I can recommend Desert Sea Divers (
Desert Sea Divers – Desert Sea Divers Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) in North Obhur - dived with them on numerous occasions and seem the most professional of all local outfits. They operate large day boats that can easily accommodate 16+ divers and do 3-tank day-trips. The sites they visit are all around 60-90 mins from the port and usually include both wreck (Chicken Wreck, Marble Wreck, etc.) and reef (Apo, Four-mile, Elbow, Anas, etc.) dives. Cost -that includes meal and soft drinks- is around 300 SAR.
Assuming you'll be working normal days/hours (i.e. Sun-Thu 8/9-5pm) you can fly to Jeddah on Thursday (spoilt for choice for flight times as there are at least 4 per hour with Saudia or Nas), stay in a hotel in Jeddah and book diving on Friday & Saturday with Desert Sea Diving. They do Nitrox and, if you arrange to return to RUH early on Sunday morning, you should be clear from excess nitrogen. One thing to keep in mind is that North Obhur is 30-40 mins away from hotels in the centre of Jeddah, so booking a taxi for the ride early in the morning (and for the way back) is advisable. There are no hotels (to my knowledge) that I'd stay at in Obhur (things mught have changed since I left) - I recommend staying in a hotel in Jeddah so you can explore the city in the evenings. What is very enjoyable, is seeing the saudi upper class enjoying themselves in the villas gardens by the Obhur creek banks and in the water, on jetskis and pleasure boats, the two sexes mingling freely, something you won't see taking place in public, anywhere else in the country.
One thing you'd need to ask your operator of choice about is whether you can dive without a Saudi diving license. I understand that this _may_ now be a requirement. I used to live in KSA and had one but my license expired after I left and on a couple of subsequent visits I was able to dive by smiling pleadingly to the Coast Guard officer on the way out of the harbour (if it comes to this, remember that politeness and flattery goes a long way).
I hope you enjoy the experience - the saudi coast of the Red Sea is not often dived so in much more pristine condition than the egyptian coast.
