Greece

The Million Yellow Anemones Cave

Wonderful large cave with at least 3 openings in the vertical or lightly overhanging wall, not so obvious access from outside.
Thousands of yellow anemones or solitary coral that look like gold embedded in the rock, briozoans, shrimps, sponges, cardinal fish...
Amazing atmosphere looking at the blue lights from inside the cave.
A marvel of nature.
Possible to reach from Beach with taverna from the East as I did it with 2 tanks but very long swim, much more convenient from boat.
Can't wait to go back !




Agios Pavlos Gold Mine

Cavern accessible by snorkeling from the long sandy beach (nice arch on the way.
Very hard work to carry scuba equipment from this side.

Possible to reach from Beach with taverna from the East as I did it with 2 tanks but very long swim and much more convenient from boat.

Should be possible to enter the cavern with a small boat.
Very bad smell inside the cavern in August 2016, maybe from guano ?
One large room with great view to the blue light coming from the wide entrance.
Basicaly it's a bunch of swimtroughs in a large cave.
Great fun !
Not so much life inside but great atmosphere.
Probably dangerous water movement and bad visibility when wavy.

Possible to combine with "Goldmine" if you are good on air, nice wall in between.



Agios Pavlos Blue Cavern is also known as Divers Playground, Guano Cavern.

Agios Pavlos Blue Cavern

Very good wall dive with small caves/natural rooms under overhangs.
Just around the rock, there is a already nice small cave 10m deep the sandy bottom with a few small posidonia patches drops gently from 15m there to maximum 35m as far as I went.
It looks like going up from there westward to the next beach.
A kind of wide sand valley.

On the map, the coast looks like a boot : the heel gap area is nice cove with interesting thin geological layers and a huge rock split in 2 making a small canyon.

Seascape is a pretty much a vertical wall dropping to a mostly sandy bottom (I didn't explore away from the wall but it seems to drops gently deeper) 
Wall is colorful and very rich in life under 12m depth (quite bare above) with some nice overhangs covered with green algea, yellow anemones, sponges, lot of tube worms etc.

Lots of small fish in september 2014 : sand smelt, picarels and damsel, parrot fish and tiny groupers.  Quite a lot of spearfishermen around. 
Will go back as soon as possible !  Not sure now which side of the taverna beach I like the most ...

West from taverna beach. Shore access by a few minutes snorkeling from the beach (taverna).

Agios Pavlos Cliff and "Caves"

Very good wall dive.
Shore access by a 10min. snorkeling from the beach (taverna).
Just around the rock, the sand drops abruptly from 6 to 22m.
A kind of wide sand valley.
Bottom with weeds then stones when gently leveling up towards north.
Seascape becomes really interesting with huge flat rocks providing overhangs covered with yellow anemones, sponges, tube worms etc.
the wall is either vertical from surface to 30m or slightly hanging over.  
Very cool atmosphear with the light giving on the wall.  
I guess it's preferable to do this dive in the first part of the day.
Tons of small fish in July 2013 : sand smelt, picarels and damsel fish.
Only one medium sized grouper spotted. 
Will go back as soon as possible !



Agios Pavlos Wall

Largely overfished. 
Abundance of abandoned nets and fishing lines.
Interesting rock formation for a one shot dive. 
Specially the zone east from the 3 rocks, easily accessible from the eastern beach.
Good for snorkeling and shallow free diving.  
Lots of stuff brought by currents or lost by swimmer and boaters to be retrieved :)
The 3 rocks and their underwater extension area can be exposed to currents.
That area is a large flat rocky block cut by narrow canyons.



Triapetra

I find it not worth for a dive.
Maybe Ok for a snorkeling and free diving session.

On the way to Agios Pavlos

Ligres Beach

Rock formation from 20m sandy bottom to 2m depth, large boulders around.
Heard that the top of the rock was above the surface until around 1995 then it broke down because of so much explosives fishing there !

Swimtrough, boulders, cracks, holes, wall.
Lot of small fish but no big ones in october 2015.

Ok to dive once but I don't think I would go back. 

Not sure of the exact location

Papadoplaka is also known as Dynamite Rock.

Papadoplaka

Clear Water, only small fish walls and drop off beetween small shallow coves.  
Very scarce or no growth on the walls or pebbles and rocks bottom.
We had 6 beaufort south west : good current in some areas.
Did a one way dive to meet the anchored boat.  Interesting landscapes for snorkeling freediving.  Spotted some hatchet fish in a shallow cave.
Day trip on a boat can be very nice but considering just the dive, the shore dives of Agios Pavlos or Kaly Limenes are more interesting to me.
Would go maybe to dive the cave from 20m to 40m on the west side.



Paximadia East

Nicewall/steep rocky slope dropping on sandy bottom with small posidonia fields 20-30 meters away from wall.  
Usually good visibility making possible to enjoy the wall from surface to bottom.

Overfished :(

From Lefkogia village, follow Schinaria signs.

Skinnaria Wall

Quite long way to reach from shore.  
Way between shore and cave not so interesting.
Beautiful wide cave, 8m to 17m depth, filled with shrimps during daytime. 
2 chimneys, one very narrow.
Sand on bottom so be careful not to fin downwards.
Anyway keep diving group small as possible.

Surroundings area just outside the cave are nice with a wall almost vertical from 7m down to 20 on the sand/sea grass.


From Lefkogia village, follow Shinaria signboards (road was renew in 2018 but still narrow at some points, and many sheeps/goats around, drive slowly)


Skinaria Cave is also known as Twin chimneys.

Skinaria Cave

A shallow dive with lots of interesting stuff to see. A great variety of aquatic marine life can be spotted. Barracuda's, Moray Eels, large schools of different Bream, Flounders, Jackfish, Octopus, various crustaceans, even turtles during the summer months. A great spot for photography (Macro) and training dives such as Discover Scuba Diving, Open water Diver Course dives, specialty dives suchs as AWARE Fish Identification. Great flora and fauna!

Easy dive for all levels, easy access from the beach of Ammoudi.

Agios Pavlos Gold Mine

Snorkeling and Scuba Diving at Agios Pavlos Gold Mine