Milton Keynes SAC, I saw this trip as a great opportunity to introduce divers of all grades to some unique nautical archaeological diving.
The plan was to fly Sunday; dive Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday; have a day trip to Pompeii and Herculaneum on Thursday and fly home on Friday. With flights going from most UK airports to Naples, it’ s easy to get there. The diving would be with Centro Sub Campi Flegrei dive centre in Pozzuoli, a highly professional and friendly team located on the edge of the Archaeological Park. All equipment can be hired, or take your own and just use their tanks and weights. They work closely with the Hotel Tripergola, a clean, no-frills hotel, 200m from the dive centre with very friendly and helpful staff. And they were happy to organise our day trip with an English-speaking guide.
Easy and shallow diving, 10m + visibility, warm 20 ° C water, and the shorthaul flights made this trip attractive. The photos, videos, unique dive sites and the reasonable price made it irresistible! With plenty of sights to see and things to do for non-divers, I suddenly had 24 people booked- 18 divers and 6 non-divers. For five nights, and three days’ diving, two dives per day, the price was € 410.
The first of our six dives was on the Villa Protiro site, the house of a wealthy Roman. At just 5m deep, the remains of the villa walls mapped out its size with the main highlight being the reception room mosaic floor – the iconic image of the Archaeology Park, as well as a white marble bathroom floor that would look at home in a modern day bathroom.
Our second dive was on Smoky Reef, a meander between the main supporting pillars of what was thought to be the viaduct
Top right: Dive trail for Villa dei Pisoni
Dive trails for Villa Protiro
over the bay. This dive had loads of marine life, and a thermal vent meadow of small streams of bubbles steadily and constantly released from the sea floor, with one large vent that was very hot, making the water shimmer like a mirage in the desert.
Day two began with a trip outside the Archaeological Park to Punta Procida, a wall dive where stunning deep purple soft coral fans grow at depths down to
40m, alongside lime green sponges covering the rock – all only visible with a good torch. Shoals of smaller fish played among them and at shallower depths were several octopus, one of which, having decided I wasn’ t going to disturb it, demonstrated how to catch his dinner.
Our second dive of the day was back in the Archaeological Park at Villa Pisoni, which was one of the largest houses in
Villa Protiro mosaic floor Ninfeo Di Claudio mosaic floor
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