Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Diving in the Red Sea


During March and April, Paul and I got our certifications as Advanced Open Water Scuba Divers and Underwater Naturalists.  Over two weekends we did 6 dives towards our certifications:  A deep dive to 90 feet, a wreck dive on a sunken Lebanese cruiser, an underwater navigation dive, a search and recovery dive, and two underwater naturalist dives. 
We did our diving in Aqaba, a city in southern Jordan, which is the only area of Jordan that borders the Red Sea.  It is a very small stretch of coastline, about 20 miles, sharing borders with Israel, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.  It’s a beautiful area, save for the port and huge cargo ships that are anchored in the gulf, but the diving is not bad and hey, it’s only a 3.5 hour drive from Amman!
The water is quite cold this time of year.  I was wearing a 5mm wetsuit and Paul was wearing a 3mm wetsuit with a 3mm shorty over it and a hood!  The visibility isn’t bad but unfortunately overfishing and pollution has really taken a toll on the fish and corals. 






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