SAND KICKERS

For a short while at one of our local sites you could find a juvenile crested velvet fish in no more than 5m of water. Unfortunately for the fish it had chosen a spot that is very popular with instructors conducting the confined sessions of diving courses, and the main entry point for the dive site. Consequently the fish was often covered in a sandstorm from people who had yet to master basic buoyancy or were applying the wrong fin kick for the conditions, so, seemingly, decided to move to a less busy area.

 WHY FLUTTER LIKE A BUTTERFLY ...
 Most newly qualified divers are taught the Flutter Kick when they start diving. It’s easy to understand why; the Flutter Kick is just like free style or forward crawl in swimming but without the arm movements (although some divers take a while to understand this), and the most common style in swimming. It’s easy for us landlubbers to transpose the skill from swimming to diving. And that is all well and good. However, there are two inherent disadvantages to the Flutter Kick: i) With the flutter kick you don’t just propel water behind you, but above and below as well. This is a waste of your energy & air, contributes nothing to forward motion and the downward displacement of water can cause damage to flora and fauna as well as stir up silt and severely reduced visibility. ii) The other inherent problem with the Flutter Kick is it dramatically increases your profile in the water, making it harder for a diver to move through the water than it should ideally be, as well as causing the diver to rock from side-to-side. ... 
WHEN YOU CAN KICK LIKE A FROG?
A better style of fin kick is the Frog Kick. The Frog Kick is, again, based on a similar technique in swimming, the breaststroke (but again without the arm movements). It is not complicated, it just requires a little time and practice. The Frog Kick has several benefits: i) It’s a more efficient form of propulsion as the majority of the water is propelled behind the diver - not above and below. ii) It’s a more balanced form of kicking as it does not rock the diver from side to side, and is therefore more comfortable. iii) When performed correctly, the Frog Kick places less stress on a diver’s legs and joints. iv) As the water is not propelled down, you are less likely to stir up the bottom, which is great for all dives but essential for sites that have silty floors such as caverns and wrecks, and that is really good for all those underwater critters that like a calm place to call home.

BUOYANCY

If you’re a diver, you’ll know about positive, negative and, the Holy Grail of Diving, neutral buoyancy. “The power to float or rise in a fluid; relative lightness”, is dictionary.com’s primary description of the word buoyancy. For the non-divers, a object that floats on the surface of a body of water (such as a beach ball) is considered to have a positive buoyancy, whereas an object that sinks in water is considered to have negative buoyancy, and an object that neither floats nor sinks, you guessed it, has neutral buoyancy. While all three states of buoyancy are of interest to divers (as well as anyone on a sinking ship), positive and, in particular, neutral buoyancy are the two more pertinent states for divers.

LATE AFTERNOON DIVES

One of the obvious advantages for a diver living in Sharm is the chance to go diving in the Red Sea almost anytime you want. If I want to go diving tomorrow, it’s just a case of making one or two phone calls. The same if I suddenly decide to make a night dive today, I just need to call one or two people and off we’ll go. This was the fundamental reason why I moved to Sharm in 2004; rather than have Stoney Cove or Dosthill Quarry as my local sites (I lived in the Midlands at the time), how about Shark & Yolanda, or Umm Sid or the SS Thistlegorm instead? (Afterall, my local site in the UK, Stoney Cove was 40 miles away from my home, yet the famous Red Sea wreck is not even 40 kilometers from my apartment in Sharm). One of the obvious disadvantages about diving around Sharm is the number of divers here; which is only to be expected, it is a major diving destination afterall. I’ve made night dives where there was so many people in the water that you could switch your torch off for the whole dive (but I’ve also had night dives where there was just me and my guests). The Thistlegorm on a busy day can resemble an aquarium air pump decoration with all it’s bubbles, the top deck a spider’s web of mooring lines, and the holds full divers all seemingly going in the opposite direction to you (but I’ve also had days at the Thistlegorm where we’ve had the wreck to ourselves). Some of the most popular sites, like Jackson reef for example, can be often completely obscured by divers (but sometimes you are lucky and find you have a reef to yourselves). Now some people like to be in a crowd when they are diving, and none of the previous examples would be an issue for them but for me, I love a quiet dive it’s calm, peaceful and I believe, without all the noise generated by dive boats, speed boats, zodiacs (RIBs), swimmers, snorkelers, tank bangers, shakers and quackers, you are more likely to encounter the shy and elusive underwater creatures that generally move away from the site while it is noisy. So what’s a diver to do? How do you avoid all these divers? How do you make a quiet dive in the middle of a popular tourist and diving destination such as Sharm el Sheikh? One easy solution is to make a late afternoon shore dive. For me there is a magical feel to a dive in the late afternoon. Firstly there is the rich, deep blue ambient light you get only when the sun is low in the sky; it gives the appearance of being in deep water without being deep. Then there is the peace and quiet. Usually, by late afternoon, most dive centers have finished their daily activities. They may be on-site, but the guides and their guests have finished diving for the day and by now are either writing up their logbooks, or packing away their equipment. The vast majority of the dive boats have finished for the day and are sailing in to Travco marina, if they’re not already there. The water is quiet now, it will stay that way till dawn. The reef is very alive at this time of the day too. The diurnal reef life, those that are active in the day, are getting close to bedtime and as such, you’ll find them all either already bedded down on the reef or looking for a spot to spend the night. There’s a lot of hunting at this time of the day; the reef is busy, a busy reef attracts predation. Some fish, like rays and sharks, are crepuscular in nature, which means they are most active during dusk and dawn (and, as far as sharks areconcerned, the reason why snorkelers & swimmers are told to avoid being in the water at these times of the day), so there’s the possibility of a large marine encounter. Another advantage of a late afternoon dive is the chance of a lay in and a late breakfast. For people, especially guests, who enjoy Sharm’s night life, the idea of waking up at 07:00 is not exactly the ideal option but, because a week is only a week long, then have to if they wish to go diving. A late afternoon dive allows you to recover from whatever ails you from the night before, whether it’s too many Sakaras, too little sleep or both. You can also plan a late afternoon dive so that, during the course of the dive, it becomes a night dive and gives you the chance to see nocturnal marine life as well - assuming you plan well enough to have torches with you - or you could simply plan a late afternoon dive followed by a night dive.

VIVA LE LOCAL!

If you ask anyone who has dived around Sharm el-Sheikh which is their favourite area for diving, the answer is usually the Strait of Tiran, or the Ras Mohammed National Park, or the Strait of Jubal (with the wrecks of the SS Thistlegorm and the SS Dunraven). When we have walk-in guests to our center it is always “We want to go to Ras Mohammed”, even though the guests often have no idea about the diving in Ras Mohammed.

Nobody ever says “we want to go local”, and we find that a little strange.

No one would compare in the same light Temple and Shark reef, but what about Ras Umm Sid (Local) compared with Ras Burg (Ras Mohammed), or Ras Nasrani (Local) with Ras Za’atar (Ras Mohammed) or the corner of Ras Katy (Local) with Ras Ghozlani?

BOAT BRIEFINGS

One of the first things that usually happens when you start your diving holiday is your guide gives you a boat briefing. Yeah, yeah, we know, you’ve heard it all before the last time you were here but for those who haven’t had the pleasure yet and for those who have had so many many boat briefings that they literally sleep through the latest version, we thought we’d go through a standard boat briefing.   i) Your boat’s name. Thankfully people are rarely left in the water at the end of their dives or snorkeling experience but it can, and sometimes does, happen. When another friendly boat comes over and plucks you from the water, you need to be able to tell them the name of your boat so they can then radio her and arrange for you to be transferred back to her. Telling them “it was a white boat with divers on” just won’t work. Your boat has a name, and you should know what it is.   ii) Wet & Dry Areas. Usually the saloon and sun-deck are off limits to wet objects, including people. You should always remove your suit and towel yourself off before going in either areas. You should also refrain from standing on the stairs to the sun-deck when wet (even if you’re asking someone to throw you your towel); water makes the steps slippery and slippery steps are a risk to everyones well being. While mentioning the stairs to the sun-deck, it is advisable that you face the stairs going up AND down. If your facing away from the stairs and slip you will land on your back   iii) WCs. All the boats around Sharm have one or two WCs, or “marine toilets”. By this we mean they empty directly in to the ocean. Any paperwork you produce should be placed in the bins placed next to the toilets, and not the toilets themselves. Nobody wants to be swimming in used toilet paper or old sanitary towels, and the reefs certainly look better without such things littering them. Another reason, boat plumbing is small and easily blocked (and it could be the ship’s chef who is tasked with unblocking the toilet). Only organic matter that has passed through your body should go in the porcelain bowel. If you feel the need to spew, please do this over the side of the boat as chunky carrot blocks pipes as easily as paper.   iv) The dive deck. Space is at a premium on a dive boat. You should keep your dive crate under the deck benches as often as possible. Don’t litter the deck with all your equipment, it can easily cause someone to trip over, and is a great way to have your equipment broken. Between dives, you should keep your weights and mask in your box.   v) Below decks. The boat crews live on the boats, and the cabins are usually where they sleep at night. They are not for guests, or guides, to grab 40 winks during surface intervals. You probably wouldn’t be happy finding strangers in your bedrooms (Mmm ...) and neither are the crews.   vi) The Galley. The galley is nautical parlance for “kitchen” and, unless you are told otherwise, is off-limits.   vii) First Aid & Oxygen. All boats are required to carry a First Aid kit and oxygen however, for some reason, this seems to be the responsibility of the dive centers. Your guide should tell you where the First Aid kit is stowed as well as the oxygen unit. In the first aid kit you’ll find an emergency assistance plan that you should follow in the event of an emergency. Most dive guides do not demonstrate how to use an oxygen unit but if you ask, they will be more than happy to show you after the briefing.   viii) Dive Log and Enriched Air Log sheets. All guests are required to log their dives with the center on a day-by-day basis. Each center has their own variation on what details are required, but the basics usually include max depth, dive time, air in and air out. Your guide will show you where these log sheets are, and hope that they don’t have to chase everybody at the end of the day to get their details.   ix) Cylinders. Cylinders usually have either tape or plastic plugs over or in their valves. This tells everyone that the cylinder is full. Once you finish your dive, even if you have 100 bar left in your cylinder, you should not replace the tape or stopper else the staff who fill the cylinders at night will believe they are full and you’ll have half empty cylinders on the boat the next day.   x) Finally, Rubbish. The only thing you should throw in the water is yourselves (or the guide, or crew members, or your friends). Please do not throw any waste in the water, nor cigarette butts, or your lunch (unless you’re hurling). The boats have waste bins for waste, ash trays for cigarette butts, and the fish have their own food sources.

MANTA MAN RESCUES DOLPHIN

Nearly everyone has heard stories about dolphins protecting shipwreck victims from sharks, or helping a tired swimmer to shore. So it is heart warming to see a video where a dolphin is helped by diver. And not any diver but Manta Man aka Keller Laros. Keller Laros is a Professional Scuba Instructor, and has logged 9000+ dives in the waters of Hawaii since 1985. As his name suggests, Keller is rather keen on manta rays and has been conducting night dives (“Kona Manta Ray Night Dive”), several times a week, for almost 20 years. It is because of a dolphin however, and not mantas, that Keller recently caught the attention of the worldwide media after he posted a video of a recent night dive. During the dive a bottlenose dolphin appears and Laros notices that the dolphins left pectoral is caught in a fishing line. Keller, who is co-founder and President of the Manta Pacific Research Foundation, gestures to the dolphin to come closer and, amazingly, the dolphin seemingly obliges and then stays with Keller while he removes a fishing hook and frees the pectoral by cutting away the fishing line. The Manta Pacific Research Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to research, education, and conservation concerning manta rays and the marine environment. You can learn more about Manta Man here www.mantaman.com/Mantaman.com/MANTA_MAN.html and watch the amazing video here      

iPhone Applications for Divers

We’ve compiled 9 iPhone & iPad applications for you to wile away the winter months. So, wether you’re sat at home, in the office, or sat on a train that’s been delayed because its horn is full of snow (really!), you can still plan your next dive trip thanks to DIVE Magazine, log your paper dives with Diving Dude or the London Diving Chamber (as well as simulate lots of interesting diving related injuries and their best treatment ... should you want to), learn interesting facts about some of the Ocean’s greatest sharks with Learn Sharks Now! and Ultimate Sharks, or, for those of you in the UK, learn that your weekend trip has been cancelled due to bad weather before your group’s organizer with Wind Guru. iNitrox is a very easy to use enriched air calculator. You select a blend of oxygen (21% - 40%), depth (0-40m), and iNitrox provides you with: - Equivalent Air Depth - Maximum Depth (1.4 ata) - Contingency Depth (1.6 ata) - Oxygen Partial Pressure DIVE Magazine - Developer - Implere Ltd Get the latest issue of DIVE magazine for free each and every month. That’s right, FREE! This app allows you to read the latest edition of the popular scuba magazine. If you wish to read a previous month’s edition, they can be purchased individually or with a ?10 subscription.   Diving Dude Developer - Pierre-Yves Guillemant Diving Dude is a social logbook for scuba divers. The app allows you to log your dives, add and search dive sites, add and search dive shops or browse your buddy’s dive trips.     Baltic Lite Developer - Eskil Olsen Another free app, Baltic Lite is a planning tool for decompression dives. The Lite edition features recreational depth levels and Nitrox-only diving.     London Diving Chamber Developer - London Diving Chamber Ltd London Diving Chamber has launched a key resource for scuba divers on the iPhone with:

• Dive Incident Planner - easy-to-follow instructions and advice on what to do in a scuba diving emergency or incident.
• Pre-Dive Check List - Are you fit to dive? Go through the head to toe list and check you are both physically and mentally ready for your dive.
• Worldwide Chamber Locator - right there on your iPhone.
• A-Z of Dive Medicine - and if you can't find the answer to your question, you can send LDC an email via your iPhone.
• My Dive Log Book - log your dives on your iPhone.
• Easy.

Learn Sharks Now! Developer - Live Doodles, LLC Another free application, this one for young children. Learn Sharks Now! Allows you to know what over 30 different sharks look like, with some interesting information, and then tests your knowledge with a fun quiz.   Ultimate Sharks Developer - Discovery Communications Definitely not one for young children, this great application with 10 3D interactive sharks, exclusive HD videos, and high-resolution photos from Discovery allows you to swim among some of the ocean’s most fearsome sharks.       Wind Guru Developer - Perceiveit Limited For all you Salty Dogs and Surf Dudes, probably the best weather site is now available from your iPhone for free. Wind, wave and weather data can be accessed for almost 3000 spots around the world, from wherever you are in the world.     Marine Tides Planner Developer - Tucabo Limited An essential tool for anyone involved with sport or leisure at the seaside. No connection is required to access over 5,000 locations. The initial free download is limited to tides for one day. To get future predications the user must use the extensions within the app which involves a small charge.            

All Publicity is not Good Publicity!

SINAI GOVERNOR & MINISTER OF TOURISM ISSUE DECREE TO PROTECT SHARKS Oriental Rivoli recently proved the old adage wrong that there is no such thing as bad publicity. Supporters of HEPCA found a photo of a dead shark being displayed on a buffet table at the hotel’s New Year Eve party. HEPCA also received news that a popular grocery chain (Awlad Ragab) was also selling shark meat in their fish stock. Within 48 hours of HEPCA posting the image on it’s website, the post went viral as members and supporters demanded action be taken.

8 Points to help with your Open Water course

i) Listen to and watch your instructor. When your instructor is demonstrating a skill, pay attention. The instructor is demonstrating the skills for your benefit (hopefully they have already mastered the skills themselves). ii) Everything in your course has a reason (even that damn snorkel), even if to begin with you don't understand what the reason is. Your instructor should explain why you are required to do A, B & C. They are not asking you to do something for the sheer hell of it. iii) Relax - easy to say, not always easy to do - nearly everyone has problems (sometimes major, sometimes minor) when they start off, it is almost expected. iv) Don't beat yourself about the head over something, your instructor will work with you until the perceived problem is no longer. v) Don’t worry if the student next to you seems to grasp the theory or water skills quicker than you. It is not a competition. People learn at different speeds. It doesn’t matter how quickly you complete the course, all that matters is you complete the course. vi) Never be afraid to ask questions. People often don't ask questions or ask for another demonstration as they're afraid of appearing stupid or slow witted. vii) Don't confuse the Open Water course for diving. Some people get halfway through the course and then say "this isn't really for me". For most people a dive is jump in the water, have a look at the fish or wrecks, and get out of the water. On most general dives we don't remove our masks underwater, perform fin pivots, remove our regulators etc. The course is a means to an end, not the end itself. viii) One last thing - Enjoy it. That is what it is fundamentally about, fun. That's why we call it recreational diving.

20 THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT DRIFT DIVING

1) May seem an obvious one to start with but it’s amazing how many people don’t - LISTEN TO THE BRIEFING.   The dive guide isn’t giving a briefing to hear their own voice (although with the length of some guides briefings, you might doubt that), they’re trying to impart to you some of their local knowledge and expertise about the next dive and the potential risks and challenges the site may present to you. You should be listening anyway, but if the guide mentions “possibly very strong currents” you should give them your undivided attention and learn how that can affect your dive and what procedures you should use in those conditions. You should also understand any possible signals the guide will use and a lot of guides will only introduce drift related signals when they make their first briefing for a drift dive.   2) When your guide says “please get ready”, do exactly that. DO NOT wander off for a cup of tea, a cigarette and a chat with somebody about what time you’re meeting at the Camel Bar. If you know you are a little slow at getting ready you should ask your guide to give you a 5 minute pre-warning so you can start before everyone else begins gearing up.   3) When your guide says “please get ready”, they mean completely i.e. ALL your equipment is on INCLUDING fins & mask. A drift entry should be as quick as possible, and shouldn’t involve people spitting and rinsing their mask, tightening fins straps or discussing what time they’re meeting each other in the Camel Bar ONCE in the water.   4) Make sure you perform your buddy checks. Once your group starts to descend IS NOT the time to discover that you left your weight belt on the boat.   5) If they are several groups of divers on the boat, then there is probably a jump sequence i.e. Group 1 enters the water, then Group 2 and finally Group 3. If your group is first to jump you should you should make your way to the transom as quickly as possible. If you are not the first to jump, allow other divers space to make their way to the transom.   6) Once you are in the water, move away from the entry area so the rest of the group can follow you quickly in to the water. If you have a camera and want the boat crew to hand it to you, jump at the end of your group so as not to block the entry area.   7) You should descend as a whole group, not individually in buddy teams. If someone has problems equalizing, you should slow your descent to match theirs. If you discover you have forgotten your weight system, you should inform your guide you are canceling your dive and return to the boat. You should NOT invert yourself so you can kick down or allow somebody to drag you down. You should also not return to the boat, retrieve your weight system and then try to rejoin the group. You fluffed the dive, deal with it.   8) During the dive, stay behind the guide and try to maintain the same depth as them. Currents run at different speeds depending on depth, how close you are to the reef and the contour of the reef. Look out for signals from your guide, such as “get closer to the reef”, “get closer to your buddy” etc. The most important thing about drift diving is group cohesion i.e. staying together. With a very strong current it is almost impossible to regain this once it has gone. It is NOT the responsibility of a guide to stay with you, it is YOUR responsibility to stay with the guide.   9) Photographers - believe it or not, a drift dive is generally not the type of dive for macro photos. There are at least two good reasons for this: conservation and group cohesion. It is bloody difficult to maintain buoyancy in a strong current, and it should not be attempted close to lovely reefs. While a photographer is stationary, trying to photograph a nudibranch or anemone, the rest of the group are now either kicking against the current whilst waiting for the diver, using their precious air, time and energy (which is contrary to the ideas of a drift dive) or they haven’t noticed that a diver has stopped (or don’t actually care) and have carried on the dive and the groups cohesion is lost. Most guides make drift dives in the hope of finding large, pelagic fish that thrive in a strong current, not as a challenge to macro photographers.   10) When you are running with the current (i.e. you are traveling in the same direction as the current), try to fin as little as possible with it. The idea of a drift dive is to let the water do the work. The diver controls their buoyancy and then lets the water push them along. If you fin in the current several things can and often do happen i) you can overtake the dive leader and should the dive guide have an important signal for you, you’ll miss it ii) you can cause the dive to end by reaching the exit point too early and iii) it destroys the groups cohesion. Don’t do it!   11) Sometimes you may find the current is too strong and you are moving too fast to have a look at anything. In this case kick AGAINST the current. You’ll keep moving with the current but it should slow you down enough to smell the coffee. Sometimes though a current will take you and there’ll be nothing you can do except sit back and enjoy the ride. Don’t panic! This is a drift dive, remember?   12) Unfortunately, and especially on a small reef, you may sometimes find your guide will lead you against a current. Again follow your guide, and check their position in relation to the reef. If they are close and tight to the reef or floor then that is probably where you should be. Using coral heads and pinnacles to shield yourself from the current is a perfectly good way to move around a reef even when you are traveling against against the current.   13) Unless your guide tells you differently during the briefing, and assuming you were listening, drift dives are finished as a group and not in individual buddy teams. The reason for this is the boat does not want to come in to the reef to pick up a couple of divers, move back to open water only to have to return in a couple of minutes to pick up more divers. It’s hard on the boat, hard on the crew and increases the chances of a boat accident involving a diver on the surface. Once your guide signals for a three minute safety stop, that’s exactly what you should do - a three minute safety stop - and not just continue your dive. If you miss the guide’s signal to start making your safety stop but notice they have deployed a surface marker (an SMB), you can generally assume you should begin your safety stop. Most dive guides will only call the boat for a pickup once all members of their group have surfaced. Nobody should have to wait on the surface, especially in the winter, because an individual believed they are more important than everyone else.   14) Once your group is on the surface, your guide will signal to the boat for a pick-up. Whilst you are waiting for the boat the groups cohesion is still the most important thing, and you should try to stay close to the guide and, hopefully, the rest of the group.   15) Once it is clear that the boat is approaching for a pick-up the dive group should, whilst REMAINING on the surface of the water, swim 20-25 meters away from the reef. The boat will not come close to the reef for a pick-up as i) it reduces the risk of colliding with the reef and ii) the wash from the propellor can push divers on to the reef. You should also pay attention to the boat’s skipper signals as he may indicate that you should swim further away from the reef or stop where you are.   16) Once the boat is close enough to the divers, one of the crew will throw a line and float to the group (one of the reasons you should stay as a group even at the surface). Once you have the line, you should pass the line to anyone close enough to you who hasn’t already caught it and then HAND-OVER-HAND work your way to the stern of the boat whilst staying on the line. Do not fin whilst on the line as there could be somebody behind you who is now having their regulator and mask removed by your fins. Do not let go off the line, even if there is no surface current. The skipper may need to move the boat suddenly and that would leave you trailing in his wake.   17) As you approach the stern of the boat, check to see if a ladder is available (most dive boats have two). If the ladders are occupied stay down the line, approximately 4-5 meters from the stern of the boat to avoid anyone who falls off the ladder. Never go under a dive ladder that is occupied. If a person falls off the ladder the first thing that will hit you is their cylinder and it will HURT!   18) Once it is your turn to exit the water, approach the ladder and take hold. DO NOT REMOVE YOUR EQUIPMENT IN THE WATER. Before you start to climb out, have a look underwater at the ladder and see whether its first step is on the right or left. Exiting is complicated if you are trying to use a step that simply isn’t there. A boat often dips up and down from stern to bow. Wait for the stern to dip down, take a step, then pause whilst the stern goes up. Once the stern dips down again, take another step and repeat until you are on the dive transom. Do not rush, take your time and exit the water safely. Usually crew members will be on the dive transom to help you on to the boat, either by grabbing your tank valve or BCD to help steady you.   19) Once on the dive transom, immediately remove your fins, then yourself from the transom (i.e. move on to the dive deck) so the area is clear for other divers to make their exits. Locate a place to stow your equipment, and sit down.   20) Once you have stowed your dive equipment and removed your wetsuit, get dry, get a cup of tea and log that dive!   The 20 points listed here are not meant to be a comprehensive coverage of drift diving but an overview of a fairly typical drift dive around Sharm el-Sheikh. Certain types of drift diving require a constantly deployed surface marker, others require different entry procedures to the buoyant one described here so you should always get a local orientation about local currents and the required drift procedures. PADI’s Drift Diver Speciality Diver course is a great way to discover the fun of drift diving.    

TURTLELY GREAT!

I’ve met people who dislike dogs (although usually they’ll tell you that it is the dogs that don’t like them), I’ve met people who dislike cats with a passion (they are strange little people and they have my sympathy) but I’ve never met anyone who hates the tortoise. How can you? They’re one of the most inoffensive creatures on the planet. Slow moving, posing a threat to nothing (unless you’re a lettuce and then, whoa, you are in trouble), with a generally contented look upon their countenance; it’s hard not to like a tortoise, let alone harbor any misgivings about them.

BIG ISN’T ALWAYS BEST

As a dive guide I am often asked the following question - “Do you ever get bored with diving?” Truthfully the answer is “Yes, from time to time I do get bored”, which usually then produces the next question, “Why do you still dive then?” The answer is simply; firstly, only sometimes do I get bored but most of the times I still enjoy diving and secondly, because there is so much I have yet to see.

Amongst my many diving related books is a copy of “Coral Reef Guide Red Sea” by Ewald Lieske & Robert F. Meyers (published by Collins). This book helps me to identify new sightings, relive memorable encounters and acts as a wish-list, showing me lots of wonderful creatures that I have yet to see, such as the Helmeted Gurnard or the Dragon Sea moth (amongst many others). One fish that has always eluded me is the ornate ghost pipefish (Solenostomus paradoxus) and, as an avid underwater photographer, this strange looking creature has been high on my wish list for several years. Imagine my joy then when earlier in the year a friend told me that he knew where two of these fish were nesting and that the site was accessible from shore? Without further delay we arranged an early morning dive at the site in question (early morning for two reasons; firstly, because we were both working that day and early morning was the only chance to dive for fun and secondly, we didn’t want other people to discover the nest) and set off with our cameras. Once we arrived at the site and entered the water, my friend escorted me to a small rock pinnacle at 16m, no higher than 40cm and gestured “here you go”. To begin with I thought he’d taken me to the wrong spot. The pinnacle was covered in small, flower-like soft white corals that were constantly in motion, opening and closing while they feed. Very pretty to look at, but not the reason I had risen early that morning. I was just about to signal “what the hell are you showing me this for” when I realized that as I was swimming around the pinnacle, some of the “corals” were moving around the pinnacle and trying their best to position the pinnacle between themselves and me. Of course the corals were in fact the ornate ghost pipefish, a heavily pregnant female and her smaller male partner. One of my dream sightings had come true AND I had my camera with me. I was a happy, happy diver. Ironically we also had a newly qualified diver with us and she didn’t seem impressed with the pipefish (wanting to see larger creatures such as turtles, rays and, of course, sharks), even though, as we explained to her, my friend and I had over 15 years experience of diving in the Red Sea and, until now, had never seen one ornate pipefish between us. A genuine icon of macro photography, the ornate ghost pipefish are relatively small, strange and fascinating creatures. Often associated with feather stars and certain soft corals, their colours and appendages typically resemble those of their crinoid home, helping them blend in and thus avoiding predators. As they are slow moving and virtually defenseless, their camouflage is their most important attribute. When not nesting, pipefish lead a pelagic existence, hanging suspended head down in the water, hardly moving, trying to pass as bits of sea weed or mangrove leaves. Usually divers only encounter them when they come close to land for nesting and this is why i) divers rarely see them and ii) when we do see them, they are usually in pairs (the larger one typically being the female, the smaller one the male). Even though they are close relatives of the seahorses, the females, and not the males, hold the eggs by forming a pouch with her pelvic fins. The male then fertilizes the eggs in this pouch. Once the eggs have been fertilized, stalks (known as cotylephores) develop from the skin and adhere to the eggs, acting like umbilical cords, transferring nutrients and oxygen from the female to the eggs Literally a week after I’d seen my first ornate pipefish, I was diving at another site in the Ras Mohamed National Park. It hadn’t been a particularly good dive for me, I’d seen nothing new, nor any creature behaving in any way that I hadn’t seen before, and the creatures I was looking for in particular (frogfish, hairy pipehorses and sea moths) I’d been unable to find. So as to ensure the dive wasn’t completely wasted, I decided to take some stock photos of corals at a beautiful glassfish pinnacle. Just as I turned shoreward to exit the water, a heavily pregnant ornate pipefish just drifted past me, no more than 2 meters from my face, and joined her partner on a coral head covered in fire coral and black feather stars. This coral head I had already passed numerous times during 5 separate dives at the dive site; I’d even got photos I’d taken of the fire coral and crinoids that, on closer examination, showed the pipefish. This illustrates several things, i) pipefish are excellent at concealment, ii) feather stars are great places to look for pipefish, iii) you’ll often find pipefish in pairs and iv) maybe I need a prescription mask? As a side note, I’m still looking for a Helmeted Gurnard …

“HERE THERE BE MONSTERS!”

A lot of people are scared of the moray eel. A lot of people will tell you that they (the moray eel not the people themselves) are aggressive, dangerous and, above all, realugly.

It is easy to understand these misconceptions (with the exception of the aesthetic value of the moray, after all beauty is in the eye of the beholder); morays are a snakelike fish (most humans have a fear of snakes or anything that slightly resembles a snake), are often “seen” demonstrating an aggressive posture (constantly flashing their fearsome teeth by opening and closing their mouths) and, thanks to movies such as Pete Yates’ The Deep, have a reputation for liking nothing better than to chow down on an unsuspecting diver.

  Hopefully by the time you’ve finished reading this article you’ll have, if not a love of the moray, at least a positive appreciation of these wonderful creatures.

DON'T PUFF ME UP!

They look like organic dirigibles of the sea, have a cute smiley face and pose no threat to humans, yet each year these wonderful and diverse fish are subjected to abuse by divers, snorklers and swimmers alike. At the best, they are caught and handled until they inflate themselves in to an almost spherical shape and, at the worst, they are caught, cleaned, dried and then inflated to make “attractive and unusual” lamp shades which, were they to know their ultimate fate would be as a talking point on someone’s coffee table, would probably provided them with little comfort. What are we talking about? Puffer fish and porcupine fish of course.

5 of our favourite dive sites

We’ve picked 5 of our favourite dive sites for your perusal. We’ve also given a list of the pro’s and con’s of each site so, hopefully, you can get the most from each site without too much effort. Enjoy! SHARK & YOLANDA REEFS, RAS MOHAMMED NATIONAL PARK Shark Reef is the Red Sea’s most famous and most popular dive site. It is easy to understand why, especially if you have dived there in the summer, with its rich and varied corals, and abundance of reef & pelagic fish. Due to its geographic location, the Sinai Peninsula enjoys a rich source of plankton and other food stuffs that are transported to the area by the strong currents of the Red Sea. Due to their geographic location, the Shark & Yolanda reefs being at the very tip of the peninsula, it is advisably that only experienced drift divers dive here as the currents can be very strong. You can also have large surface swells, especially in the winter, that make exiting the water rather tricky. Having said that, on a bad day Shark Reef is a great dive, on a good day Shark Reef can blow your mind.

Shark and Yolanda Reef

Shark Reef is the Red Sea’s most famous and most popular dive site. It is easy to understand why, especially if you have dived there in the summer, with its rich and varied corals, and an abundance of reef & pelagic fish.

Due to its geographic location, the Sinai Peninsula enjoys a rich source of plankton and other food stuffs that are transported to the area by the strong and massive currents of the Red Sea. Due to their geographic location, the Shark & Yolanda reefs being at the very tip of the peninsula, it is advisably that only experienced drift divers dive here as the currents can be strong, very strong. You can also have large surface swells, especially in the winter, that make exiting the water rather tricky. Having said that, on a bad day Shark Reef is a great dive, on a good day Shark Reef can blow your mind.

SS Thistlegorm

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The body’s blood runs slow and deep at 4am. Outside it’s cold, dark and the sun will not show herself for another couple of hours. Most people, the sensible ones at least, are still in bed, wrapped in their duvets, wrapped in the arms of loved ones, wrapped in the bliss of sleep and dreams. And yet across Sharm numerous guests are shuffling bleary eyed to their hotels lobbies, breakfast boxes in hand and the feeling that somewhere someone is having laugh at their expense.

Why are people forsaking their beauty sleep and the warmth of their beds then? Easy. To dive the SS Thistlegorm.

Laying at 30 meters in the Strait of Gubal and forty kilometers as the crow flies from Sharm el-Sheikh (hence the early start), this British merchant navy ship has become, in a relatively short time, an icon of diving in the Red Sea, and is without doubt Egypt’s most famous wreck, if not one of the world’s most famous.

Night Diving in Sharm

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Why go night diving?

Night diving is one the best ways for a diver to experience some of their favorite Sharm dive sites in a whole new light (if you’ll excuse the pun) with the chance to see strange and wonderful creatures that they rarely, if ever, get the chance to see in daylight. There is also the adrenaline rush of venturing in to the unknown for those making their first night dive.

A site that someone knows like the back of their hand in the day becomes a completely different place once the sun goes down.The colours of the reef are so much more vibrant (admittedly with the aid of a torch) and, as Whodini sung, the freaks really do come out at night.

Sharks Need You!

With all the media hysteria regarding the recent shark attacks around Sharm el-Sheikh, it is easy to forget that several of these magnificent and misunderstood marine creatures are threatened by extinction. If ever an animal needed a publicity agent, it’s the shark. Of the 490 known species, only 12 are dangerous to humans yet 20 face extinction and the number is increasing. We’re more likely to eat a shark than be eaten by one, isn’t it time we gave Jaws a break? Great White Shark (carcharodon carcharias) The film Jaws brought the great white star status but also fuelled demand for great white shark products, strange though it may seem to use an animal's dental work as an ornament. Peter Benchley, the author of the book, prior to his death was prominent in the campaign to stop the practice of shark finning but conservationists are still concerned that the film perpetuates the idea that the only good shark is a dead one.

Urchin Mantis Shrimp

One of our favourite sites around Sharm el-Sheikh is Shark’s Bay. At first glance it seems little more than a vast tundra of rocks and sand. On closer inspection though it has a lot to offer, especially if you enjoy macro. One of the most exciting discoveries we have made there recently is a small colony of urchin mantis shrimps. Admittedly we didn’t know what creature we’d stumbled upon until we’d compared our photos to others on the Internet but even before we were able to positively identify the shrimps, we knew we’d spotted something a little rare and unusual. The shrimp has a telson (in laymans terms, it’s arse) that resembles a rock-boring urchin which it blocks the entrance to its cavity (lair) to avoid detection (both from predators and divers). We only initially noticed the shrimps because one just happened to move whilst we were photographing the coral it inhabits. On the same day we saw an eagle ray which is enough to make most divers happy, yet this 30mm shrimp was the highlight of the dive.

Shark's Bay - Love it or Loathe it

Okay, with dive sites such as Shark Reef, Thomas Reef or Ras Umm Sid to choose from, why would anyone in their right mind say "One of my favourite dive sites is Shark's Bay"?

You'll probably never see hundreds of snappers there, or a shiver of sharks, and no wrecks (except for sun-wizened dive guides), so why, oh why! (do girls love horses?), would anyone cite Shark's Bay as one of their favourite dive sites?

For a start, it's an excellent spot for a night dive, teeming with crustaceans, echinoderms and cephalopods. Shark's Bay is predominately made up of hard corals (and sand) so can look ... without wishing to sound too harsh ... dreary in the daytime but at night all these corals (or at least the polyps) come out to feed. It's also an excellent place for photography, with lots of macro and little currents. It is quite easy to spend 90 minutes on a dive and not drop below 8 meters.

Secondly, admittedly you have to look a little harder in the daytime, but Shark's Bay has a very healthy population of stonefish and scorpionfish (devil, bearded, and smallscale). Yeah, I know, these are the 'ugly bastards' of the fish world and not to everyones taste and, if that's you, there are plenty of 'pretty fish' such as butterflyfish, angelfish, gobies, blennies, anthias and anemones (including at least two pink anemones).

And there's not just the small things there either. Admittedly not a regular basis, I've also seen here whale sharks, a leopard shark (just the one), eagle rays, mantas, fantail rays, honeycomb rays (or leopard rays) and, of course, the bluespotted ray. I also know guides who have seen guitarfish and oceanic white tips.

I've seen robust ghostpipefish (there has also been sighted ornate ghost pipefish), juvenile starry puffers (which look like swimming olives), juvenile yellow-mouthed morays and juvenile coral hinds. The reason for these, I think, is there is very little current action in Shark's Bay which is why it is such a popular place for training dives too.

My favourite spot in the whole area is the glassfish pinnacle (28m) but don't look for it on the dive site maps as it seems, amazingly, to have been overlooked. Here you will find a very healthy pinnacle with a large pygmy sweeper colony protected by several red-mouthed groupers. On the pinnacle itself you can find numerous types of shrimps and a very active cleaning station, while usually somewhere at the base of the pinnacle you can find a couple of resident scorpionfish. Often you'll also come across a large malabar grouper that likes to stop at the aforementioned cleaning station and, while it is being cleaned, is quite happy for you to 'float' next to it (usually at all other times the fish won't have anything to do with you).

Shark's Bay also hosts, I believe, the two fiercest anemonefish in the whole of the Northern Red Sea. On a sandy plateau at about 14m, you come to a very nice coral head (often with two large morays inside it) and next to this is a bubble anemone inhabited by some seriously aggressive fish. If you believe anemonefish don't have teeth (which I've actually heard some dive guides say), spend a few minutes near this anemone and then tell me they don't have teeth. I swear these fish are reincarnated sharks.

Best time to dive Shark's Bay? Obviously at night, but before 8AM is equally good (i.e. before the day boats arrive to ferry all those divers and snorkelers to the Strait of Tiran) as is an hour before sunset (once all those day boats have deposited their guests back on terra firma).

Love it? Loathe it? It's all the same to me; Shark's Bay is one of my favourite dive sites.

See our Shark's Bay Photo Gallery

The Oceanic Whitetip Shark "Carcharhinus Longimanus"

Sightings of oceanic whitetip sharks at certain dive sites in the Central & Southern Egyptian Red Sea became a common occurrence in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Found off-shore in tropical and subtropical seas around the globe, they are normally cruising the upper layers of their open-ocean habitat in search of food. They are easily recognisable sharks, with their broad, large, rounded first dorsal fin, wing-like pectoral fins, and conspicuous colour markings on practically all fins (see fig. 1). These markings do not only identify them on the species level, they also allow for easy identification of individuals.

Shark incident off Southern Sinai

<span ><span > Short summary of the events:On November 30th, 2010, two snorkelers were attacked by a shark off a beach just north of Naama Bay, both suffering serious injuries. Photographs taken minutes before the 2nd attack show a fully grown oceanic whitetip shark (Carcharhinus longimanus), that closely circled divers before approaching and eventually attacking a swimmer on the surface.On December 1st, 2010, a third swimmer was attacked just a few kilometres north of the previous incidents; no photographic material is available from this event.Reports of a fourth attack were later corrected, stating that the injuries to the hands of the swimmer involved were sustained by contact with corals rather than from the bites of a shark.

Hammerhead Shark

Hammerhead Shark from Cigdem Cooper on Vimeo.

The hammerhead sharks are a group of sharks in the family Sphyrnidae, so named for the unusual and distinctive structure of their heads, which are flattened and laterally extended into a "hammer" shape called a "cephalofoil". Most hammerhead species are placed in the genus Sphyrna; some authorities place the winghead shark in its own genus, Eusphyra. Many, not necessarily mutually exclusive, functions have been proposed for the cephalofoil, including sensory reception, maneuvering, and prey manipulation. Hammerheads are found worldwide in warmer waters along coastlines and continental shelves. Unlike most sharks, hammerheads usually swim in groups (called ‘shivers’). Some of these schools can be found near the Cocos Islands by Costa Rica.

It's official - Stonefish are from Space!

NASA has confirmed what many divers have believed for a long time - stonefish (Synanceja verrucosa) are not of this world!

NASA boffin Issac Einstein Asimov told reporters that, using the Hubble telescope, they had located the home galaxy, named 'Tadpole Galaxy', of the

stonefish.

Stonefish

Stonefish (Synanceja verrucosa)

Length: up to 0.4 m Distribution: Pacific and Indian Ocean, ranging from the Red Sea to Great Barrier Reef

Synanceja verrucosa is a fish species, sometimes lethal to humans, which is known as the reef stonefish or simply stonefish. They are carnivorous ray-finned fish with venomous spines that lives on reef bottoms, camouflaged as a rock. They are the most venomous known fish in the world.   The average length of most stonefish is about 30-40 centimeters. The largest Stonefish ever recorded was 51 centimeters long. It has a mottled greenish to mostly brown colour which aids in its ability to camouflage itself among the rocks of many of the tropical reefs. It eats mostly small fish, shrimp and other crustaceans. Like the shark family, stonefishes do not possess a swim bladder and swim by thrashing their tail in a side-to-side manner. However, divers rarely see a stonefish swimming (which has given rise to the often stated and incorrect statement that "stonefish can't swim") as they are usually found motionless on the coral or floor. Unless severely frightened, a stonefish will prefer to move by walking on its pectoral fins. Its main habitat is on coral reefs, around dull coloured plants, near and about rocks, or can be found dormant in the mud or sand.

The Reef Stonefish is the most venomous fish in the world. Its dorsal area is lined with 13 spines that release venom from two sacs attached to each spine. Its venom causes severe pain with possible shock, paralysis, and tissue death depending on the depth of the penetration. This level can be fatal to humans if not given medical attention within a couple of hours. Immediate first aid treatment requires immersion of the affected limb in hot water, ensuring that it is not so hot that skin damage may occur. The immobilisation of venom at penetration site by tourniquet or firm constrictive bandaging is no longer recommended.

The venom consists of a mixture of proteins, including the hemolytic stonustoxin, the neurotoxic trachynilysin and the cardioactive cardioleputin; an antivenom is available.

The venom is protein based, and it can be (partially) denatured by the application of a very hot compress to the injury site. Some relief can be gained from infiltrating the wound with a local anaesthetic. This is a temporary measure to reduce localized pain and shock. Medical aid must be sought at the earliest opportunity. Typically, surviving victims suffer localized nerve damage occasionally leading to atrophy of adjoining muscle tissues.

There have been unproven reports of osteo-arthritic sufferers experiencing improved mobility and reduction in joint pain following envenomation episode. The responsible agent has not been identified.

The pain is said to be so severe that the victims of its sting want the affected limb to be amputated. The poisonous sting of Scorpion Fish and Lionfish are said to deliver almost the same level of pain.

Gordon Reef, Strait of Tiran

Gordon Reef is the first of four reefs lying in a north-east line in the Strait of Tiran and is easily identified by the wreck of the Louilla, a Panamanian cargo ship, that ran aground on the reef in 1981. The "classic" dive here runs along the north side of the reef, however the reef on the southern and western side is, for me, far prettier, more pristine and has a lot more variation.