Spain is blessed with many beautiful diving spots, and is difficult to pick a top destination but if you were to search for it, quite frequently Illes Medas, off L’estartit (Costa Brava, Girona) would feature as one, if not the top, destination for diving not just in Spain, but the entirety west Mediterranean coast. It is a marine reserve protected for decades, and marine life thrives there.
The flip side of the coin is, it is an incredibly popular destination, so timing your trip could make all the difference. We settled for early June as prices are discounted, visitors are (allegedly) not so many and both visibility and temperature are ok or good.
After travelling on the Sunday 31st May, we woke up in the hotel Les Illes to a lovely breakfast (great deal on pension completa, meaning all meals are included) and after doing the usual paperwork, we were off to start our first few dives.
The diving is done in two different areas, the Illes Medes Marine Park, or the coast of Montgrí (protected, but less so, as we saw people doing line fishing in there).
There is so much to see, most of us dive 10 times and only repeat a single diving spot, due to bad weather conditions. Luckily, the place we visit is such a great dive, Dofí Sud (it means dolphin cave, from the South) also known as the Cathedral, as it is a huge cave with entrance around 12m deep and several openings, one of them to the surface.
Red and yellow coral are very common, and once you get past certain depths, you start seeing large forests of Gorgonias both yellow and also red (appearing blue/purplish due to light refraction at depth
Posidonia mediterranea is making a comeback, which is great news. It is not the most exciting thing to see (is a relatively dull sea grass) but stop for a moment, and you will notice the tiny bright orange juvenile fish hiding in their foliage. It is a very important fish nursery.
Groupers here are humongous, and they feed on octopus. I believe we didn’t see a single octopus in the marine park, only some on the coast.
Lots and lots of life, if I had to pick a highlight I would say Ferranelles was an excellent dive, saw a school of Espetons (barracuda), and some large fish in the blue, probably Tuna or similar (no pictures).
The diving was pretty beginner friendly, but guides were not included so you had to navigate the sites after being explained the dive on a map, still, fairly close to the coast and well protected so currents were absent or relatively mild.
We came back after 6 days, 10 dives under our belts, and feeling like they might see us again fairly soon, a highly recommended place, just be aware of how popular it is.
Report and trip organiser Juan Vicente Ramirez Garcia
