Secluded Vacation

The Admiralty Chart shows Sha’ab Anbar as a very long, slightly bent line of coral just below the surface. In reality, it is a very long slightly bent collection of broken reefs with a sheltered lagoon in the north. It has a north point, west and east walls, a south wall and a south eastern plateau. Some of it has been dived before, but the majority of this five mile long obstruction to shipping is virgin territory. The wind blew out diving on the north side unfortunately, but with so much else to discover it wasn’t a problem.

The west wall was our starting point. The swell effect disappeared around five metres down and we started down the wall, which wasn’t as sheer as I imagined it would be. Small shelves and gentle slopes were more usual than vertical drops which made for an interesting topography.

Again, the corals were outstanding. Hard formations that are usually so delicate and consequently so often broken were commonplace and with orchestral precision constructed a pretty wall.  Read more...

Nightlife The two 1500w Halogen lights above the rear of the dive platform attracted some interesting visitors: Three large ‘Silky’ Sharks were investigating the brightly-lit area below the rear of the boat, their fins periodically breaking the surface in search of prey drawn in by the lights. In the past these sharks would be fed from the boats, but now thankfully it is against Park Policy as feeding encourages an unhealthy inquisitiveness on the part of the shark. Between twilight and Dawn these sharks turn from passive to predator, anyone daft enough to have entered the water would have been instantly torn to pieces…

Thresher  Read more...

Depending on the tide, it is a fairly constant 25-27m to the seabed and 18-20m to the upper (starboard) side throughout the dive. The wooden superstructure and planking have all long-since rotted away – though many fragments of planking are still found attached to the iron framework. This leaves a steel hull held together by iron cross-members and, with the decking gone, this allows the Diver to explore both the external features and two deck levels within the wreck itself.

At the Bows there is a large copper ring that once held the bowsprit in place and just in front of this is the ship’s leading curved metal bowsprit support – underneath which was once found the figurehead. Swimming slightly away from the Bows and looking back, it is easy to see the Carnatic’s fine, sleek lines – even today.

From the Bows, the ship gently widens to the main body where, on both sides, lifeboat davits are found – still swung out. These are, however, usually missed by Divers because the preferred route from stem to stern is to enter the vessel and swim between the first two levels of iron framework – a fascinating close-encounter with something built in 1862! We even found a small brass porthole, though I must confess that I covered it with debris so that it would remain in situ for a little while longer – all the others having been removed.  Read more...