UK Divers Trip to the Red Sea June/July 2008 on the MV.Tala Trip Report by Phil O

I'm not going to go into a detailed trip report but will highlight a few of my memorable events. The UKD contingent was supplemented by Jesper Kjoller of DYK magazine and for the first few days we had two chaps from HEPCA who were travelling to measure the condition of reefs and check on Turtles eggs. For the second half of the week we said good bye to these 2 guys from HEPCA and were joined by 6 Egyptian guests plus the Managing Director of HEPCA - Amr Ali. It was a pleasure to meet Amr and listen to his views on sustainable development in Egypt and the work they are doing on wrecks and reefs. They are fighting hard against unscrupulous boat operators and he took a few photos of boats that did not have the necessary permissions to be in Marine Parks. All in all we had a good bunch plus a really hard working crew, 2 great dive guides - Stein and Foad plus of course the charismatic owner of Red Sea Explorers, Faisal.

Faisal Khalaf - © JesperKjøller

The Carnatic

The next one was the Rosalie Moller. I dived this with Jesper and Faisal scootering the length of the hull twice before entering the ship through the bomb damage on the starboard side going through holds, cabins, store rooms and the engine room. The next buddy team were to use our scooters so instead of waiting to the end of the dive we sent them up on a DSMB to be collected by the Zodiac team so that batteries can be changes. It was a slick bit of operating as we did not connect a reel to the DSMB and relied on the Zodiac team being above us at the right time.

Entering the Numidia - © JesperKjøller

Finally, my best dive ever. Myself Jesper and Faisal dropped onto the wreck of the Aida from a Zodiac each carrying 2 deco bottles and a scooter. We went through the Aida to the prop and scootered round to the Numidia at about 55m. We ascended up the deck of the wreck and did our first deep stop inside one of the holds before pausing at 24m to fine tune the deco calculations with the deco being made mostly on the reef wall as we scootered back to the Tala.

Phil O & Faisal review deco calculations in the Numidia - © JesperKjøller

Memorable Event

The most memorable thing I saw on this boat was a smile - not just any old smile of a diver who saw a shark or manta or dolphins but the smile of a diver after Monkey Diving for the first time. When Amanda came back after her very first monkey dive she smiled so much that I knew then that we would see her again on this boat.

Amanda and Air Guzzler get scooter tips - © JesperKjøller

The last night was the usual mixture of dancing and jolly good fun which ended in a Limerick competition - luckily I had turned in by then. Thankfully no photos of me dancing on the pole this year.

Whoops

Memorable Quotes

I started to make a list of funny quotes from people but to be frank after day 2 I was so laid back that I couldn't be arsed, but here's one

In a restaurant on the arrival night Zoglet was having difficulty explaining how he wanted his steak cooked to a new Egyptian waiter.
Zoglet to Faisal - " What's the word for Rare"
Faisal - " Rare"

There were loads of laughs throughout the week and I'm sure others will be along with more fine lines.

Thanks to everybody on board for great diving and excellent funny bits but particular thanks to Davey Willo for the organising of it and a massive shame that you weren't there. I've been on the boat 3 times now and this trip was undoubtedly the best so far.