkeyfish (Pterois miles); Lunar fusilier (Caesio lunaris); Lunar-tailed bigeye, goggle eye, or moontail bullseye (Priacanthus hamrur); Lyretail hogfish or lyretail pigfish (Bodianus anthioides); Maiden goby or orange-spotted sleeper-goby (Valenciennea puellaris); Masked Puffer (Arothron diadematus); Moon wrasse (Thalassoma lunare); Napoleon or humphead wrasse (Cheilinus undulatus); Northern red snapper (Lutjanus campechanus); Orange-lined or Undulated Triggerfish (Balistapus undulatus); Orbicular batfish (Platax orbicularis); Orchid dottyback (Pseudochromis fridmani); Pale damsel (Amblyglyphidodon indicus); Picasso Triggerfish (Rhinecanthus assasi); Pinecone soldierfish (Myripristis murdjan); Red lionfish (Pterois volitans); Red Sea bannerfish (Heniochus intermedius); Red Sea Clownfish or two-banded anemonefish (Amphiprion bicinctus); Red Sea goatfish (Parupeneus forsskali); Red Sea houndfish (Tylosurus choram); Red Sea mimic blenny (Ecsenius gravieri); Red Sea sailfin tang or Desjardin's sailfin tang (Zebrasoma desjardinii); Roving coral grouper or spotted coral grouper (Plectropomus pessuliferus); Royal angelfish (Pygoplites diacanthus); Rusty parrotfish (Scarus ferrugineus); Sabre squirrelfish, giant squirrelfish and spiny squirrelfish (Sargocentron spiniferum); Schooling bannerfish (Heniochus diphreutes); Scissortail goby (Ptereleotris evides); Scissortail sergeant or striptailed damselfish (Abudefduf sexfasciatus); Scorpion fish (Scorpaenopsis oxycephala); Sea goldie or red anthias fish (Pseudanthias squamipinnis); Sergeant major or píntano (Abudefduf saxatilis); Sinai parrotfish (Chlorurus genazonatus); Speckled sandperch (Parapercis hexophtalma); Steinitz' prawn goby (Amblyeleotris steinitzi); Striated surgeonfish (Ctenochaetus striatus); Suez fusilier (Caesio suévica); Sulfur damsel (Pomacentrus sulfureus); Tassled Scorpionfish (Scorpaenopsis oxycephala); Threadfin butterflyfish (Chaetodon auriga); Threespot dascyllus or domino damsel (Dascyllus trimaculatus); Titan Triggerfish (Balistoides viridescens); Vanikoro sweeper or greenback bullseye (Pempheris vanicolensis); Whitebelly Damsel (Amblyglyphidodon leucogaster); White-spotted puffer fish (Arothron hispidus); Yellowbar angelfish or half-moon angelfish (Pomacanthus maculosus); Yellowfin goatfish (Mulloidichthys vanicolensis); Yellowspotted burrfish (Cyclichthys spilostylus); Zebra angelfish, swallowtail angelfish or lyretail angelfish (Genicanthus caudovittatus);
Sea anemones (order
Actiniaria)
Black coral or thorn coral (order Antipatharians)
Carnation Corals or strawberry corals (such as
Dendronephthya hemprichi, genus Dendronephthya); Fleshy soft corals or mushroom leather coral (such
as arcophyton trocheliophorum, genus Sarcophyton); Giant Sea Fan (Annella mollis); Gorgonias or Venus fans or sea fans (such as Gorgonia
flabellum, genus gorgonia); Pulse corals (such
as Xenia umbellate, genus Xenia); Toadstool leather coral or rough leather coral
(Such as Sarcophyton glaucum, genus Sarcophyton); Whip corals (such
as Junceella rubra, genus junceella and
others genus cirrhipathes);
Stony corals or horny corals (order Scleractinia)
Acropora pulchra (genus Acropora); Branching corals (such as Acropora florida, genus Acropora); Staghorn corals (such as Acropora cervicornis, genus Acropora); Table corals (such as Acropora pharaonis, genus Acropora); Cauliflower coral or lace coral (such as Pocillopora damicornis, genus Pocillopora); Cup Corals (genus Balanophyllia); Dome corals (such as Porites nodifera, genus Porites); Finger corals (genus Porites); Hood corals or smooth cauliflower corals (such as Stylophora pistillata, genus Stylophora); Mushroom corals (Such as Fungia fungites, genus Fungia); Pinnaple corals (such as Favia favus, genus Dipsastraea); Pore corals (genus Montipora); Sun corals (such as tubastrea faulkneri, genus Tubastraea); Thin birdsnest coral (such as Seriatopora hystrix, genus Seriatopora);
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