Roman Ruins in Baiae - Diving or Snorkeling?

[Schenkeli]

Hi, as an advanced snorkeller and freediver (20m depth are no problem at all): Is it worth scuba diving the Roman Ruins and mosaics in the bay of Baia near Naples? I guess the visibility in the summer will be so bad that Diving is better than Snorkelling?

Can you just snorkel on your own or is a guide mandatory? Or is the visibility so bad that you will not find the mosaics without a guide anyway?

Thanks for your help!
Thomas

 

[DaddyJr]

I saw a youtube scuba diving video () in which guides cover certain points of interest with sand after showing it to patrons. Maybe to prevent vandalising/theft. So a guide may be required to be able to see all of the sights.

But interested to know how you get on, a couple of mates and I are planning to scuba dive over there in early September.

 

[Schenkeli]

We did the dive today - and I would definitely recommend doing it as a dive and not by snorkelling.
First of all diving just gives you far more time close to the mosaics - but more importantly: we had a day with bad visibility, maybe three to four meters. Which means you can even see the mosaics from the surface - even if they are already uncovered (which is done by the first group every day, so if you go in the early afternoon everything should be uncovered. The last tour covers it again).

We were a boat mixed with divers and snorkellers and the divers took a lot more out of the dive.

Also lots of octopus - saw I think six on two dives.

Subaiae dive shop was a good choice.

If you like Roman history and e.g..Pompeii you will also like this dive. Otherwise you will get bored in 4m depth with bad visibility.

 

[Rob9876]

We did the dive today - and I would definitely recommend doing it as a dive and not by snorkelling.
First of all diving just gives you far more time close to the mosaics - but more importantly: we had a day with bad visibility, maybe three to four meters. Which means you can even see the mosaics from the surface - even if they are already uncovered (which is done by the first group every day, so if you go in the early afternoon everything should be uncovered. The last tour covers it again).

We were a boat mixed with divers and snorkellers and the divers took a lot more out of the dive.

Also lots of octopus - saw I think six on two dives.

Subaiae dive shop was a good choice.

If you like Roman history and e.g..Pompeii you will also like this dive. Otherwise you will get bored in 4m depth with bad visibility.

Awesome, thanks for posting this! Can you please tell me what the water temperature was?

 

[Schenkeli]

It was extremely warm: 29 degree celsius (surface and bottom since it is so shallow).
The dive guide said last week it was even 32. We used a 3mm shorty - more than enough. The snorkelers had no suit at all.
Enjoy!

 

[DaddyJr]

We did 2 dives on the 30th August and there were snorkelers in the group. Visibility was quite poor, but for us divers that wasn't an issue as you could go up close with the statues and other relics. But for the first site, the snorkelers said they found it hard to see much because of the poor visibility. For the second site, visibility was better and apparently the sun was also at a better angle for them to see things. 2 of the snorkelers with us were also scuba divers but they hadn't dived for a few years and said that had they known about the visibility, they would have done dive refreshers, but overall, they were still enthralled by the sight of the statues and ruins.

Saw lots of small fish here and there, and 1 Octopus in the second dive.

The water was warm, 29 degrees celsius. My daughter and I didn't bother to use a wetsuit, we just used the rash guards we had on.