Um El Faroud – the underwater pearl of Malta
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By Paul Adams
The sea around Malta has been a bit choppy for a week or two, but we braved it down to the Blue Grotto. Not too bad as it turned out.
We have just moved to Malta from the UK and it is wonderful for us to have so much diving right on our doorstep! Also we don’t have to get up at a ridiculous time in the morning to get to a dive site either, yet another bonus! We used to live just about as far away from the sea as you can get in England, a trip to Stoney Cove (140 mile round trip) was our usual weekend dive site. So Zurrieq is extremely exotic to us!
We all met up at 10 o’clock (a most civilised time) with the guys from Scuba Works Malta, our guides for the day. We had dived at the Blue Grotto 18 months ago on a holiday to Malta, we were very new to diving then just qualified as ocean divers. My wife Debbie had wanted to try diving for some time and I had gone along to be nosy and just 10 months later we were in the crystal clear waters around Malta! We hadn’t been able to go as far as the Um El Faroud on that occasion due to our inexperience, but today we thought we would both be seeing it for the first time.
The sea was dark blue as we stepped off the dock. The vis was good, we descended and prepared for the short fin to the wreck. At this point we noticed a quite considerable air leak from Debbie’s contents gauge, no amount of fiddling with it improved the leak. So she had no choice but to resurface and sit it out.
We continued on to the wreck. I love all aspects of diving but I particularly like wrecks, the life they attract is varied and concentrated in such a small area. It is also fascinating that a machine such as a ship, which in its intended role is so manmade and sterile, when at the bottom of the sea, becomes something alive. The sea not only takes it but utilises it. As an engineer I find it interesting to find congers living in conduit, blennys in boiler tubes or crabs in capstans. The Um El Farud was no disappointment, lots of life plenty of bits of old junk to keep me amused.
I had a great morning, Debbie was a bit miffed! I’m sure we will be back for another look at this wreck, there is a lot to look at and so close!
More pictures from Um El Faroud here …
Tags: Blue Grotto, Diving in Malta, guided dives in malta, Malta best diving sites, malta diving, scuba diving malta, tanker Um El Faroud, Technical diving in Malta, Um El Faroud, Um El Farud, Wied iz-Zurrieq, Wreck Diving in Malta, Wrecks, Wrecks in Malta, zurrieq
Posted by Scuba Works Malta under Diving, Sites | Permalink