Tucked behind rocks at 90 feet, my fellow divers and I were getting restless hoping for a visit from hammerheads or one of the resident tiger sharks, neither of which were cooperating. The dive master motioned for the group to follow, as he headed to another cleaning station and perhaps better luck. As I turned to make sure the videographer to my right got the signal, I saw him kicking in the opposite direction to deeper water.
First off, a confession. I love diving in Roatan. Why? For a couple of reasons. Number one—the reefs around the island are still in superb shape. Not a lot of ocean-going pelagics, it’s true. But I’ve been diving the reefs of the Caribbean for more than ten years, and I would rank Roatan in the top two. (Bonaire would be my other choice.)
Cold water diving will never be the same after a visit to Gulen situated north of Bergen on the Norwegian west coast. Here, history meets present day, the deep ocean meets kelp forest and the gargantuan meets the minuscule.
Whatever you want to see underwater, chances are good that you will find it at the Gulen Dive Resort.
A rusty tram clatters past us. An uninterrupted line of cars slowly moves along Leó Frankel Street. Businessmen in dark suits hurry to their desks. Women in high heels walk carefully on the cobbled pavement. Between the houses, the ferries on the Danube can be seen, drifting past the Isle of Margaret that divides the town. We are in the middle of the Budapest morning rush hour. Our team attracts attention from passersby.
When people from the United States go on a European vacation, diving is usually not on the agenda. But the Costa Brava area on the northeastern coast of Spain offers some interesting diving. It might not be as colorful as the Red Sea or Indonesia, but add on the cultural experience, and it is worth a visit.
British Columbia (BC), Canada is known for having some of the most colourful temperate water diving in the world. This holds true for excellent critter sightings as well, found throughout the varied coastal regions.
Palau—prior to a few years ago—was just a name that meant a distant dive destination on my list of places to go. I had seen the periodical article written with its crystal blue water emerald green rock islands and sea life and coral combinations like no other place diving. A dive site called Blue Corner, sounded like fantasy land, almost as if it were thought up by Walt Disney himself, if he were a diver.
Seen from space, Isabela Island—the largest island of the Galápagos archipelago— reminds me of a giant seahorse facing the great blue yonder of the Pacific Ocean. As one approaches land, the cap of thin white clouds dissipates. Isabela’s majestic landscape is a perfect alignment of shield volcanoes, rising above 1,000 metres, which stretches from the southeast to the northwest. Among them, Wolf Volcano reaches 1,700 metres.
Unlike Max in the children’s book by Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are, I hadn’t worn my wolf suit, or made mischief of one kind or another. I hadn’t been sent to my room before it transformed into an island of magical monsters only reachable after a year of sailing.
I wouldn’t want to spend that long on a boat, so I behaved(ish) and looked forward to being on Galápagos and spending my nights tucked up on dry land.
There can’t be many dive sites that owe their existence to the direct intervention of the country’s president, but Tasi Tolu, on the outskirts of Timor Leste’s capital Dili, can claim that unique patronage.
