March-23-2024
Crew: Captain – Mohammed Khareeb & Shakosh. Adventure Director – Ahmed. Dive Team – Rashad, Donia & Mohammed. Stewards – Hussain & Ali. Chef – Shazly. Pastry Chef – Shenawy. Engineers – Hosny & Mohammed. Seamen – Abdou, Ali, Mohammed, Mahmoud & Salem.
Owner Representative – Nick Jackson
25 Guests – Valerie, Brice, David, Pablo, Emily, William, Ronald, Victoria, Tracy, Marcus, Raphaela, John, Melanie, Carey, Peter, Benjamin, Johanna, Mark, Jody, Antonio, Lionel, Lionel, Mike & Kim.
Nationality – Our guests this week were from USA, Spain, UK, Singapore & France
Saturday 23 March 2024
The majority of the guests arrived at 11am and took the time before boarding to explore the delights of Port Ghalib, the final guests to arrive did so about midnight.
Day One Sunday 24 March 2024
Location: We left the port at 0830 and headed towards Marsha Shona
Conditions: Surface Temp18. Water Temp18. Wind Speed 20knots. Current none/mild
Dive Safety brief was at 0900
Description: Everyone dropped into the water for the check dive making sure the weight systems allowed for the additional density the Red Sea brings. Due to winds over the weekend the visibility was not at its prime but still around 60 foot. Blue Spotted Stingrays and Green Turtles were the talk of the first dive followed up with the next two offering shoals of barracuda, Tuna and a myriad of other small reef fish, too fast and too many to name. The beautiful corals both hard and soft were a fantastic landscape for the days diving and the night dive brought along its changes in the reef with Spanish Dancers and a Hawksbill Turtle with a very large Spotted Eagle Ray making an appearance.
Enter location of each dive:
Dive 1 – Location Marsha Shona,
Dive 2 – Location – Abu Dabab 3
Dive 3 – Location – Abu Dabab Dusk 3
Dive 4 – Location Nigh Dive Abu Dabab Night 3
Day 2 Monday 26 March 2024
Location: South
Conditions: Surface Temp 18-23. Water Temp18. Wind Speed 10 knots. Current low to mild
Overnight travelled South and a good nights sleep was had by all. Guests woke up to a warm still day. Highlights of the day were a pod of 40 to 50 Dolphins , including their young, playing with the guests as they were diving, White Tip sharks and the swim throughs at Claudia around some very beautiful coral gardens massed by reef fish. The visibility was fantastic and thankfully the water temperature has risen.
Enter location of each dive:
Dive 1 – Location Shaab Maksoor
Dive 2 – Location Claudia
Dive 3 – Location Claudia
Dive 4 – Location Claudia
Night Dive – Location Dolphin House
Day 3 Tuesday 26 March 2024
Location: South
Conditions: Surface Temp 19. Water Temp 19. Wind Speed 8 knots. Current none to mild
Overnight we moved across to Paradise Reef, the pinnacles had so much aquatic life around them, stunning. A small swim through warmed the guests up for St Johns Caves, lots of anticipation and St Johns did not disappoint, a fantastic days diving working through the maze of swim throughs and overhangs.
Enter location of each dive:
Dive 1 – Location Paradise Reef
Dive 2 – Location Paradise Reef
Dive 3 – Location St Johns Cave Reef
Dive 4 – Location St Johns Cave Reef
Day 4 Wednesday 27 March 2024
Location: South – St Johns Area
Conditions: Surface Temp 20. Water Temp.20 Wind Speed12 Knts. Current Mild/None
After a good nights sleep we arrived in the Dolphin House area. The first dive most of the guests saw the shy White Tip reef shark, it stayed deep and passed on after a few minutes, hopefully a good omen for the rest of the days diving. Plenty of marine life including Morays, Octopus and Tuna was the talk of the day, the night dive was stunning with the bioluminescent lifeforms showing the way…great stuff.
Enter location of each dive:
Dive 1 – Location Shabrur Elnus
Dive 2 – Dolphin House Snorkelling
Dive 3 – Location Dolphin House
Dive 4 – Location Dolphin House – Alternative location.
Dive 5 – Location Malahy
Day 5 Thursday 28 March 2024
Location: Mid Red Sea - Daedalus
Conditions: Surface Temp 22. Water Temp 20. Wind Speed 5 knots. Current medium but varying in areas around the reef
Description:
The crossing to Daedalus was very calm and the sea almost glasslike, as the guests woke to a gentle breeze eased what was going to be a warm day. Full of excitement the guests dropped in for their first dive, Daedalus was fantastic, we were the only yacht there and the conditions were perfect to see all the reef had to offer, some of the guests also chose to visit the famous lighthouse.
Enter location of each dive:
Dive 1 – Location Daedalus
Dive 2 – Location Daedalus
Dive 3 – Location Daedalus
Dive 4 – Location Daedalus
Day 6 Friday 30 March 2024
Location: Elphinstone & Marsha Shona
Conditions: Surface Temp 25. Water Temp 22. Wind Speed 8 Knots Current medium to strong
Description: Another gentle overnight cruise saw us arrive early morning at the world famous Elphinsone Reef, the guests saw Octopus and White Tip reef sharks amongst many other smaller reef fish, with Tuna and Barracuda making darting runs into shoals of smaller fish. Marsha Shona or otherwise known as Turtle bay was also another great dive with guests spotting multitudes of very large Green turtles, Vick Robinson also managed to get her 1000 dives in, well done Vicky!
Dive 1 – Location Elphinstone Reef
Dive 2 – Location Marsha Shona
We finally sailed back in after another successful weeks diving having the cocktail party at 4pm. We congratulated 3 Iron Divers, and Advanced Open Water and Nitrox courses completed. We celebrated Vickys 1000 dives with a cake and Dive Guide Donya on her 30th birthday, also with a cake. In total our guests competed 442 dives, only 15 dives short of the charter record.