Malta Trip

[shmeeg]

We have just got back from an excellent weeks diving in Malta. We were diving with Dive Deep Blue and they were absolutely brilliant. The 1st 4 dives were part of the Deep Diver Speciality course but they included the Coral Cave, The Blue Hole and the Rosie (a tugboat wreck). The diving was fantastic with consistant 30m viz and at least 40m on some. The drop offs were breath taking (I got some good pics but had major problems with my camera fogging (tried everything - dessicants, leaving it out of the sun etc to no avail).

I think my favorite dive was the EL Faroud - an oil tanker wreck lying at 35m on white sand. We swam out about 70 yards from shore at about 10m then dropped down onto the stern of wreck as it came into view. We then swam along the walkway under the bridge, down the stairs onto the main deck and through a huge crack in the hull (the ship is split into 2 parts) down to the sand and crossed to the other side of the wreck. From the sand you could look right up past the side of the ship through shoals of fish to the surface - pity my camera was fogged up at that time!! We then slowly ascended up the side of the wreck and swam through the bridge and headed back to the shore at about 20m. We did our safety stop in the small harbour where my camera miraculously unfogged. After that I replaced the battery with a fully charged hong kong ebay battery with went flat after 5 mins!! doh

This wreck is huge (100m) and we probably could have done 3-4 more dives to see it all - next time I suppose.

The guys at Dive Deep Blue were absolutely brilliant and I would recommend diving with them to anyone who is thinking of going to Malta. Most of the diving is shore based and they keep the groups small and cater to all experience levels.


http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa228/grw850/faroud3a.jpg

http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa228/grw850/bluegrotto1a.jpg

[Midton]

Thanks for the write-up. I like Malta as a place to visit, it's good to have a recommendation for a dive company.

Cheers!:D

Al.

[stew]

nice blog, more pics if you have any please :D

fogging......
put the camera in the housing in the morning before you leave the hotel.
assuming you have air con. the housing should not fog on the inside.

leaving it in the sun will more than likely cause it to leak as the air expands with heat.
when you hit the water, it contracts causing a vacume that may draw water in to the housing. sadly i learned that one the hard way!

[Scuba-Doh!]

Um El Faroud is a fantastic wreck and was my first. I dived it on my Deep Dive while doing my Advanced course. Really wierd sitting on the deck doing our deep dive skill (measuring nitrogen narcosis effect) with a bloody big hole in the deck not far away. The tanker had been in for repairs and was thought to be completely empty of oil/gas/whatever but an unlucky welder ignited some vapours in the hold which opened the tanker up like a tin of sardines. The boat was purposefully sank off the west coast (either in memory of those lost in the explosion or for divers (or both)).

[shmeeg]

fogging......
put the camera in the housing in the morning before you leave the hotel.
assuming you have air con. the housing should not fog on the inside.




Thanks - that makes sense. I will see if I have anymore pics that are not too hazy due to the fog. Most of them look like I've used a soft focus filter - would have been ok if there had been an underwater wedding going on!

[Claire]

doing our deep dive skill (measuring nitrogen narcosis effect)

I read about this drill somewhere else - what does it consist of? My personal recommendation for a test would be how much someone laughed at gas guzzler's jokes - laugh a lot = very narked.

[Scuba-Doh!]

I read about this drill somewhere else - what does it consist of? My personal recommendation for a test would be how much someone laughed at gas guzzler's jokes - laugh a lot = very narked.

Our instructor had on his slate the numbers 1 to 20 (or 30) in little circles randomly arranged and we had to point to them in numerical order. We did it on the shore and he timed us then we did it again on the deck. There was a noticeable difference. I've seen/heard of instructors putting sums on the slate or asking how long the bottom time for x meters could be.

[Airmonster]

Our instructor got us to write the alphabet backwards, :eek: not the easiest thing to do even when not narked! :D

/Colin.

[loudy331]

I'm doing my deep speciality next weekend and the instructor was telling me he'll get me to write where i work backwards when were at 40M :eek: jeez i doubt i'd be able to do it at the surface.

[regthing]

Our instructor had on his slate the numbers 1 to 20 (or 30) in little circles randomly arranged and we had to point to them in numerical order. We did it on the shore and he timed us then we did it again on the deck. There was a noticeable difference. I've seen/heard of instructors putting sums on the slate or asking how long the bottom time for x meters could be.

That's exactly what I had to do as well. He made sure to point out that it should be easier under water as the slate will look a third bigger and you'd done it once all ready. It still took longer to find them....

[Claire]

I'm doing my deep speciality next weekend and the instructor was telling me he'll get me to write where i work backwards when were at 40M :eek: jeez i doubt i'd be able to do it at the surface.

I don't think I could manage that on the surface - law firms and their complex multiple names.

Bet you wish you worked for BP!

[Scuba-Doh!]

Bet you wish you worked for BP!
I did, wouldn't want to spell the name of the engineering consultancy firm I'm working for now backwards.

[stew]

when i did mine, they got me to write my name backwards & then do a long multiplication sum.
writing my name backwards is something i used to do as a kid as one day we didnt have a 50p for the telly. after the long winter i got good at it..
numbers is also something i can recall being good at, so no problems there (generally)
i actually did the test faster under the water than on the boat!
but i did put the decimal point in the wrong place in the sum, but she let me off with that error.