diving in Sharm el Sheikh 12-24.01.15
as last year's winter sun was such a success, M and i decided to head back to Sharm this year - along with 6 other diver friends :D
we dived with Eagle Divers again, and stayed at the Ocean Club hotel - the hotel was as basic as previously, if not worse. dont think we're going to stay with them again!
however, we got a warm reception from Hannah & Ash at Eagle Divers (and met resident cat, Eagle). as we had 5 days diving, we did plenty! some reef diving, the Thistlegorm, a night dive (Temple)... plenty of things i havent done before!
it was interesting diving some of the sites we did last year - in some ways they looked very different because i was spending more time at about 20m, rather than last year's 6-10m (colours get very washed out, as you lose the red).
note to self: over-weighting to be able to hold the safety stop...not such a good idea :( dry suit is definitely good though. try 10kg not 13?
so what did we see? well, on the second day we saw both a (gray reef) shark! and a (green) turtle! the shark was in the distance, but the turtle...i hovered above it for quite some time as our group clustered near it (M taking photos, obvs. he got some amazing shots). the turtle waited patiently til we'd finished gawping, chewing the coral calmly.
that made our day, esp O who loooooooooooves sharks. but! the day wasnt done with us - during our surface interval on the boat, we saw dolphins! doooooooooooooooooooooooooolphins! lots and lots of dolphins, swimming and leaping by the boat :D :D :D :D day, made.
although those were the highlights of the week, there were plenty of other things to see and do - we dived the Thistlegorm and saw her cargo of trucks, motorbikes and APCs. along with plenty of lionfish, a crocodilefish and interrupted a little blue fish trying to eat a jellyfish (sorry fishie, we didnt mean to scare you off!). on the second dive, i was on my own with Hannah and i cut my finger.
did you know that at 20m blood looks green? and because of the salty water it doesnt clot? yeah, i do now. ouch! luckily it was just a scrape and was fine once i got back on the boat. the green blood underwater was bizarre though. wasnt expecting that!!
once our 5 days diving were done, we had a day off on Friday before flying back on Sat, so we went quad-biking in the morning. this unleashed everyone's inner petrolhead and was fun (although i'm not sure i'd want to do it again). in the afternoon, we lounged on a local beach and people went swimming. T saw a small silver eel and C saw lots and lots of fish!
it was a good holiday - the right mix of Doing Things and relaxing - with good friends and no egos or disagreements.
oooh i forgot to mention that we also dived the wreck of the Yolanda (now an artificial reef) - although the ship herself is at about 140m, her cargo is much shallower (about 20m). she was carrying toilets & baths in a container which decayed, leaving them lined up in neat rows :)
we dived with Eagle Divers again, and stayed at the Ocean Club hotel - the hotel was as basic as previously, if not worse. dont think we're going to stay with them again!
however, we got a warm reception from Hannah & Ash at Eagle Divers (and met resident cat, Eagle). as we had 5 days diving, we did plenty! some reef diving, the Thistlegorm, a night dive (Temple)... plenty of things i havent done before!
it was interesting diving some of the sites we did last year - in some ways they looked very different because i was spending more time at about 20m, rather than last year's 6-10m (colours get very washed out, as you lose the red).
note to self: over-weighting to be able to hold the safety stop...not such a good idea :( dry suit is definitely good though. try 10kg not 13?
so what did we see? well, on the second day we saw both a (gray reef) shark! and a (green) turtle! the shark was in the distance, but the turtle...i hovered above it for quite some time as our group clustered near it (M taking photos, obvs. he got some amazing shots). the turtle waited patiently til we'd finished gawping, chewing the coral calmly.
that made our day, esp O who loooooooooooves sharks. but! the day wasnt done with us - during our surface interval on the boat, we saw dolphins! doooooooooooooooooooooooooolphins! lots and lots of dolphins, swimming and leaping by the boat :D :D :D :D day, made.
although those were the highlights of the week, there were plenty of other things to see and do - we dived the Thistlegorm and saw her cargo of trucks, motorbikes and APCs. along with plenty of lionfish, a crocodilefish and interrupted a little blue fish trying to eat a jellyfish (sorry fishie, we didnt mean to scare you off!). on the second dive, i was on my own with Hannah and i cut my finger.
did you know that at 20m blood looks green? and because of the salty water it doesnt clot? yeah, i do now. ouch! luckily it was just a scrape and was fine once i got back on the boat. the green blood underwater was bizarre though. wasnt expecting that!!
once our 5 days diving were done, we had a day off on Friday before flying back on Sat, so we went quad-biking in the morning. this unleashed everyone's inner petrolhead and was fun (although i'm not sure i'd want to do it again). in the afternoon, we lounged on a local beach and people went swimming. T saw a small silver eel and C saw lots and lots of fish!
it was a good holiday - the right mix of Doing Things and relaxing - with good friends and no egos or disagreements.
oooh i forgot to mention that we also dived the wreck of the Yolanda (now an artificial reef) - although the ship herself is at about 140m, her cargo is much shallower (about 20m). she was carrying toilets & baths in a container which decayed, leaving them lined up in neat rows :)