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Wooo Hooo! It is warming up again!! The water has finally thawed a degree and is now 23-24ºC, which only really happens once the good weather is here to stay!! So, after a bit of a false alarm, summer should be just around the corner before we know it.
We had some awesome hot weather last week, but as expected (it was faaaar too early for that kind of heat) that did all cool off a bit this week. But that week of hot stuff was enough to get the water warming up, so that can only be a good thing.
We have had eagle rays, turtles and great big morays, and that has only been local. I did do another dive on Shark and Yolande a day after the last dive I logged here, and in contrast, the viz was great. I had a great dive, just bimbled with my buddy, who kind of inherited the giant napoleon wrasse as his buddy for a bit, and we just about circled every bit of each reef, so that was cool.

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Actually, if I were to get pedantic, it has been more like six months since my last dive without having either students or a group of divers in tow.
So I thought I would take a dip in the water on Shark and Yolande reefs, and hang about on the bag of Hamada’s group on their dive.
I was followed for the bulk of my dive by one of the largest napoleon wrasses that I have ever seen, he really seems to be growing every time I see him (assuming that there is only one family of napoleons living in that location, I could be wrong). I saw quite a few morays, and generally had a very nice dive. The surface was flat, and currents minimal, so it was all very leisurely.
The viz was not quite as clear as it usually is, in fact there was a definite greenish tint to the water, a sure sign that things are on the brink of warming up. Great in the long-term, but that will mean a few jelly filled dives with murky viz for a week or so.

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Ooo, so I installed a new system for tracking my web-stats a few hours ago, and even in such a short time, I have realised that we are a little bit global here at DB.
Already today we have had visits from the UK, Egypt, Thailand, Poland, the USA, Canada, Ireland, Malaysia and Switzerland… to name a few… not bad eh? Take a look at the snap shot of our visitor map taken earlier:

So keep up the good work girlies and spread the word, see how far we can take it.

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Yes we were right not to trust the flat weather… on Wednesday Tiran was like a different country with massive swell and wind from just the wrong angle resulting in even the usually sheltered Woodhouse reef being plagued with waves and choppy conditions. Needless to say we quickly opted to ditch the 3rd dive that day.
Since then, aside from the wind battering the Thistlegorm and Ras Mohammed yesterday, Tiran was pretty ok. We had three great dives. Got a shark on the first one (Thomas) which was really cool, and on Jackson I spotted a big fat stone fish which is always rewarding. They are so damn good at that camouflage thing!
So today I have a day of rest, and can re-charge my batteries after a 9 day week.

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So while I can’t help but get optimistic with all this very warm very still weather, I can’t help but be a little suspicious. All our skippers are shaking their heads in concern. Partly because it is actually quite difficult to see the reef when the water is this flat (not a good thing when your job is to drive a boat in and around a bunch of reefs) and partly because this kind of stillness usually heralds a storm!
We dived Tiran today, and it was glorious. Well the sun wasn’t exactly out to play, as there was a very heavy haze hanging in the air. But the water was glassy flat which meant we could do whatever we wanted dive-wise. Having said that, the currents were being a bit contrary with a down current for a big chunk of the first dive.
We did Jackson reef, drifting from one garden across the front of the reef to the other garden, and it was a great dive (apart from the down current… that was a bit of a pain, but not strong). I saw the biggest tuna ever, so big that for a few seconds I almost thought it was a white tipped reef shark, but as it sidled closer, it has the normal fishy tail of a tuna, shame. But we did get a couple of hefty turtles turning up, one of which decided to rest his flipper on our videographer’s camera whilst he took a closer look into the lens! Fantastic.

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So could it be that summer is just around the corner???
Weeeell March is a little early to be honest, but we have had a lovely week of sunshine and heat, I even caught the sun whilst snorkel guiding yesterday!! So the news is good so far. Having said that, we will no doubt be bombarded in the next few weeks by at least one week of serious windy stuff and probably a few clouds (in fact it has been forecast as hazy and cloudy this week… oops). But there is no denying, winter is on its way out… yeee har!

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Well after a few days out of the water, I was back off the beach teaching this week. And thankfully the weather had calmed down a bit!!! No more surf school this week.
That course has now finished quite successfully, we had a couple of great dives yesterday, seeing some pretty cool stuff, namely a hefty moray eel and the usual cute n pretty stuff you get in the Gardens area here in Sharm. And looking out of the window now, I am quite glad the course is over as it really looks quite windy!! Again!! Ah well here we go…