Canary Islands

[carlreid]

How Is The Diving In The Canary Islands ??:10:

Please If You Have Been, Let Me Know What The Water Temp Is And How Is The Visibility. If The Visibility Is Good, Is There Anything To See. I Started Diving In The Carribien And Have Since Been To The Great Barrier Reef And It Is Hard To Dive Sights That Have Nothing To See. Look Forward To Hearing From You :11:

 

[drbill]

Carlreid... all dive sites have something to see even if it means having to look closely and really focus. If you know of any that have nothing to see, stay clear of them... they're probably full of deadly toxins.

Dr. Bill
I've never met a dive site I didn't like

 

[DocVikingo]

How Is The Diving In The Canary Islands ??:10:

Please If You Have Been, Let Me Know What The Water Temp Is And How Is The Visibility. If The Visibility Is Good, Is There Anything To See. I Started Diving In The Carribien And Have Since Been To The Great Barrier Reef And It Is Hard To Dive Sights That Have Nothing To See. Look Forward To Hearing From You :11:

We have a forum dedicated to European dive venues within our Scuba Diving Vacation & Destinations section.

I have taken the liberty of moving your post there in hopes it will get a wider response.

Best regards.

DocVikingo

 

[Diver9360]

Hi Carl,
I dived on Fuerteventura 2 yrs ago when stying in Gandia.
Did dive with Fuertedivers an PADI and NAI divingschool/base operated by Kurt a Swiss Instructor.
The divespots were nice lot's off morray eals and wrasses also eagle rays and other fishes like cuttle fish.
If you would like they can book rooms for you. have a look at www.fuertediver.com
Also nice to go is El Hiero the smallest islands off the Canary Islands, if you like diving without to many divers on a spot i would go there. From all the islands this is the best for good diving so friends tell me and they dived all the islands there. There is much too see there. But you can also go to the others islands for diving but bear in mind that the bigger the island the crowdier it gets underwater.

 

[gozumutti]

How Is The Diving In The Canary Islands ??:10:

Please If You Have Been, Let Me Know What The Water Temp Is And How Is The Visibility. If The Visibility Is Good, Is There Anything To See. I Started Diving In The Carribien And Have Since Been To The Great Barrier Reef And It Is Hard To Dive Sights That Have Nothing To See. Look Forward To Hearing From You :11:

Dear Carl

Diving in the Canaries is fantastic. The eastern islands, Fuerteventura and Lanzarote, are a bit colder, water temp around 2C less then the other islands, as they get the cold upwelling off Africa.

Otherwise, the dive season is year round, due to the climate here, water temps fromm 18C to 27C. Air temps from 20C to 40C.

Visibility is normally in the 30 meter range. The marine life is amazing, including many subtropical and mediterranean species, as well as endemic species.

The warm summer currents bring in mantas. Many pelagics, and a resident whale population.

I live and run a dive center on Tenerife, so I cannot tell you enough

But definitely worth the trip!

best regards
gozumutti

 

[Belushi]

So, gozumutti, you have seen mantas and whales in The Canaries have you?
Your website doesnt seem to point to any.

I must be honest I would not book a diving-specific holiday to the Canaries after diving the GBR and the Caribbean!

You might be better going to the Red Sea for warmer water, better chance to see big stuff, if that is your thing.

 

[grazie42]

I´ve only dived of Gran Canaria so my experience may or may not be applicable for the other islands...
I´ve been there twice (not exclusively for diving) and found the water to be warm and viz to be good to great. Both times were in December. Like other posters have said you can see cuttlefish, barracudas, squids, rays, moray eels and all the other stuff you usually find in warm water...During my last stay there we even found a "colony" of angelharks that we visited during the day (when they were sleeping).
To compare it to the Red Sea (where I´ve been twice), IMO, the underwater life is pretty much the same except for the big pelagics that you can find further south and the dolphins...If you´re looking to do something else besides dive on your vacation I´d propably go for the Canary Islands, if all you´re going to do is dive, dive, dive then a Red Sea liveaboard is propably a better option...

The outfit I went with was Nordic Divers btw....http://www.nordicdivers.com/

 

[gozumutti]

So, gozumutti, you have seen mantas and whales in The Canaries have you?
Your website doesnt seem to point to any.

I must be honest I would not book a diving-specific holiday to the Canaries after diving the GBR and the Caribbean!

You might be better going to the Red Sea for warmer water, better chance to see big stuff, if that is your thing.

Dear Belushi

Inform yourself, please, at other dive centers. Mantas are spotted here yearly, and no, I do not have any photos on my website, to my disappointment I have not yet been able to get one.

I have been diving in the Red Sea 4 times, and have never seen a whale shark there. (and NO, not just diving on day trips out of Sharm or Hurghada).

But here a list for you of the species to be spotted around the Canaries:

Makos, whale sharks, basking sharks, hammerhead, smooth hounds, angel sharks

Common stingray, round stingray, roughtail stingray, eagle ray,bull ray, butterflyray, marbled electric ray, Manta (mobular mobular, manta birostris

Dotted morays, dark morays, tiger morays, golden-tail morays, mediterranean morays

Conger eels, garden congers, golden balearic congers, golden spotted snake eels

Pipefish, seahorse (hippocampus guttlatus), sharpnose sorcerer eel, trumpetfishn

snipe, pilchards, barracudas, grey mullet, amberjacks, guelly jacks, black jacks, atlantic mackerel, pilot fish, barrel fish, remoras, bluefish, lizardfish, weevers, striped mullet, streaked gurnards, wide-eyed flounder, sand sole, tonguefish, ******* grunts, striped grunts, scorpionfish of various species, sharpnose puffers, band-tail puffers, spotted burrfish, pygmy filefish, gray trigger fish, unicorn fish, ocean trigger fish, sunfish, glass-eyes, cardinal fish, dusky grouper, black-tail comber, comber, learned rockfish, macronesian grouper, atlantic damselfish, blue-fin or neon damselfish, various gobies, blennies, hogfish, ballan wrasse, atlantic wrasse, ornate wrasse, rainbow wrasse, razorfish, 10-12 species of bream, umbrines, brown meagres, stargazers, frogfish, wahoos, atlantic bonitos...


This according to the wonderful book "Diving in Canaries" by Sergio Hanquet.

There is an instructor here who freelances for me from time to time, he worked GBR for 5 years. His opinion (not mine, I have never dived GBR) that the diving here is just as good, if different.


Thanks for the wonderful and friendly welcome back to the Scubaboard, Belushi ;-)

 

[ScubaBaby]

gozumutti

Beliushi & I went on a liveaboard from Sharm, down to the Brothers etc, and have footage of the whale shark we swam with - it hung around for a good hour! This was only last month! So, they do exist in the Red Sea - as do Oceanic White tips, hammerheads, thresher sharks and god knows what else we saw on the same day!

 

[drbill]

Interesting to see the Canaries posted under Europe. Certainly they are European from a political perspective, yet I've seen other international dive web sites list them as African dive sites. I would tend to agree with grouping them under Europe. In another case (Bonaire) I failed to see why National Geographic assigns them to "North America" rather than "South America." Politically they are "European," yet geographically they should be South American. Go figure.

Wherever they are assigned, I hope to dive them!

Dr. Bill