Two remote islands near the Sudanese border — Zabargad an ancient peridot mine with a wreck, Rocky Island a small, current-swept reef with big animals.
Zabargad is a proper island — a hill of olivine that supplied peridot to the ancient world, with a sheltered lagoon, a wreck and a surprising amount of shallow diving. Rocky Island, a short hop away, is the opposite: small, steep, swept by current, and the reason advanced divers book the deep south.
Both sit near Egypt’s southern maritime border and both appear only on longer liveaboard itineraries, usually with a weather caveat attached. Trips get rerouted here more often than anywhere else in Egypt.
When it works, it is the closest thing Egypt has to Sudanese diving — bigger animals, better coral, and almost nobody else in the water.
This is planning information, not a dive briefing or a substitute for one. Conditions change; your guide on the day is the authority. Diving emergency numbers and the coast’s recompression chambers are on our emergency contacts page.
Listed by the desk, in alphabetical order. Nobody pays to be here.
Marsa Alam
Official site ↗