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Ras Nasrani


This has to be one of my favourite local dive sites.

I tend to begin my dive on the end of Ras Bob, and spend most of my time relatively shallow throughout the dive. There are only two points at which it is worth going below 12 metres. One is on an elbow of reef that juts out early on in the dive, covered in the purple broccoli corals and usually host to a whole horde of tiny glass fish and baby anthias at around 22metres. The other point is later on in the dive, after the sandy alcove (more about that in a minute) where the reef plateaus out and heralds several large gorgonian fans. It is here that you can get passing traffic, so it is often well worth leaving the deeper part of your dive until later in order to take in this area.

I always do this dive as a drift dive, taking advantage of the current that picks up on the corner.

The early part of the dive is very pretty, however you must stay shallow to enjoy the beauty at its best. Go too deep and you will be disappointed. As we reach the corner, there is a gathering of gorgonian fan corals, a sure sign that currents prevail here. The corals also seem to glow in their bright colours... helped by the shallowness of the dive of course. As the current picks up, it is well worth taking a left turn into the little sandy alcove that is often home to huge napoleon wrasse or occasionally a barracuda. Even if the bigger things don't show up on this dive, the corals in this area, and shoals of tiny juvenile fish make this alcove extremely pretty.

There is a red anenome nestled into the reef at about 12 metres just after the alcove, however it does go through phases of tucking itself so far into the reef that it is barely visible. On a good day, it looks like a bright fushia belisha beacon. Here the reef starts to plateau out and on the drop off, you can see the gorgonians mentioned earlier. It is at this point that I have seen the odd white tip shark, eagle ray and even whale shark! So definitely a point to keep eyes out to the blue. Also don't forget the reef, as you can find turtles here, and failing that, it is a great site for scorpion fish too.

As we drift around the corner, I usually carry on in the same direction until the visibility starts to wane as we head towards Ras Ghamilla. Then I shallow off, make a U-turn and head back on myself to end my dive, this time really shallow (around 5 metres) swimming over the undulating mounds of porites corals. Here you will find a rainbow of colours in the reef itself, from bright sky blue, through purples and pinks, to reds and greens. It is really quite glorious. Just be aware that glass bottomed boats also like this area, so I tend to send up an SMB at this point, just so they know we are there.

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