Malta & Gozo: A little dip before the European Divers Meeting
We were invited to take part in the European Divers Meeting in Gozo this week. Of course, we jumped at the opportunity, as we have never dived in either Malta or Gozo before, even though it is just a short hop from home. Before the actual celebrations got started, we were given the chance to dive with Calypso Diving for a day to see some of the cavern and reef dives that were on offer.
Now usually, the diving in Gozo is shore based, with a host of dive sites that have dedicated stairs and ladders to reach the dive sites, but, as Caroline had had a small accident on the staircase at home and was unable to get up and down very easily, the team at Calypso were brilliant and took us to our two dive sites by boat.
We dived Cathedral Cave and Crocodile Rock. Alas, just as we were heading out for the first dive, the sky clouded over, lighting and thunder flashed and boomed and all the beautiful natural light that would usually cascade into this cavern disappeared! But the dive was still great, as somewhat unusually, you can surface in this cavern. It even has a supply of fresh air so you can have a chat half way through the dive. As you turn to face back out to sea, the window reflects on the surface and it is a super place to grab a shot of your buddy in the blue.
The weather was no better after lunch (this is the only day of rain in ages and is extremely unusual) but we headed to a site near to the famous Blue Hole and where the Azure Window used to be. It is called Crocodile Rock, not because Elton John once dived here, but because the rock poking out just about the waves really does look a lot like a crocodile. There is a steep wall that drops vertically to over 40m but we stayed shallower looking for marine life. We found a huge nudibranch, a cuttlefish, lobster, scorpionfish and the highlight of the dive was a small school of barracuda that was happy to allow us to get up close and take a few pictures.
Just as we finished the dive, the sun came out! So, at least, we had a pleasant boat ride back to the dive centre. There was no time to hang around so we hastily rinsed our gear and ran to get changed, as the official opening of the event was being held that evening over in Malta and we had a ferry to catch!
So we will tell you more in our next post…
For more from Nick and Caroline, visit www.frogfishphotography.com
