Favorite place in Europe for Vacation and Diving?

[leapfrog]

Reasons for taking Spain into account: You could rent a car, say at Barcelona, see the city, full of art and architecture and then get some very good dives in on the Costa Brava. Then you could drive down to Madrid see that and drive back out to the Andalusian Mediterranean coast, around the Villaricos Mojacar Carboneras and Cabo de Gata areas. Sure you won't be diappointed. You can then take the coast road along the Costa del Sol (no really good dives here) until you get to Tarifa also known as Windsurf City. Here there are some great fauna dives as everything that moves underwater is making its way fom the Atlantic into the Med. Next you could cross over with the ferry to Africa and dive in Ceuta or keep going until you get to the area of NAB Rota and Sanlucar. Have some dives here, make your way by car to Seville, stay there for a couple of days and then back to Madrid via Toledo. You will have done great diving and really got a feel for all the differences in Spanish culture and cuisine from one region to another. I particularly recommended the Boreas Wreck Dive off Palamos harbor with the guys from Gymsub Aiguablava and the WWII British Bomber engine dive off Carboneras with the guys at Centro Escuela Buceo Mojacar. Whatever you decide to do, enjoy!

 

[Tomeck]

Reasons for taking Spain into account: You could rent a car, say at Barcelona, see the city, full of art and architecture and then get some very good dives in on the Costa Brava. Then you could drive down to Madrid see that and drive back out to the Andalusian Mediterranean coast, around the Villaricos Mojacar Carboneras and Cabo de Gata areas. Sure you won't be diappointed. You can then take the coast road along the Costa del Sol (no really good dives here) until you get to Tarifa also known as Windsurf City. Here there are some great fauna dives as everything that moves underwater is making its way fom the Atlantic into the Med. Next you could cross over with the ferry to Africa and dive in Ceuta or keep going until you get to the area of NAB Rota and Sanlucar. Have some dives here, make your way by car to Seville, stay there for a couple of days and then back to Madrid via Toledo. You will have done great diving and really got a feel for all the differences in Spanish culture and cuisine from one region to another. I particularly recommended the Boreas Wreck Dive off Palamos harbor with the guys from Gymsub Aiguablava and the WWII British Bomber engine dive off Carboneras with the guys at Centro Escuela Buceo Mojacar. Whatever you decide to do, enjoy!

Estartit in Spain is very known for dive.

 

[Izze]

My suggestion would be Malta. You get english as a primary language and the island is small which allows you to stay in a quiet area but still have short distances to both diving and shopping areas. You can also opt to stay on the relaxed island of Gozo and just take the ferry to Valetta for the big (or rather medium sized) city stuff.

The diving ranges from good wreck diving to spectacular nature dives with caverns and similar areas. The fish life is on par with the Mediterranean in general which means less fish and less color than tropical areas. All diving is accessible by day trips no matter where or on which island you're staying.

In my opinion Malta has the best diving in the the Med and it is the only place I am planning on going back to, at least on a diving vacation. Admittedly I haven't seen it all but my experience includes a fair number of destinations all around those parts.

 

[liuk3]

Reading some of your suggestions also reminded me how poor my foreign language skills are. Obviously, I am fluent in English. My Spanish is very broken, and my Taiwanese is pretty bad too (my parents cringe and wife makes fun of me when I speak), but I figure that I can get by if I need to. It might be good to know how well we might be able to survive with English in these different countries. Of course, though, we do not want to be presumptious in speaking English, but it would give us an idea how much trouble we'll be in hanging out in these different areas.

As an aside, I forwarded the thread to my wife, and she was really appreciative of all the ideas people have thrown out as suggestions. She had no idea people could be so helpful on these forums. It is pretty amazing how the internet allows us to communicate from around the globe.

I'm sure that you can tell that I am not exactly a world traveler, but now that I am older and have the money put away, I'd like to try to start seeing the world. Thanks again!

 

[Snagel]

Another important thing, is when you are coming to europe ( dates)
Mediterranean is in mi opinion the better option to diving in summer, water is warm,you can dive with a shorty, and also at depends the country is nice to visit
In Spain for example , you can dive in the morning and visit Granada ( La Alhambra) in the evening from "La Herradura".
There is a lot of good diving near to barcelona,
Everywhere you can find dive centers with English speakers in their staff, people speaking simple english as me , you can find everywhere as well, Spain has a large tradition in receiving tourist so your are not going to have problem with the language.
On the other hand, summer is so crowd in the Mediterranean coast so I suggest June o September
avoid July and August :no too many tourist

welcome to Europe

 

[Air One]

Spain has a large tradition in receiving tourist so your are not going to have problem with the language.

Hi my dear fellow European.
My experience in Spain is a bit different, but I have to say that I use to avoid the crowdy places.
I've notice that many people speak french in the north, but for example in Hierro ( Canarias), it was quite difficult to find anyone speaking french or english. The only one we met was the dive op's wife ( speaking both !). Never mind ! It's a lovely place and I just had to quicly learn a bit of spanish ( cerveza, comer, buceo and all thoose very important stuffs...).

Anyway, if you want to visit places where the people often speak english, go east or north : in Greece, Scandinavia, Neetherland, you won't have any problem.
In France, Italy or Spain...it could be different.

And well...of course you should'nt forget the UK and Ireland !

 

[String]

As Tomeck said, PADI and Naui aren't widely recognized

Eh ?! PADI is probably the biggest agency in europe.

Both them and NAUI comply to the european standards for qualifications and therefore are recognised everywhere. Even France now recognises it.

 

[String]

In my opinion Malta has the best diving in the the Med

I'd agree with that - one of the few places in the med where they havent spear fished/dynamited most of the fish life. It also has a huge number of wrecks and possibly the clearest water.

 

[String]

Sardinia as a good place to meet all your objectives.
Diving includes general reef diving, wrecks and caves.

Does it actually have any fish life or is it like the entire eastern med which has clear warm waters and no life. Mainly as the locals have spearfished everything to extinction.

The Italians and Greeks are the worst ive seen for that. An italian, 18 litre tank and a speargun. A site i see far too often (even though its illegal).

 

[BobSch]

HI
I have to agree with Leejnd, Italy. Besides being a fun place to travel they have some very nice diving sites. I would say the Italian Rivera to be ecxact. It maybe expensive there staying in hotel but you can look into B+B or Agroturisomo. we've been there twice and enjoyed every minute. My wife doesn't dive also but she went to some muesuems just walked around. I would suggest Rappalo. At Portofino there is a dive site with a sculpture of Jesus. I've heard that Corsica is wonderful place for diving but I'm sure other people can tell you better. If you are budgeted look into Agroturisimo they have nice places there for 50Euro a night for a couple. they may not be located on the beach but inland a bit but still far away from the hussle and bussle.
enjoy
Rauven