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.