Marsa Alam & Port Ghalib · Egypt · Wall · Drift
Queen Wall
Drift along a pinnacle-studded wall from the hotel jetty
Area photo: David Sanford · CC BY-SA 3.0
Queen Wall is a wall and drift dive that begins at the jetty of the Queen Hotel and runs along a coral wall in 15 to 25 m studded with coral pinnacles. The jetty start makes it one of the easier drifts on this stretch of coast to organise, since the plan is simply to enter, drop to the wall and let the water carry you along it.
Where it is and how deep
25.2225° N, 34.8036° EApproximate position — the dashed circle shows where the site lies; your operator's briefing has the mooring.
The dive
The dive starts by the jetty of the Queen Hotel. Get down promptly and find the wall, because the drift begins as soon as you are off the shallows and there is no advantage in fighting it near the surface. Once you are on the face, set yourself between 15 and 25 m and hold that band, and let the dive end on gas and time rather than on reaching the end of anything.
Along the way the wall carries a lot of coral pinnacles, with coral gardens of soft, hard and brain corals and plenty of colourful fish over them. Rather than swimming, use the current as transport and spend your effort on trimming in and out around the coral heads as they come past. Keep a little distance off the face so the pinnacles do not catch you as you pass, watch that the group stays together in moving water, and send a marker up before the ascent so the surface team can see where you have got to.
Marine life and season
The sources we used don't single out particular species here.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Good | Good | Prime | Prime | Prime | Good | Good | Good | Prime | Prime | Prime | Good |
Season follows Marsa Alam & Port Ghalib: Dugongs and dolphins are resident year-round; spring and autumn bring the calmest seas for Elphinstone.
Sources
- Queen Wall — Scubago
More dive sites in Marsa Alam & Port Ghalib
Reef
Shallow reef to 15-20 m with pinnacles off the southeast
Two of the seven dugongs known on Egypt's Red Sea coast.
Coral garden
Coral garden to 25 m, a quarter of an hour south of the marina
Best chances of oceanic whitetips run from October to December.
Reef
A horseshoe of reef enclosing a pool of coral gardens
Wall
Starts at a 27 m pinnacle by the drop-off, then drifts shallow
Reef
Canyons cut into a reef table at only 8-10 m
Two resident dugongs grazing a shallow seagrass meadow.
Similar dives elsewhere
Scalloped hammerheads off the back of the reef in late summer
Cousteau's diving-saucer hangar still on the sand at 13 m
A freighter's bathroom cargo scattered across the reef at 25 m
A chimney through the reef onto a wall with no bottom in range