Diving in Egypt
[more photos from the diving in the Egypt set on Flickr]
I had an early start as today I had booked two dives in the Red Sea with Emperor Divers, who’d bent over backwards to arrange everything for us before we came out. I have dived in the Red Sea before (a handful of shore dives from Eilat), but these would be my first boat dives in the area.
It was a great day on a lovely boat (the Emperor Marcus), with a fantastic lunch, and Ryan was one of the best dive guides I’ve had – just a great personality and his rapport with Paul, the other guide on board, was fantastic.
The water was warm and the sea life plentiful. Visibility is amongst the best I’ve had while diving but I still limited myself to two dives despite a third being offered for only €20. I tend to get headaches after diving and today was particularly bad, perhaps down to dehydration. I definitely need to remember to drink more water in such hot climates.
Our rarity of the day was an eagle ray, seen at quite some distance. There were plenty of interesting fish and the like at a closer proximity to get decent photos of. My buddy, Norman, managed to find a cute little nudibranch but even without taking into account the more mobile life forms there’s no denying that the coral in the area is some of the most spectacular I have ever seen.
Diving in Egypt
I opted to cough up for the Nitrox course afterwards and was supplied with a DVD player, DVD and manual to bone up on before Thursday’s dives and short test. Courtesy of a special offer, Emperor were swallowing the PADI certification fee for the course which is now a “dry” one, not requiring any actual dive time.
Back at the dive centre, I bumped into my dad who’d had a go at a Discover SCUBA Dive (DSD) course. Sadly, he’d not been able to complete it. Due to some ill health over the last couple of years his breathing’s not top notch and he just couldn’t get the rhythm. Thanks, though, to the staff who assisted him as best they could and he has said he’d love to have another go sometime.
