Thistlegorm - the best wreck dive?

I've had 6 dives at the Thistlegorm in the Red Sea (Egypt) and I find it very good each time. A 126,5 meters long 'war museum' full of material, lots of fish, strong current, great visibility, warm water ...

Following this link you find a lot of information about it.

Link to info on The Thistlegorm

Have you been on The Thistlegorm? Do you think it's the best wreck dive in the world?

If you've been there and don't think it's the best, please tell us what's your favourite.

Hi Gisle,

I did three dives at Thristlegorm and I loved it. For sure it's one of the best wrecks. It has it all as you mention and I look forward to diving it again. Is it the best? I really don't know. To answer it I think it is necessary to dive many other wrecks which I didn't. Nevertheless I was really impressed with it.

Take care.

My dives @ the Thristlegorm were great, but I'm still waiting to dive the USS Saratoga at Bikini, which I think would fit the mention "best wreck in the world"!

I've not dived that many wrecks (8, I think) and the Thistlegorm was the best. I'm sure there are better wrecks ans I hope to dive them so far its the Thistlegorm.

You can't beat it for quality combined with easy access and easy diving.

One time at the Thistlegorm, the water was so clear and still that we could see the wreck from the boat ...

B y the way, that morning we were the first boat there so we could make the first dive with only 5 divers at the wreck

Never been to the Thistlegorm ;-0

I still think that, due to the impossibility to reach the Titanic (and the other day I heard it won't be there for the 100th anniversary of its sinking due to corrosion), and the Andrea Doria being for tech divers, that it must be one of the best in the world.

It could have beed a nice wreck if only one boat per day was allowed.

Unless you dive it at midnight or 5am, prepare to share it with 100s of other divers. some of whom have very vague idea of bouyancy control, so forget going inside

and the night dives look like dayglo dives with so much light coming from above

There are many other wrecks that IMO are better dives that T-gorm - Rosalie Muller in the Red Sea (deep and enigmatic with myriads of glass fish swirling around) and my personal salt water favorite - Zenobia in Cyprus.

Haven't doen Truk or Bikini yet, i am sure my top ten salt water list would change after that

And the the best fresh water wrecks - Great Lakes rule!

Happy Diving!

http://community.webshots.com/user/dekina

I only did two dives on the Thistlegorm, and only managed to see a fraction of what there was to see. I'd like to do more on it and would certainly rate it as the best wreck I've done, if only because of the amount of interest on it and its condition. But I've never dived Truk or Scapa Flow, so there may be better wrecks there.
I'd have to give the Thistlegorm site negative marks for the number of divers (yeah, I know, everybody else at the site was probably thinking the same and we were all causing the problem!): I got there by 8am and even at that time there were probably 12 boats already on it and lots more on the way. From what I've heard/read there also seems to be a problem with divers bringing back trophies from the holds, which is a pity.
The BBC made a fabulous short documentary about the sinking of the Thistlegorm which aired about three years ago. It told the story of the ship, interviewed some of the last remaining survivors, and recreated the sinking. It made for good television, though there wasn't a whole lot of underwater stuff in it.
I see from your post there are strong currents there, Gisle. I didn't know this: we must have been lucky the day we were there, the diving conditions were perfect.

I dived the Thistlegorm 4 times in two days, and whilst it was quite good, it certainly didn't match the Rosalie Moller, which we did a couple of times.The Thistlegorm has been well and truly plundered and it looks a mess.

Neither of these wrecks come close to those up in Scapa Flow. The sight of 12 inch guns staring at you out of the gloom really gets thepulse racing, and the size of the battleships up there is truly awesome. You could quite happily do a week or more diving the same battleship and still not see all of it nor become tired of it.

Out of the other wrecks I have done, I particularly enjoyed the Zenobia, the Hispania (off the West Coast of Scotland), the P555 (A Submarine off the South Coast of the UK) and LST523 sunk during the Normandy Landings of WW2 and still carrying its full complement of Sherman Tanks. Now that was a sight to behold! :wacko:

Chris