Diving in Malta

Divetrip to Malta

Me and the girly went to Malta this June - I had read quite a bit about the diving in malta, and was really looking forward to it, seeing as I had never ever dived wet before. Malta turned out to be a not-so-great place with every single corner serving "english breakfast" which might have been a by-product of all the fat brits huffing around. The islands also sported a range of fantastic historical architecture and archaeological sites which lost some of their beauty to the fact that a majority of them had flashing neonadds bolted to the walls or a sweaty Macdonalds cramped into it. The food was everything from awfull to the best I've ever had. The best food Iæve ever had was probably awfull too, but I had treated myself to a couple of liters of sangria and a cheap bottle of local redwine prior to the meal. We didn't go there primarily to dive - allthough I have to admit that it was my primary motivation for choosing Malta from the multiude of cheap package hollidays. We were going to be there for two whole weeks, but we were short on money so finding the right divecentre (right beeing, unfortunatly, the ones able to compete in price) was essential, and luckily, the small islands have something like 44 of them to choose from. We went to a lot of centers, that quite honestly, scared us a bit due to seemingly low standards on rental and safety equipment, but then we stumbeled upon a newly opened centre that is run by a likeable and entertaining british couple: http://www.corsairdivingmalta.com/. We went pretty early in the season, so we lucked out and were able to pick exactly when and where we wanted to dive - having noone to bother us but the instructors. They picked us up from the hotel (the hotel being a whole sad story of itself ) in the morning, brought us to the centre for e briefing and then drove us to the divesites. There was no timeschedule, so there was no sense of rush at any point of the days spent diving.
The divesites themselves were in one word: fantastic. a lot has been done to create interesting sites where there are none, and let me assure you: there are very few places on malta where there are no interesting sites. The underwater limestoneformations is worth a multitude of dives by themselves. Huge arches, small grottos, swimthroughs, octopusses, moray eels, baracudas, seahorses, fireworms, parrotfish and much more hiding in the cracks. the Viz was supposedly not great, but imo. it was better than good. I've only seen better during mid-winter in northern norway. I used a shorty, which, tbh I don't think I really needed (the water was warm), and a halcyon eclipse 40'. My longhose drew some snide remarks from the snorkelinstructors and bubblemakers, but didn't seem to be an actual issue.

If you get the chance to go to malta to dive. do so, but opt for Gozo instead of the main island. If you have to choose between the red sea, malaysya etc. and Malta, don't go to Malta as a first choice unless you are short on money or have already been to the countries and sites which are a step up on the ladder on the scale of exotic. Gozo rivals everything else out there, but main Malta is simply just good enough.