Sharm El Sheikh - Scuba Diving In The Red Sea

As one of the most popular scuba diving resorts in the Red Sea, we thought we would take a closer look at Sharm El Sheikh, to see why huge numbers of scuba divers visit here each year.

Sharm El Shiekh is located on the Southern tip of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, and is today the main destination for those wishing to scuba dive in some of the Red Sea's best dive sites. From Sharm El Sheikh, day boats regularly visit dive sites such as the Thistlegorm Wreck, the Straits of Tiran, the Dunraven Wreck and Ras Mohamed.
Getting to Sharm El Sheikh is relatively easy from most major western airports, and there are numerous airlines offering cheap flights to Sharm El Sheikh from Manchester, Gatwick and other major UK airports. These cheap flights, coupled with the huge increase in hotels and other forms of accomodation in Sharm El Sheikh have resulted competitive prices for those seeking a cheap scuba diving holiday. The main airport in the region is Ras Nusrani, which also serves as the destination airport for those travelling on to the resort of Dahab further north on the Sinai Peninsula. There are a number of luxury coach and bus companies operating trips to Sharm El Sheik from Cairo, although the distances involved do tend to deter people on a limited timeframe.

Today, there is a large number of excellent hotels in Sharm El Sheikh, including the Hilton, the Movenpick and the Intercontinental.

There are a huge number of dive operators in Sharm El Sheikh, many of which are very well established and extremely well organised and equipped. The dive industry in Sharm El Sheikh is undoubtedly big business, and the huge numbers of day boats leaving the harbour each morning is testimony to this.

Of the dive operators in Sharm El Sheikh, there are a number of better knowns dive operations including the Oonas Dive Club, the Red Sea Diving College and the Camel Dive Club. Today, these operators are able to offer a complete package for a scuba diving holiday, including the accomodation in Sharm El Sheikh, the diving, and even the bars and restaurants in which to discuss the days diving afterwards!

As with the majority of scuba diving in the Red Sea, the diving in Sharm El Sheikh is excellent, and offers a wide range of dive sites for divers of all levels of experience. For the more experienced divers, sites such as the Thistlegorm Wreck or Shark and Yolanda Reef can prove to be the highlight of a scuba diving holiday. For beginners, or those wanting to learn to scuba dive, there are a huge number of shallower reefs, which offer good diving in an environment highly conducive for those wanting to learn to scuba dive.

Throughout the Sharm El Sheikh region, the coral reefs offer a good range of both hard and soft corals, and the marine life on the reefs is comparable to other destinations such as the Maldives and the Great Barrier Reef.

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Scuba Diving In The Red Sea - Elphinstone Reef

Elphinstone Reef is undoubtedly one of the highlights of scuba diving in the Red Sea, and is widely recognised as being one of the best dive sites in the entire Red Sea region. The Elphinstone Reef is usually accessed either via a Red Sea liveaboard, or from one of the numerous day boats which leave from the nearby resort of Marsa Alam.

Located approximately 5 miles off the coast of Egypt at Marsa Abu Dabbab, Elphinstone Reef is in fact one large long reef, with walls which fall away to around 70 metres on either side. The diving on Elphinstone Reef is split into the Northern and Southern Plateau's, with the northern end offering a shallower option, and the southern end of the reef sloping away into the depths. At the northern end of the reef are two large pinnacles, which are deep at around 40-42 metres.

At the far end of Elphinstone Reef is the Sarcophagus Archway where legend dictates that an ancient pharoah lies beneath the arch in their sarcophagus. In fact, this is a large stone in the shape of a sarcophagus, which only more experienced, technical divers are likely to encounter due to it's depth (65m).

There is a good amount of both hard and soft coral covering Elphinstone Reef, as well as a good marine life population. On the reef, you are likely to encounter some large Napoleon Wrasse, as well as the resident Oceanic White Tip Shark and his accompanying Pilot Fish.

If you would like to find out more about the opportunities for scuba diving in the Red Sea, why not visit our main site, and take a look through the wide range of scuba diving holidays and destinations on offer.

Dahab Scuba Diving - The Bells Dive Site

The Bells is one the most well known dive sites in Dahab, and it characterised by the large wall which is the foundation for this beautiful dive site.

The dive site itself is located about 100m north of the Dahab Blue Hole dive site, and following the dramatic entry point (a small slot in the wall), you work your down to around 30 metres before beginning to follow the wall along. The exit point for the dive is the Blue Hole lagoon, which is in around 6m of water.

There is a good amount of coral to be found on the wall, with good amounts of plate and cabbage corals to be found. As with the majority of the dive sites in Dahab, there is a wide variety of reef fish to be found in the area, which overall make for a very pleasant dive, and certainly worth more than one visit if you are diving in Dahab. There are a number of dive operators in Dahab, and all will visit the Bells on a regular basis.

If you would like to know more about diving in the Red Sea, including dive sites such as the Thistlegorm Wreck, the Dunraven and The Brothers, why not visit the main Scubaworld web site which covers it in detail.

Dive Operators In Phuket

Also recently added to the Scubaworld site is the dive operators in Phuket pages, which will allow any dive operators on the island of Phuket to list their services on the site.

There are a large number of operators on the island, and the scuba diving in Phuket is widely acknowledged as being amongst the best diving in Thailand. Located between the Andaman Sea, and Phang-Nga Bay, the scuba diving in Phuket offers a wide variety of dive sites for divers of all levels of experience.

If you are interested in finding out more about the scuba diving in Phuket, then you should feel free to visit the Scubaworld site, where there is extensive information on the scuba diving in Thailand and Phuket. This covers information including some of the major dive sites in Phuket including Racha Islands and Shark Point.

Dive Operators In Scotland

Over the weekend, we launched our dive operators in Scotland pages, which are incorporated into the Scuba diving resources channel, accessed through the link in the top right corner of the page. From here, divers are able to access our large database of dive operators from around the world.

It's a tall order, but it is our hope that we will have all the worlds dive operators indexed through this database within the course of the next year, providing an invaluable resource for someone looking to go scuba diving overseas.

So if you are a dive operator, and you would like to be listed, or if you know of a specific dive operators in Scotland who you feel should be included in the list, why not let us know via the comments box on the Scubaworld Blog. If you would like to know more about the opportunities for scuba diving in Scotland, why not visit the main Scubaworld web site, where we look at all aspects of diving in Scotland including the diving at Scapa Flow, widely acknowledged to be one of the worlds best dive sites.

Florida Keys Scuba Diving

Hi,

Our latest post on the Scubaworld blog, is to let you all know that we have now launched our Florida Keys Scuba Diving information channels, which covers all aspects of scuba diving in the stunning Florida Keys in the United States.

In this channel, we cover a number of the more popular locations, including scuba diving in Key Largo, Marathon, Islamorada and Key West. In each of these destinations, we take a look at the opportunities for scuba diving there, to see what is available.

If you've been scuba diving in the Florida Keys already, we'd love to hear from you, and we'd love to hear any interesting dive stories you have about any of the areas in the Florida Keys.

Dive Operators In Thailand

We have recently launched our new partner program for dive operators in Thailand, which will allow operators in specific regions including Koh Tao, Phuket and Pattaya to be listed on the resources page of the site.

We have provided this as a new resource for users who would be, for example, searching for dive operators in Koh Tao. You'll notice that we have split this up by regions to help make your search easier and quicker.

We will be adding in more destinations as we add to the site, and we will of course keep you posted through the blog. If you are interested in diving in Thailand, why not visit the Scubaworld web site, where we look at all aspects of scuba diving in Thailand, including the top dive destinations of Koh Tao and Phuket.

Regards,
Scubaworld.