|
|
|
|
I travelled to Malta in October 2003 & was based in the Mercure Hotel Gran San Antonio in St.Pauls & used Subway Scuba in Buggiba, who picked up & dropped off every day. It was my second visit, having dived before in 1999, and was a whole lot more enjoyable this time for reasons which are unimportant! I'd booked the holiday through Malta Direct , so was able to fly scheduled, which allowed me to pick & choose the flights to allow maximum holiday time. Dive 1 was out the the Blue Grotto at Zurrieq & the wreck of the Um-El-Faroud, a Libyan registered oil tanker purposely sunk after 13 Maltese workmen were killed in an explosion. It was a nice start with plenty of life, and with Antoine the mad as our guide we had great fun doing all the swim throughs etc. Dive 2 was at the opposite end of the island on the left reef at Cirkewwa, by the Gozo ferry port. we entered by a the rocks and set off for a nice bimble around the reef, with plenty of life in evidence once again, highlighted by spotting the first octopus of the holiday. The next morning was back to Cirkewwa for Dive 3 and another purpose sunk wreck of an old tugboat, The Rozie. this was my first dive with the camera and provided some cracking photos. I swam out in mid water (around 15m) to stay above the thermocline, but dropped to 33m once we hit the wreck. Viz as always was superb, and came across a massive Stonefish, as well as several small purple nudibranchs. Dive 4 on the remains of the HMS Maori that afternoon proved to be one of the best dives of the week. There was only myself, Antoine & Kevin (A local) on he dive and all the water was very green, viz was about 10m plus. We did the swim through the wreck, and was then bombarded with amazing fish life, there was a Triggerfish, Cuttlefish, Octopus and a lovely little Moray out in the open, which again provided so superb photos. The next trip we were off to Comino using the Subway hard boat. First dive of the day, and we anchored of Lantern Point where we kitted up and I was buddied with Davide from Switzerland, and so Dive 5 was off and running. As there were 4 less experienced divers on the boat who required Antoine's attention we were left to our own devices. On rolling in we dropped into the chimney at around 8m, a nice tunnel about 30m long which brought us out at 20m. We drifted with the current through the rocks for about 20 mins seeing a nice hard coral formation (photo didn't work!) and a lovely red starfish. We then headed back into the current towards the boat. We had just found it when I spotted something at the edge of the viz, so decided to investigate. Once there we were greeted with the stunning sight of a shoal of around 5 to 600 barracuda all about 18" to 24" long. We approached cautiously and were rewarded with a spectacular dive and a great photo. It was at this point that gas became an issue to we had to head back to the boat, and after a safety stop surfaced with about 10 bar of air! (Don't try this at home kids, not clever!). After refilling the cylinders and a spot of lunch on Comino we headed of to the Santa Maria Caves on the opposite side of the Island for Dive 6. We dropped into crystal clear water in the bay and headed off in our same pairs from the morning. The caves are quite large and some are interconnected, in the first we saw another octopus. We headed around the bay and around a headland & out to the open side of the site. There was plenty of life including a Grouper. As we headed back through a cave into the bay we stooged around beneath the boat watching the fish where I was rewarded with cracking shot of a Sea Bream right in front of my lens. (I promise that photo has not been edited!). Tuesday was off to Gozo for Dives 7 & 8. Both dives were pretty much at the same site, the first in the Blue Hole with more great caves, chimneys and swim throughs, although there wasn't so much in the way of fish life. The second dive proved to be an absolute disaster through no-ones fault but mother-nature. The dive started in the inland sea, where we where to drop to 5m to swim through the large tunnel (around 80m long). On a normal day you can see the one end of the tunnel to the other, but we discovered that viz was cm's and after fighting my way along with only the wall to guide I popped out alone! After a couple of mins the guide appeared but no buddy or the rest of the group! We waited, surfaced, looked around but no sign so we headed back. The viz was so bad I decided to surface swim along the wall & keep an eye out for boats, not an experience to be repeated. With the next day blown out, Dive 9 was on thursday back at the Um-El-Faroud, which was the only dive site open on the island, as a consequence there were around 100 or so divers on the wreck! We managed to keep out of the way by doing more of penetration dive. The last dive of the week was back to HMS Maori again for Dive 10. It proved to be a great once more, although with 7 divers much more crowded. There wasn't anywhere near as much life, although we came across two Flying Gurneys which I'd never seen before and provide a good end to the trip. As an aside, something I discovered on this holiday, that they don't tell you in any books, is the best way to relax after a days diving is to hit the sauna, then jacuzzi and finally beer. It perked me up no end! Malta is a place that deserves your time, the history of the place is fascinating, although the diving can get a little samey after a while. I would definantly go back, but as a small group to do some of the deeper, less popular dives and maybe a couple of the war wrecks out of recreational limits.
Thanks to Antoine, Roger & Benson (above) and everyone else at Subway, I had a great time. copyright Nige 2004 email nige at scubadive dot me dot uk
|
