Protea Banks or Aliwal Shoal

[sandrix]

Difficult choice indeed.

I would define Protea Banks as more "personal experience" there are less sharks than in Aliwal Shoal but you have more variety.

In Protea you can see Blacktips, Bulls, Hammerheads, Tigers and Duskys in the baited dives and sand tiger sharks in the reef dive. In Aliwal you'll see plenty of blacktips and sand tigers and, if you're in the right period you may see tiger sharks too.

To recap, if you stay more than 2 days go to Aliwal Shoal because there is more to see. If you stay only 1 or two days and want to see big stuff go to Protea.

 

[gbtech]

Thanks. I've found two operators that dive PB - AquaPlanet and African Dive adventures. Do you have any recommendations?

 

[widget]

Thanks. I've found two operators that dive PB - AquaPlanet and African Dive adventures. Do you have any recommendations?

Both operators are very good, I personally usually dive with Roland at African Dive Adventures, but thats just because I know him well, you will be happy with either.

Personally I would concur that with minimal time I would dive Aliwal Shoal, simply because there is more to see and do, more operators and more frequent diving when on a limited time frame. The shoal has an abundance of big marine life, Rays, Morays, Turtles, Dolphin and although its not usual to see Ragged tooth sharks around this time of the year, there is always an off chance. There are also two great wrecks to dive close to the Shoal, "The Produce" and "The Nebo" and both are worthy of a few visits.

Protea Banks can be great and its likely your chances of seeing sharks this time of the year is better there, but, its usually a deep or blue water dive, there can be very strong currents and surge and it can also be a complete bust, ......your call I guess, as I said both operators are great and will look after you well, I guess you need to ask..."are you a gambling man".?

 

[Carcharis]

Hey gbtech
I think most people heading to either site want to see sharks and for this reason i would say protea is king theres a much better chance of seeing sharks there. There is actually a bit of a reef at protea but most people dont notice it because of the sharks it is also deep at about 30 mtrs with normally a very strong current(which is a good thing as it makes for a great drift)Roland at african dive adventures is a very good operator.
Aliwall is another great spot shallower than protea which means you can potter around the reef but if there are no raggies around the sharks are more hit and miss(it does happen last time there we had a tiger shark and a great hammerhead turn up). Umkomass is full of good operators.
I would say though that two days is a tight window and this coast does get hit by some big swells so i would recomend getting a rental car an trying to do a day on each or if weather is bad hoping one site is diveable and do the two days there. Its very doable as rental rates are very reasonable and the two sites are only an hour apart on a good road.
Cheers


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