Diving in Alexandria

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meierdierck

Contributor
Scuba Instructor
Divemaster
Messages
256
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Location
lake tahoe nv
# of dives
500 - 999
Going to honeymoon on mediteranean cruise, spending 2 days in Alexandria, Wife really wants to dive Cleopatra's sunken palace.

Has anyone done this dive recently, know a good local dive op,
and esp. dive operations to avoid?

thanks for your comments
 
I have been diving in Egypt many times and I organize regular trips to Egypt, but I have not dived in Alexandria at all. What I will say is this. It is very tough to get good service if you are going by yourself. You need someone that knows the area to show you around. The reason there is a lot of bad reviews on the diving in Alexandria is that there is only one dive centre that does Cleopatra's sunken palace. As a result, they can get away with a lot of things.

Secondly a lot of people expect diving in Alexandria would be the same as the Red Sea. This is far from true. The water is much colder and the visibility is much worse. You have to be very determined if you want to dive in Alexandria and be use to diving in bad conditions. If this is your expectation then you will have a blast. You shouldn't compare it to diving in crystal clear waters like the Red Sea.

I am currently in Canada and will be back to Egypt in December. Depending on when your cruise is I might be able to show you around Alexandria. Good Luck!


Ahmed Nassrat
Owner/President
Atlantic Adventure Divers
Atlantic Adventure Divers - Atlantic Adventure Divers
 
diving in Alexandria is very far from the redsea.
The cleopatra palace is very shallow (6 meters) with rough sea above, hence you will feel the waves taking you up-down-right and left...
Very poor visibility, you will not see any global view of the site, just what is 1 meter in front of you.
I had a plant to do it with a friend, then due to some ear problems he had to go without me and when he was back and I saw the photos I was happy my ear was not feeling fine by that time.

About the dive operator, as mentioned it is only 1 operator hence he sets his standards which are not to be compared with the redsea operators
 
Alexandria has a significant problem with sewage, you can smell the stench from that city from miles out at sea.

I would be very hesitant to dive near Alexandria without a suit/full face mask designed for a raw sewage environment.
 
Thanks to everyone for the info... when we arrived in Alexandria we opted out of diving completely, for all of the above reasons, my wife is not very experienced, and was not happy with the viz, the smell, or much else about Alexandria & Cairo. So we did the guided tour thing, and called it good

We will take everyone's advise and return to dive the Red Sea,
 
Thanks to everyone for the info... when we arrived in Alexandria we opted out of diving completely, for all of the above reasons, my wife is not very experienced, and was not happy with the viz, the smell, or much else about Alexandria & Cairo. So we did the guided tour thing, and called it good

We will take everyone's advise and return to dive the Red Sea,

Did you get out to the beaches west of Alexandria? They are some of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. They have some tremendous tourism potential there, if they ever fix the sewage problem.
 
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