This is one of the world’s most famous dives, I saw a dvd showing it and I really wanted to go, so much so that I went and had some more technical diving lessons to get good enough to be allowed to go to the bottom. It’s probably the hardest dive I’ve done in terms of depth and compression. Realistically it was an experience like no other, but I would probably have been just as blown away doing a shallower dive around the top of the hole.

The Great Blue Hole is basically a huge sinkhole in the reef and because it’s a lot deeper than the reef around it it looks really dark blue. The holes walls are light coloured limestone and it‘s about 100 - 120 metres across and probably a bit deeper than it is wide. People say it’s a perfect circle, but it’s actually got two breaks in the circle and because of the big coral growths near the holes mouth it doesn’t look quite circular. I saw angelfish and butterflyfish around the rim. Once you get past the coral at the top the walls are pretty smooth for the first 50 metres or so, then ledges start to form, which is where it gets more interesting if you like to dive amongst fish and the visibility is pretty good for the first bit and the water is still, good conditions for fish watching. I saw most os the animal life at the top of the hole but bigger fish further down including tuna, a blacktip reef shark and a bull shark. The weird rock stalactite type rock formations on the inside of the hole get spikier the deeper you get. If you’re going down into it at the bottom there’s some tunnels and a couple of big caves. It’s really quiet down there and dark, it’s probably the darkest dive I’ve been on and to be honest I felt a bit claustrophobic even though I’d seen the dvd so I knew what to expect and what to look for. I had a really nice guide and I felt safe but still a bit nervous but I think it’s just the surroundings and the depth that make you feel frilly.

Written by  Dan Mason.

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