Join Me in the Club - 03/01/2019

Day two of my midwinter dive adventure saw Dive Aqaba take me to a beach club near the Saudi border for a couple of dives.

The first and by far the most impressive was The Bowl. The second, and the one I was meant to get excited about was The Cathedral. The Cathedral turned out to be a man made structure that housed a small lighthouse on the surface. The Bowl was where the action actually happened.

We had been swimming for some time when I first saw something in the gloom. The dive guide saw it too. It could of been a shark, a tuna, a turtle,or a dolphin. We'll never know as it only ever remained a shadow in the distance. However, once we gave up on seeing it came round a small rock formation only to see a remora.

I 'd never seen one before, but when I saw its suckers and its interest in me I knew instantly that I didn't want it to attach to me. I sensible kept my distance and performed manoeuvres that would keep it away. It was nice to see and gave credence to the larger creature in the darkness theory.

Dive two never saw anything that would compare, but we did see some nudis.

Nudi!

Shadow of the Cathedral

Hunting

Puffer

Remora

Cable Canyon - 02/01/2019

The diving gods were kind to me in 2018, and set a trend that seems to be continuing into 2019, as myself and Gill.I.Am took advantage of some cheap flights and a love affair with Jordan to allow me to dive again at one of my favourite parts of the world. 

Long term readers will know, I've visited and dived in this area before. However, I genuinely love this site. A wee bimble down a coral canyon to 43m then a turn and ascending under the man made cables connecting Jordan and Egypt, passing bright red anemones and delicate corals. Most importantly, considering all the people that dive from South Beach you won't see a soul until the shallows. That's because, they all want to dive the Cedar Pride. I did too, back then. But now it's so passe.

This time I was diving with Dive Aqaba, the company I'd used in the past was now kaput. I chatted Abdallah, tolf him of my experiences and how I wanted to see some old friends down deep on the reef I went, and there they were. I was, as the youngsters say, "totes emosh". 

We followed that up with a wee dive around the Cedar Pride, but I knew my wee anemone was still safe 4 years on. I was happy.

Then - December 2014

Now - January 2019

Snakelocks

Buddy for the day

Cedar Pride

Cedar Pride

Day 6 – No Dolphins, But BOGOF on Wrecks

The final day began with a dive at Dolphin House - a site where at certain times of the day dolphins swim by. Sadly, today was not one of those days. As it was it was a pretty dull reef dive only enlivened by some of the Kingmaker's underwater antics. 

He signalled me over and pointed to a whole. We watched for a minute and my suspicions grew. Some more divers came over to see what we were looking at. We watched for a few minutes more. I began to realise that there was in fact nothing to see and that he was just 'yanking my chain'. Still we watched and still more divers gathered. We laughed and swam off.

Our last dive of the trip was the wreck of the El Minya, a minesweeper sunk by Israeli jets during the 7 Day War.  The briefing had also indicated the presence of a second wreck off the stern of a fishing trawler. The trawler was actually the better of the two wrecks despite being a fraction of the size and boasted considerably more life. It was a good way to end the trip.

Nudi

Red Anemone

Red Anemone

Crocodilefish

Lionfish

The Trawler

Day 5 - ...Rosalie Moller, then there was 300 -14/01/2016

Day 5 was always going to be a little bit special. Today my dive log is turning 300, but I’m getting a little ahead of myself. First was the Rosalie Muller, a WWII wreck in deep water (35m+).

Our plan had been to crank up the PPO2 to 1.6 to enable us to dive around the deck without our computer playing the greatest hits of Electronic Disco. This worried me a bit, as did the entry which involved keel hauling ourselves from stern to bow of our own boat before descending to the wreck.

I’ll be honest, I don’t really like this kind of dive and I used a lot of air going down the line. Once on it, despite being at 35m, I calmed and slowed my breathing, but took a conscious decision to not take photographs as this would only deplete my air even quicker. We got back to the boat with 40 bar to spare and without hitting deco. That seemed like a win. What impressed me the most about the wreck was its eerie completeness. It’s dark and a little unnerving.  The Gandalf of the Internet described her before the dive as, “the lady of the Red Sea – revealing her magnificence one fin stroke at a time”.

Then there were 300. At first I thought it would be a poor dive, having dived it the night before, but it proved itself very worthy with an impressive drift, turtle, nudibranch and stargazer fish. The Kingmaker, Hell's Kells and Legend Roy made fine companions. We drifted for over an hour - a clear sign it was decent dive.

Dive 3 of the day was looking to be a bit of a washout with little to see until it sprang to life with the presence of an Eagle Ray. They’re such graceful animals, but sadly I have no footage to share. What was particularly amusing was Hell's Kells dance of victory aimed at Midge and I who never saw it on its first pass. Midge was diving with us because his usual buddy Russ was feigning back pain. The ray, subsequently dubbed 'the Ray of Victory' was only over-shadowed by accusations that our reluctance to swim back against the current meant that we SMB'd the 'Zodiac of Shame' - so named by the chaps of Scuba Leeds who were daft enough to swim against the current and also missed out on the ray. *chuckles*

Pufferfish

Quadricolour Chromodoris

Arabian Picassofish

Turtle

Nudi

Embriated Moray

Blue spotted flatworm

Day 4 - The Day of Wrecks - 13/01/2016

With an itinerary that contained the Dunraven, two dives on the Thistlegorm and a night dive on the Barge, it was always going to be a wreckish day.

I like the Dunraven as a wreck. It's upside down which is unusual and strangely picturesque. The challenge for me is always to get back to the liveaboard from the wreck. I mean, how far can you make your air last? I reckon it is entirely doable, though I have now failed twice. I should say that we never failed because of low air, but rather we got bored of swimming along the Beacon Rock reef into a current.  As it was we no more than about 60m from the boat. Easily done with 80bar.

Like the Dunraven, I’d dived the Thistlegorm before. The last time I was with the Zookeeper and remember not particularly enjoying the current or the penetration into the wreck. On this occasion, I knew what to expect and so I was far more comfortable on both dives.

The Kingmaker had agreed to lead us in the penetration portion of the dive. It gave rise to one of my heartiest underwater chuckles as he headed into a block entrance and had to reverse out. In fairness to him, he actually did a pretty darn good job after that initial moment, but I still gave him a few metres head start throughout the dive in case it happened again.

The Barge at night was a mixed experience. It’s a good site with lots of Morays, Stonefish, Scorpionfish and nudis, but there were just too many people on it. Our little group of 4 got split up and I took the decision to swim with Trist out of the Barge and wait for it to clear. I think Hell's Kells & Royston did the same thing, but went the opposite way, as we all reassembled ten minutes later with no one else on it.

Dunraven

Thistlegorm Locomotive

Thistlegorm Gun

Kingmaker & The Thistlegorm

Fimbriated Maray

Stonefish

Day 3 - The Narc Shark and the Deep Blue - 12/01/2016

Shark & Yolanda reefs are two of the more spectacular reefs in the northern Red Sea. Although, I sometimes think they are so vast and sweeping that vista sometimes that you miss the life that makes its life there. It was on the this reef that I had my first narc of the week. Dives one and two of the day were on this reef.

I always like to keep my eyes on the deep blue. It's where you see sharks and some of the bigger marine life. Well on dive one I was squinting into the blue and I saw one. Well, I thought I did. It seems it was a turtle, but at 35.5m and working hard into a head current it was definitely a narc shark at the very least. I chased it, until my dive computers started playing the classic hits of disco-electonica sending me up to more sensible depths. Meanwhile, the rest of the group looked on bemused. I rallied at the end of Yolanda and regrouped my senses. It was a great dive though! Back on the boat I was the butt of the jokes. I didn't mind, I saw a narc-shark.

For the Kingmaker, a large Napoleon Wrasse seemed to hold his attention. It's not the best picture, but you can certainly see the scale of it.

Our second dive saw the Kingmaker who knew this reef well take a short cut across 'the saddle' between the reefs in the deep blue. I think the we went into slightly deeper blue than expected because we arrived on Yolanda Reef on the shallow remnants of the Yolanda from which the reef takes its name. We also arrived before everyone else. The upside was that we got to spend a lot longer on Satellite Reef and with a turtle we'd seen earlier.

The third and fourth dives of the day were at Beacon Rock. The highlight of the dives here was getting to dive on the wreck of a liveaboard that sunk here a few years ago. There really wasn't that much to see. Although Hells Kells did spot a warted nudibranch of some kind.*

Turtle

Kingmaker & Napoleon Wrasse

Turtle

* I know, it's amazing how nonchalant you become about some of the diving very quickly.

Day 2 - Carnatic, Marcus and the Alternatives - 11/01/2016

The Carnatic is considered one of the oldest wrecks in the Red Sea having sunk in the 19th century. It's really rather beautiful. Though, as I discovered, it's a tight fit up at the bow. I kind of wished I'd lost a few Kgs before going in. While swimming round it towards the end of the dive The Dangerous Brothers had spotted a nice nudibranch - a wart slug.

The Marcus, also known as the Tile Boat, was without the doubt the surprise of the trip. I'd never heard of it before, but she turned out to be a fine wreck with some great life and swim throughs. As it's name suggests it was laden with tiles when it went down. The tiles are still there today and all stamped "Made in Italy".

We were all a bit sceptical about the Alternatives. All of us had dived it before and didn't have a lot of positive things to say about it. So when it emerged that the last two dives of the day were on this reef we were a bit disappointed. As punishment, we asked for the dive guide to join us on the first one. He actually, made the most of a very average Red Sea dive site spotting barracuda, a turtle, scorpion fish and a nice nudi.

The night dive saw me choose to forgo any photographic activity as I instead buddied a relatively novice diver. Having no idea how he was in the water I opted to keep an eye on him. As it is, Kung Fu Trist turned out to be a very competent diver - a credit to the BSAC club that trained him. He ended up joining myself, Royston and Hells Kells for the next few night dives.

Carnatic Propeller

Inside Marcus

Crocodile fish

Lion fish

Devil Red Scopionfish

Blue spotted ray

Midge's nudi

Reef life

Stonefish

Day 1 - The Poseidon Adventure begins - 10/01/2016

The day began, as all liveaboards do, with a check dive. The reef (Poseidon) was pleasant, somewhat like an aquarium, but with nothing of any great interest. It was, afterall, a check dive.

It was to get better with a move to the Giannis D – one of the reasons for my trip.* The Giannis D ran aground and sunk in 1983 and has been sitting at a 45 degree angle confusing divers ever since. It's really quite disorientating, I personally began using my torch and bubbles  as a plumb line while penetrating. It's a great wreck and at a little more than 20m very accessible.

While inside the wreck we lost the Kingmaker amidst the dazzle of Royston's lights. Knowing he was no longer inside the wreck, the remaining three of us emerged and had a look for him. Now when you lose your buddy you tend to stick to standard buddy separation procedure, but on this occasion we asked ourselves what would the Kingmaker do? We took a gamble and headed to the shallower bow of the boat where we found him snuggled in like a cuckoo with another buddy pair - panic over, dive saved. It made me wonder though....

Our third and final dive of the day was a night dive on the Sha'ab Abu Nuhas reef itself. I took the opportunity to have some with an inexpensive UV torch I'd been given for Christmas. The down side was that this meant I'd have to dive with a yellow filter on my camera - something which I'd never done before. IT definitely messes with the white balance of the camera. As such I have no fluorescing photographs. I do, however, have some nice little video clips and some non UV but yellow filtered pictures of Spanish Dancers!

To add even more colour to the experience, the Kingmaker was using a red filter on his video light. Apparently, it doesn't scare the reef life quite as much and so you see a bit more on the dive.

Kingmaker

Hell's Kells

Fish & Coral

Giannis D bow

Porcupinefish

* I've done a Red Sea Liveaboard before and I have dived much of this itinerary before. However my last boat was wooden hulled and poor weather meant she wasn't able to make the crossing over to Sha'ab Abu Nuhas.

Return to the Red - 09/01/2016

I'm doing a liveaboard with Blue O Two Blue Melody on the Red Sea. Based out of Hurgahda, Egypt, she is considered one of the better boats in the BO2 fleet.

I am diving with some blog regulars the Kingmaker and Bridget (who I've taken to calling Hell's Kells) and a chap we met on the boat who we'll call Royston. He's a BSAC diver from Bristol who, it appears, doesn't actually breath.

On the boat are a collection of great characters from all over the UK. Midge & Russ -  the Dangerous Brothers, the lads from Leeds Scuba and whole who host of others who I'll mention as we go on.

Back: Me, Midge, Kingmaker,Royston
Front: Hell's Kells & Ahmed

Fame! I'm Gonna Live Forever... - 02/03/2015

Front Cover

"..I'm going to learn how to dive!"

Now that I've dropped that cheeky little earworm into your head I'll get down to business. Scottish Diver, the official ScotSAC magazine have published an amalgam summary of Posidon's Parlour's Jordanian adventures with Aqaba's Anchor. I've known it was going to be in for a wee while, but quite unlike me I kept it quiet.

So it was with baited breath that I waited for the latest March/April edition to fall through my letterbox. Thus far, it has not arrived, but I knew it was out there as blog readership briefly spiked on its release and TDFKAMF sent me a blurry photograph of it taken on his mobile phone. However, yesterday, the kind chaps at Aquatron gave me a pre-thumbed edition while I was in getting fills (Thanks Mark & Chris). I didn't expect to be quite as tickled as I was to see it in the flesh. 

I eagerly thumbed through it and there it was. The red anemone glowing out from the page. I never wrote the headline, had I done so it would have been far more narcissistic. :) 

I've included a fairly low res version of the article below, but I'd encourage you if you aren't a member of ScotSAC to invest a few quid in either a subscription to the magazine or join the organisation for a free copy. Seriously, it's like £12.50 for 6 issues a year and this month the article "Dougie's Picture Perfect" is accompanied by some amazing photographs.

Remember, you can like Poseidon's Parlour on Facebook too!

The article