Michelles London Life

Diving in the Red Sea - Bells to the Blue Hole

I had the most amazing experience of my life in Dahaab.

Over the first couple of days Anna and i had been diving to complete our PADI Open Water Divers course here in Dahaab (we had started the course in London). We finished that and became officially qualified divers at around lunch time Wednesday. The rest of the people we were travelling with were going to go snorkling that afternoon at a place called the Blue Hole. It's a circular coral reef with a giant hole in the middle that goes to about 250 metres deep. So, our instructor Rachal suggested we go and dive it. Unless you're a qualified diver, you're only allowed to snorkel there, and even if you are qualified you have to have a local guide with you to make sure you're safe.

It sounded like a great idea, but once we got out there and sat down for the debrief before suiting up, i realised what we were actually going to do and started to get a little freaked out. I'm afraid of the sea in particular and any water that i can't see through in general. If i can't see then i don't know if i'm going to hurt myself on a rock, or sharp branch, or if something that will hurt me or eat me will come up behind me. I don't like touching something that i can't identify, slimey or moving things, in case they bite or sting me. Also, i'm afraid of being stuck. I just don't like the idea of getting stuck and being unable to move and then eventually dieing. All pretty normal i reckon! Any sane person would be afraid of that sort of thing...

What we were going to do is begin the dive by jumping into the water from a rock further up the coast at a spot called Bells, or the 'Pond'. It's a tiny version of the Blue Hole but much much narrower, like a tunnel. Ok, so i was going to have to jump blindly into water i can't see through completely surrounded by rocks on all sides. Then i would be in a tunnel that we'd have to descend to 18 meters in, then swim through until when we reached the end, and then as we come out of the tunnel of rocks to our left and right is an enourmous cliff face of coral reef. It is rated as the number one coral reef to dive for in the world. Below us and beyond us is what is known as 'the blue'. Where we come out and all along the entire section of coast line, the ocean floor is 2000 metres below us - they call that bottomless because no one can actually go that far down.

Then we follow the coral reef along for a half an hour or so until we reach the Blue Hole, while we do that we have to hug the reef because if we get too far away from it we'll be caught in a current and swept away, but at the same time we have to be seriously careful of not touching the reef, both for it's protection and our survival. Some of the most beautiful pieces of life can be poisonos or deadly. Once in the Blue Hole we can 'relax' a bit because it's sheltered and not so dangerous.

Right, so, after the debriefing i'm sitting there shaking in my swim suit - probably had a classic horrified expression on my face. But I haven't pulled out yet. With all our gear on waddling like ducks up the coast to the entry point i pass a section of cliff covered in varous memorial plaques in different languages. One of them is in english, and it's a memorial for a man that died diving here. Fuuuuuuuuck!!!!!!! - all of the plaques represent people who have died diving here!!! Not just shaking anymore, good and proper freaked out.

The hardest thing i've ever done in my life is jump into that rock tunnel. I was standing on the edge of the cliff , my feet shaking in my flippers, huge heavey tank putting me off balance, looking out at the dark surface of the ocean with darker rocks and unidentifieable shapes underneath - scared the bejeezus out of me. But i did it... and i didn't die! Yay!

As soon as i was under the surface, breathing and realising that i was ok, visibilty was perfect and crystal clear, everything was suddenly fine. The surface of the ocean is much scarier than being underneath it. It was still scary swimming through that tunnel, but once we came out in front of the cliff face - i have never seen anything more beautiful anywhere in the world. I cannot describe it well enough to do it justice. I just spent the next half hour staring about in dumb wonderment. I wasn't afraid, i was too amazed at the colours and all the crazy looking fish. It's like a magical brilliantly coloured garden. The fish aren't afraid of us, they swim around us and ignore us completely. There was a huge cloud of tiny golden fish that surrounded us, and bright purple fish as big as my hand, there were Nimo's and other tropical fish all over the place. We saw an octopus. At one point Rachal pointed at this huge rock, and i couldn't tell what she wanted us to look at, then the rock moved and it was an enourmous fish almost as big as i was. All kinds of different corals, hard ones, living ones - a swarm of baby seahorses, a sea snake! so so many things.

We had an underwater camera. We have a few cool photo's, but they are nothing compared to the real thing! It's so disappointing that the colours don't come out on film. I want you all to go and do the same dive immediatley so you can see for yourself what i'm talking about.

I'm definitely coming back to Dahaab next year to do more diving. Dahaab is about the only place in Egypt i'm in any hurry to see again. Although i do want to go back to the pyramids and the Sahara one day too.

After those five blissful days, it was back to London and work... to suffer through the British winter.

posted by ... @ 3:27 AM