Shark and Yolanda are two neighboring reefs in the Red Sea on the territory of the Ras Mohammad national park, it is not far from the city of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. This is one of the very popular places for divers.
Firstly, everything is fine with underwater life in the park: fishing is prohibited there, the behavior of tourists, including underwater ones, is monitored, and they try to keep the entire ecosystem in good condition. From Shark Reef, a beautiful wall descends to a depth of several hundred meters, full of life around. Of course, most recreational scuba divers have access to depths of only up to 30-40 meters, but the greatest variety of underwater inhabitants is concentrated on them.
A variety of corals, turtles, fish ... there are also moray eels. Great teeth, right? :)
Some time after the start of the normal dive route at Shark Reef, the divers go through a shallow plateau with the current and reach Yolanda Reef.
And it serves as the second point of attraction in this place. The fact is that there in 1980 the Cypriot ship Yolanda (or Jolanda) sank, transporting a cargo of sanitary ware to Jordan. The ship itself was easy available for diving until 1985, but after that during a storm it was carried away below, to a depth of 140-160 meters. And yet, a fairly large part of the cargo remained at a depth of about 15-17 meters — and is now quite often visited by divers. Coral-encrusted things are popular :) In addition, there are quite strong currents around the reefs, which provides interesting sensations during the dive.
So we swam with the current to the remains of the ship and its cargo accessible to us. Yes, this pile, whitening in front — it's a lot of toilets! Divers love to take pictures next to them, including literally sitting on a faience thrones.
Just be careful: inside the toilets (as in any recesses and niches) moray eels like to sit, which do not really like the "lower parts" of the divers, hanging from above and blocking their entire view :)
And here's part of a larger cargo: bathtubs that will never make it to bathrooms. But at the same time, they never run out of water.
Yes, sometimes I find it funny what attracts divers underwater. But still, it is interesting to see the sanitary ware, deep under the water — like the natural landscape, it rather quickly overgrows with corals, moray eels settle in it and fish swim around. After all, where else can you see so many toilets at the same time :) I also found this unusual view interesting. Moreover, the first photo from the post (the one with the fish in the foreground and the illuminated toilet bowl in the background), has been used as my desktop wallpaper for several months.
Just before the ascent to the surface, we swam a little behind the stingray. It seems that it was not too pleased with our presence — we declassified its ambush (they burrow a little in the sand), so it swam several times along the sandy bottom away from us. We realized our importunity and left it to hunt further :)
It's better to watch the photos in high resolution.
Camera: OLYMPUS E-M5 Mark II
You can also see my photos in my blog LJ and in my profile on NatGeo. You can read a short interview with me here.
