Emperor Fleet - Cruise Itineraries

Just Brothers - A trip to be remembered

Report by Fefe Morisod

Picture by Jan Hechter

Picture by Kevin Little

Picture by Kevin Little

We set sail on this Saturday from Marsa Ghalib. Obviously having all heard the reputation of Brothers Islands, we could only dream of the best! But we didn't have the best start as the coastguards decided to give us some trouble and the weather wasn't on our side.
After our 2 first dives, we decided to go ahead to Brothers, even though the wind was strong and the waves were big. We had a bit of a bumpy ride and dinner was deserted by most of the guests, but we made it and were anchored onto the island of Small Brother by the evening. We all had a good night sleep to get ready for the next day.

The following day, we all woke up early and went in for the East wall on Small Brother. The weather was still rough, but we still had one of these dives with lots and lots of Grey Reef Sharks and some of us even saw the rare Thresher Shark. We also had a very curious Napoleon playing with us at our safety stop.

For the second dive, we did the South plateau and we all had a chance of seeing the Thresher Sharks! They were hard to see between all the others Grey Reef Sharks, but the best was yet to come.

For the third dive, we had the chance to do the North tip of Small Brother and as soon as we jumped in and went down, it took me a few seconds to realize what was happening. I had the most beautiful view of a giant Manta swimming up onto the North tip. I was completely stunned, as we really didn't expect to see it! The Manta decided to stay a while and wasn't bothered by all of us. It even did a little tour to make sure everybody could get its picture.

But that wasn't the end of this dive. When the Manta finally vanished into the blue, we continued our dive on the West Wall and again we saw Thresher sharks. About 35 minutes into the dive, we could hear somebody banging their tank and to our great surprise, a Hammerhead shark appeared in the blue!

Picture by Jan Hechter

Picture by Penny Hands

Picture by Jan Hechter

When we finally made it back, there were some sharks under the boat and some of us went to snorkel with them - it turned out these were Silky sharks.

When everybody was back on board and the sun was down, we were still all speechless! We were all jumping around and were so excited. This dive was one of the best in our lives! Even as a dive guide, I couldn't really realize what had just happened. Believe me, it took us all a few days to really grasp what had happened and to calm down!

We continued our trip and had more exciting dives on Big Brother with the wrecks of the Aida and Numidia, but the weather deteriorated and we had a huge storm the day we were supposed to leave Brothers. It rained, it hailed, there was thunder and lightning and even the cargo ships had to stop waiting for the storm to calm down. It finally all cleared up and we could sail back under a beautiful rainbow!

We still did a very exciting dive on Elphinstone where some of us saw another Manta and more Grey Reef sharks. We also finished up with another beautiful dive in Marsa Abu Dabab watching the giant Green Sea Turtles and Guitar sharks!

Picture by Kevin Little

Picture by Kevin Little

Picture by Penny Hands

We also had some guests doing a Nitrox course and they were crowned "Nitrox Kings" as we came back to the marina!

James Esten, Jan Hechter, Kevin Little & Ted Sumers Picture by Fefe

I really think this trip will be remembered by everybody who was on board!

Picture by Lucy Kent