© Scubapro
Ayia Napa, located on the southeastern coast of Cyprus, offers a captivating diving experience with its diverse marine landscapes. Known for its crystal-clear waters, Ayia Napa is a diver's paradise featuring an array of caves, tunnels, rock formations, and canyons. Shore diving is particularly popular here, allowing easy access to pristine reefs from the beach. For those seeking a bit more adventure, the region's famous dive site, The Caves, invites divers to explore its intriguing labyrinth of small tunnels and caves, providing an exhilarating underwater journey. For advanced divers, Ayia Napa is home to remarkable wreck dives, including an artificial wreck located just 1 kilometer off the coast. This site offers a thrilling exploration opportunity and a chance to encounter various marine species that inhabit the area. With generally calm sea conditions and excellent visibility, Ayia Napa is perfect for both beginners and seasoned divers. Dive centers in the area provide courses and excursions, while liveaboards offer access to other stunning dive sites across the Mediterranean Sea, making Ayia Napa a must-visit destination for diving enthusiasts.
Ayia Napa diving has sites for everyone, from novice divers to the most advanced divers. The Caves dive site offers the best of Cyprus’ cave diving, with a number of incredible underwater caverns and extensive tunnels where shafts of light act as a torch for the divers. At Cyclops Cave, located in Green Bay, slip into mini canyons by a seated entry among countless tropical fish. The site is great for advanced dive courses, from performance buoyancy to digital underwater photography while Sandy Bay is ideal for novice dive courses, where you can practice skills on the sandy flats.
There are also some great artificial reefs, in the form of boat wrecks that were sunk in recent years and are now teeming with life. The Nemesis III and the Liberty Wreck both stand in the Ayia Napa water, lying at 25 meters/82 feet. Around Cape Greco, there are many dives where you can enter by shore into calm waters devoid of current.
Scuba diving in Ayia Napa is possible all-year-round, where the calm sites are rarely affected by the weather conditions. From May to October, the weather and the waters are at their warmest with the warmer water conditions inviting a greater abundance of marine life to the area.
Cyprus’ rainy season starts in November and lasts until February but fortunately, the average rainfall is modest and whatever season you decide to visit, there will always be plenty of sunshine to dry you off at your surface interval.
Moray eels sit idly in the crevices of wrecks while giant barracuda and grouper circle above. In reefs and seabeds thriving with seagrass, turtles can be seen enjoying their meal as octopus, cuttlefish, and lobster hide within the many underwater caves. In the hotter months, urchin and starfish cover the seabed, with small wrasse, bream, rainbow wrasse and potentially a bullnose ray swooping in from the deeper ocean.
Wildlife Sightings are Based on User Generated Content
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 200
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 300
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 12
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 3
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 130
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 60
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 90
The image shown is a representative illustration and does not depict every individual animal in this category.
Total number of species approx.: 300
