Diving

Cyprus is an unusually forgiving place to dive. The water runs between roughly 16 and 27 degrees through the year, there is very little plankton, and the visibility that results is the first thing most visiting divers comment on. Add caves, tunnels, reefs and a genuinely world-class wreck, and the island earns its reputation. This site documents 8 dive sites, listed by district further down the page.

The Zenobia

The Zenobia is rated among the top ten wreck dives in the world and lies just 1.4 kilometres off Larnaca, reached by boat in minutes. It is the reason a good number of divers come to Cyprus at all. It is also a large, deep wreck that rewards experience and proper planning rather than curiosity.

The rest of the wrecks

The Three Stars off Limassol is at the opposite end of the scale — she caught fire and sank in 1972 and now lies partly submerged in about 7 metres of water, only 30 metres from shore, which makes her one of the most accessible wrecks on the island and a good first wreck dive.

Off Paphos, the Vera K was a Lebanese ship that beached in 1972, was used for target practice and was later broken up as a hazard, leaving scattered structure in shallow water. The White Star, a former Russian fishing boat, went down near Yeroskipou in February 2007 while under tow.

Reefs, caves and turtles

Green Bay at Protaras is known to almost everyone as Turtle Bay, and is the shallow, sheltered, easy site that suits snorkellers and training dives as much as it does experienced divers. Manijin Island, close to the sea caves at Peyia, and the Amphitheatre are the west coast’s rock-and-cave dives, where the interest is the topography rather than a wreck.

Practical notes

Dive centres operate from all the coastal resorts and will supply equipment, so most visitors travel with nothing but a certification card. Summer gives the warmest water and the most boats; spring and autumn give better visibility and far fewer people. Wreck penetration on the Zenobia in particular is not a casual undertaking and requires the appropriate qualification. For the wrecks as history rather than as dives, see Cyprus shipwrecks.