Hamata. Any advice appreciated please.

[Misa]

You`ve seen deep south, hamata, zabargad and st john?

 

[shortcuts]

You`ve seen deep south, hamata, zabargad and st john?

Correct. I did them on a privately chartered liveaboard with some mates a couple of years ago. Went out of Marsa Alam and spent all of the first night sailing South and all of the next week slowly coming back North.

 

[swisstrav]

for you lahami bay hotel is just perfect. large rooms, food used to be above egyptian standard. pretty good hous reef too. either entry from the beach or shuttle by rib?

they run also day boats. with the former operator of the dive shop there have been about seven every day. using the boats during summer time is ideal. always a nice breeze.

was not there in the last three years. i also do not dive egypt before late may ;-)

zabargad is more basic.

 

[shortcuts]

Thanks' for that swisstrav. Appreciated.

 

[swisstrav]

anytime. my pleasure

just thought a little bit about your problem which is mines too (once in a while). the next close good diving (in my opinion) would be fujairah uae. book the toury thing, flight and Meridien Al Aqah Beach Resort with half board via a travel agent in uk. get in contact with the former "maku - dive shop" used to be very relaxing diving arround dibba rock. dephth max. 20m. but for a week in winter time about the best you can do.

or musandam (oman) have never been there during winter time.

 

[samaka]

WELCOME TO AZIAB then click on "Hamata".

There is a warning (in Firefox, not Explorer) on the site at the moment but you can ignore that because there is nothing wrong. I'll have that fixed when I'm back home in Egypt next week. I'm currently in Malaysia on vacation and can't do anything but as I said there is no risk by entering the sight.

.......a.......

 

[large_diver]

I've heard pretty good things about Lahami.

My former dive club in Switzerland used to go to Zabargad dive resort in Hamata every year in May. I think it is rougher around the edges than Lahami, but they felt it was a decent hotel and well run dive op. Decent kiteboarding oppoetunities in that area as well.

Zabargad Resort

You might also consider the southern location of Red Sea Diving Safari in Nakari.....not sure of exact distance fom Hamata...perhaps 50km? Very basic accomodations and good to great diving via shore, RIB and day boat. I was there in '07 and loved it.

Chris

 

[Waterbaby09]

We stayed at Hamata (Zabargad resort) and dived with Orca a year ago. We liked it a lot. The hotel is fine, the rooms could be smartened up a bit but the food was decent, lots of variety and so on. Our one complaint was to do with dishonest charging on drinks prices. They quote everything is £ pounds so you assume Egyptian pounds but on check-out they bill you in Euros so much more expensive than you expect.

Orca were good, and the house reef dives are decent if you don't want to go out on the boat every day.

 

[jyexley]

After having performed a search I find that there is some info on Hamata but it's all fairly old and was wondering if anyone has been recently. If so:-

My wife and I are looking to book a holiday for some shore based Red Sea diving and are looking at possibly heading to Hamata some time in February/March.
We basically fancy some quality shore based Red Sea diving for a week in a nice quiet location without the madding crowds. Usually go for a liveaboard but fancy some land based time for this trip. More in to reefs over wrecks.

Regaldive are looking good at the moment but still undecided.


The main question is have any of you been to Hamata and if so where?
Two possible locations. Zabargad Dive Resort or Lahami Bay Beach Resort.

Any advice, suggestions, recommendations or observations (in regard to weather, wet suit, accommodation diving etc etc) will be appreciated and gratefully received.

Hi, I also am in the Uk and was looking for a weeks holiday at christmas diving and like you i need somewhere warm. Given the wind I dont think a liveaboard would be great for me, so looking for land based too. I cant seem to find much that allows me to go away on boxing day or the day after and return in 7 days ready for work on 4th Jan- what joy! Just wondered if you had found any more info. Normally do sharm but I am so sick of the russian dollybird invasion that fancy somewhere else. Just looked at the wakatobi dive resort- looks brilliant ( expensive) but it takes 2 days to get there so out of the question. I did dive in Lanzarote at christmas this year and 22 in water and 30 outside so not too bad but the island is not the best. Sorry for the ramble. Any ideas that you have gathered in your reserach would be apprecaited.

Jo

 

[Waterbaby09]

If you only have a week and only have the Xmas period, you are really pretty stuck with a much closer destination than Indonesia. Egypt is always cool and windy at that time, except for a few hours in the middle of the day so I would suggest Tanzania - the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba have warm water and it's only 10 hours. The diving is nice, not as good as the Red Sea but still pretty exciting and you get tropical species. Another option would be the Maldives, better diving but higher prices. Then again Xmas/New year is always expensive but I reckon you know that.