Grouper scubiduba
Madeira – Manta Divers
In the evening the ferry brought me to Madeira. In daytime it´s a wonderful trip, you will see so much of both islands and even the Islas Desertas. Arrival in Funchal was hell, your luggage is just stowed in heaps on some trailers, so everybody goes looking for his. This with 300 people around and you can easily imagine the overall picture. Only one street leads to the ferry so a long traffic jam results, when everybody tries to take off at the same time. I promised myself not to rent a car in Funchal, August seems to be the worst month for the Funchal people a taxi driver told me – but well good for Tourism. September, my friends told me, is a better time to come. I chose Galomar Hotel in Canico, 20 min away from Funchal. A modest hotel (3 star) connected to some other business next by where they offer accommodation for every demand, all run by the same German guy. The hotel sits on and in a steep cliff right at the seaside, stunning setting you won´t find elsewhere. Stairs and elevator take you down to different plattforms. On top a nice garden and snack bar, a bit deeper a good restaurant Atlantis with spectacular view on the cliff right and left and the litte bay beneath. Further down another snack, showers, a pool , recreational sun area, dive center, multiple entry points in the bay protected by buoys and cliffs on both sides. All this on various bigger and smaller plattforms and levels in between rocks. There is even a bridge to some other level and more place to get a good tan. There are the Manta Divers an excellent business which already won several prices from dive magazines for „Best of Atlantic“. It´s a well organized center with great competent staff. You get everything here, Nitrox, guided or buddy dives at the house reef, boat dives, scooter rental, apnoe training, night dives, lessons with a marine biologist, specialty courses etc. To guide a new group through all this and introduce everything and gear up took more than 1.5 hours. Definitely way too long for some experienced oldtimer. This was my first dive center with debriefing – hooray to that – where I learned that my octopus hose is not long enough to provide sufficient help for a buddy – well you never stop learning. Dives were good but less visibility than Porto Santo, maybe due to swell and construction work around the area? We had some medium fish life, small schools of reef fish – see above- some barracudas, groupers and sting rays. Most times we swam around some huge boulders nearly reaching the surface. They have a greyish ugly Aluminium „Tin Lizzy“ without any colour on it, which serves it´s purpose surprisingly well and is ideal for this area. Getting in and out oft he boat in the sometimes heavy swell needed strong arms and plenty of help. Please don´t miss out on the wine tasting, touring the countryside of the east coast, hiking and visiting the market on a Saturday.
In the evening the ferry brought me to Madeira. In daytime it´s a wonderful trip, you will see so much of both islands and even the Islas Desertas. Arrival in Funchal was hell, your luggage is just stowed in heaps on some trailers, so everybody goes looking for his. This with 300 people around and you can easily imagine the overall picture. Only one street leads to the ferry so a long traffic jam results, when everybody tries to take off at the same time. I promised myself not to rent a car in Funchal, August seems to be the worst month for the Funchal people a taxi driver told me – but well good for Tourism. September, my friends told me, is a better time to come. I chose Galomar Hotel in Canico, 20 min away from Funchal. A modest hotel (3 star) connected to some other business next by where they offer accommodation for every demand, all run by the same German guy. The hotel sits on and in a steep cliff right at the seaside, stunning setting you won´t find elsewhere. Stairs and elevator take you down to different plattforms. On top a nice garden and snack bar, a bit deeper a good restaurant Atlantis with spectacular view on the cliff right and left and the litte bay beneath. Further down another snack, showers, a pool , recreational sun area, dive center, multiple entry points in the bay protected by buoys and cliffs on both sides. All this on various bigger and smaller plattforms and levels in between rocks. There is even a bridge to some other level and more place to get a good tan. There are the Manta Divers an excellent business which already won several prices from dive magazines for „Best of Atlantic“. It´s a well organized center with great competent staff. You get everything here, Nitrox, guided or buddy dives at the house reef, boat dives, scooter rental, apnoe training, night dives, lessons with a marine biologist, specialty courses etc. To guide a new group through all this and introduce everything and gear up took more than 1.5 hours. Definitely way too long for some experienced oldtimer. This was my first dive center with debriefing – hooray to that – where I learned that my octopus hose is not long enough to provide sufficient help for a buddy – well you never stop learning. Dives were good but less visibility than Porto Santo, maybe due to swell and construction work around the area? We had some medium fish life, small schools of reef fish – see above- some barracudas, groupers and sting rays. Most times we swam around some huge boulders nearly reaching the surface. They have a greyish ugly Aluminium „Tin Lizzy“ without any colour on it, which serves it´s purpose surprisingly well and is ideal for this area. Getting in and out oft he boat in the sometimes heavy swell needed strong arms and plenty of help. Please don´t miss out on the wine tasting, touring the countryside of the east coast, hiking and visiting the market on a Saturday.