Daedalus

This island lies half way to Saudi Arabia. 450 m in length and 100m wide this reef is as impressive as the brothers but dived less therefore making it our pick of all southern sites. The best diving can be found on the north side of the island. The deep water and currents provide a perfect habitat for the bigger fish. Schooling hammerheads can be seen, gray reefs, threshers, schools of barracuda, jacks and tuna. Manta's can be spotted during certain times of year. There are many crack and holes in the eastern side of the reef where some of the smaller fish congregate. Stunning soft and hard coral including black coral can be found everywhere, as well as an impressive number of fish. On the west side lies an anemone city where clown fish can be seen along with beautiful blue coral.
It is also possible to find Oceanic white tips on the south side around where the boats anchor up.

Elphinstone

Elphinstone lies close to Egyptian mainland, however it has all the characteristics of an offshore marine park. Then north plateau drops down to around 50m. Strong currents can run through this dive site which bring in numbers of white tip, grey reefs, occasional hammerheads and of course most famous for the Oceanic white tip. As well as the big palegics there is plenty to see on the reef walls. Anthias, squirrel fish, masked butterfly fish, scorpion fish, cornet fish and napoleon wrasse all inhabit the reef. At the south plateau there is a deep archway at 55m. Threshers are often seen around the arch.
Elphinstone has become famous for the Oceanic white tips that are there throughout sept-april. A fantastic dive site but has a tendency to get busy from the day boats.

Rocky Island

The reef is slightly kidney shaped like at Sha'ab Sharm, but it is surrounded by a beautiful shallow reef plateau, which is home to many strange and familiar reef fish. The sheer walls are covered in soft corals, sponges and sea fans and plunge first to a shelf in 25 metres, then once more slightly less sheer to 50 metres and more. Tall dangly sea whips grow up from the deeper water and a series of fantastic overhangs and caves complete a weird and wonderful scene.

When the conditions are right it is possible to see just about anything, both underwater and on the surface. The south-east corner of the island is reckoned to be the best place for shark and pelagic action and that's where we dropped in first. The scene was fantastic, perfect for sharks and the shelf at 25 metres would have made a great place to watch the action. Sadly the temperature was a staggering 31 degrees, far too warm. The sharks were few and far between and those we did see were well below us. Still we did enjoy the amazing scenery and a glimpse of a couple of greys and hammerhead. Between dives some of our group snorkelled with a pod of passing dolphins! As they were doing so, a sailfish surfaced right beside them!

St Johns

St Johns spans 13 miles across and 8 miles in length, and due to its remoteness it's one of the last Red Sea wildernesses. The reefs rise up from an enormous undersea plateau. Some are tiny and have yet to reach right up to the surface. Known as Habilis, these virgin reefs offer virtually no protection to dive boats, but they make breathtaking dives. We dived on one simply known as Four Metre reef. We could just see it below the surface and it looked like we could have swam right round it in five minutes, but once under the surface we found it grew much wider.

Its walls plunged away sharply on all sides and as we descended into the inky blue water, we were mobbed by one of the biggest shoals of fish I've ever encountered. A mixture of fusiliers, surgeon and unicorn fish, they danced all around us in mesmerising fashion and when they dispersed, behind them were three or four white tip sharks.

Sharks are commonly encountered at St Johns. Hammerheads, threshers and even oceanic white tips are sometimes seen, whilst greys and white tips are regularly sighted. We were just happy to see the white tips, since the warmer-than-normal water kept most of the sharks in deeper water. During the rest of the dive we cruised round the undersea island, past millions of orange anthias, yellow and black bannerfish, groupers and regal angelfish, and through bushes of black coral and beautiful purple and orange soft corals.

At Sha'ab Martin, named after the Ghazala Voyager skipper Martin De Banks (one of the last European skippers operating in the Red Sea) we were on the hunt for more sharks, but the only ones a couple of our group encountered were in 60 plus metres! I wasn't too concerned as I found myself swimming through huge shoal of fusiliers, bannerfish, butterfly fish and snappers, past another forest of black coral and some stunning sea fans. We also came across a turtle that was gorging itself on coral like there was no tomorrow, and watched Napoleon wrasse cruise round the reef top, with a backdrop of hundreds of smaller tropical fish and brilliantly coloured coral groupers.

Many of St Johns sites have yet to be given proper names and are relatively unknown, but there are a few exceptions. Sha'ab Mharus is a fairly large reef, with sheer walls adorned with beautiful sea whips and soft corals, and riddled with caves. Sha'ab Farag, a large circular reef, is also very scenic with a huge overhang which dominates a plateau on its south end, while along its east wall a couple of caves are joined together by a short tunnel and make entertaining exploration. Close by there is a huge field of anemones and resident clown fish.

Fish life at St Johns is refreshing; we saw plenty of large shoals, with Napoleons and jacks on just about every dive. On a couple of reefs bumphead parrotfish, a species normally found further south in Sudan can even be encountered.