BDE liveaboard October or November

[finn3]

I have done this route a few times in the past, probably 3 or 4 times. Generally towards the end of October, although I did also do the DE part in August 24.

As mentioned above the reefs on these off shore sites are still pretty good. I think on my dives at Daedalus I have seen hammerheads on about 50% of them. Expect a hammerhead or two, you won't see schooling hammerheads. Oceanic manta also now seem to be an occasional vistior. I have seen a couple of these on different trips in October. For the first dive of the day at Daedalus the normal format is to drop into the blue and hang out to see what is there, max depth is up to you - the viz will be very good so you can be at 20m-30m and easily see a guide at 40m. There won't be any pressure to go deep, but you will need to keep eyes on the guide. Normally I let the guides go deep, and then only descend if they spot something interesting. While most people will dive nitrox during the week, for the first dive of the day there is normally the option to have an air fill, so you end up with a weak nitrox mix for dive 1. Depending on what happens in the blue, and the current, it will either be a blue water ascent, or a drift along the reef wall and ascent along the reef. If you are unlucky you can spend the dive just looking at blue water, but you do have a good chance of something interesting appearing. The 2nd and 3rd dives of the day can vary depending on what was seen on the first dive. Normally the 3rd dive is a drift along the reef wall.

For the BDE route expect the first and last dives of the trip to be a bit underwhelming, once you get to the actual BDE part the diving improves. Sea conditions can be a bit rough in October, , so expect a rough over night crossing at some point during the week - it is unlikely that all night crossings will be rough. Depending on sea conditions some of the zodiac rides to the drop off points can be exciting! Equally I have been there in totally flat conditions at that time of year.

Thank you!
If you done this a lot in October, what did you usually see apart from the hammerheads and manta?
Some thresher, oceanic white tip sharks, dolphins maybe?

 

[scubajasonr]

In terms of sightings I have seen thresher sharks several times at the Brothers. Normally around the plateaus on either end of Big Brother. Oceanic Whitetips used to be a common sighting at Brothers, but I don't think I saw any when I was last there (2023) but would always see them in previous years, since boats have stopped over night morning these sharks seem to have moved on. There were a couple of oceanics at Elphinstone in October 2023, we didn't see any in August 2024. I have never seen dolphins while in the water on this route, but you do occasionally see them in the water around the boat. If you want to see dolphins find a route that takes in Sataya. Overall lots and lots of general reef life, barracudas, blue fin trevally, hump head wrasse etc, plus you never really know what will turn up out of the blue.

If you just want to see sharks then this route has the possibility of being disappointing. As an example I was recently in the Maldives and on the first dive there I saw more sharks than I have seen on any week I have done on the BDE route. However the Red Sea offshore dive sites are stunning, the combination of the remoteness, the amount of soft and hard coral and fish life makes them very unique places.

 

[finn3]

In terms of sightings I have seen thresher sharks several times at the Brothers. Normally around the plateaus on either end of Big Brother. Oceanic Whitetips used to be a common sighting at Brothers, but I don't think I saw any when I was last there (2023) but would always see them in previous years, since boats have stopped over night morning these sharks seem to have moved on. There were a couple of oceanics at Elphinstone in October 2023, we didn't see any in August 2024. I have never seen dolphins while in the water on this route, but you do occasionally see them in the water around the boat. If you want to see dolphins find a route that takes in Sataya. Overall lots and lots of general reef life, barracudas, blue fin trevally, hump head wrasse etc, plus you never really know what will turn up out of the blue.

If you just want to see sharks then this route has the possibility of being disappointing. As an example I was recently in the Maldives and on the first dive there I saw more sharks than I have seen on any week I have done on the BDE route. However the Red Sea offshore dive sites are stunning, the combination of the remoteness, the amount of soft and hard coral and fish life makes them very unique places.

ah wow thanks, I didn't know you see so many sharks in Maldives. But in the central Maldives routes it's mostly jsut the reef sharks right? Didn't hear much about others. Also the whale sharks of course, but apparently you only see them with big crowds of snorkelers chasing them.
So far I had the impression BDE is the shark route in red sea..

 

[scubajasonr]

We were on a local island in the Maldives in Vavuu Atoll (Fulidhoo) for the first week. Lots of sharks in the area, the first dive we did was into a channel with a fairly strong current, probably 25+ grey reef sharks when we got into the channel, and they hung around. Every dive after that had varying numbers of sharks, I think it was just grey reef, white tip and silver tip. Viz was poor compared to the Red Sea, and diving was slightly more challenging due to currents, but shark life was impressive. Lots of nurse sharks around the island so you could spend the evening watching them cruise around the jetty. Price for the week on the island including diving was actually similar to a Red Sea liveaboard around US$1,000. Obviously longer and more expensive to get there. After the week on the island we did a liveaboard heading north from Male. Less sharks (although still saw them on most dives), but made up for by regular appearances by reef manta. There were a few whale sharks around, we had a couple at the back of the boat over night, we did also briefly join a bunch of snorkel boats following one, that was fairly crazy.

BDE is the shark route for the Red Sea, and you will see sharks, just don't expect to see sharks on every dive, or sharks in large numbers.