Dive Sites

The very experienced professional Ocean Pro dive team and the unique location of Helengeli in the very far north of the North Male Atoll guarantee some of the most spectacular dive experiences in the Maldives. There is no other tourist island nearby and all dive sites are not only for your eyes only but they are also still rather unspoiled and therefore offer very good chances to see many, also bigger fish. 

The approximately 40 dive sites are all visited by boat and are suitable for be-ginners and experienced divers alike. The variety of our dive sites include easy to dive “giris” and drop offs with outstanding coral growth but also exciting channel dives and “thilas” unique to the Maldives with their unbelievable number of fish including sharks, rays, turtles and na-poleon wrasse.

"Thilas" and "giris" are underwater coral mountains. They start at the sandy bottom and grow towards the surface. Many of them are not more than 50 metres across at the top and can be easily circum dived in less than an hour. "Thilas" start between 5 to 15 metres underneath the surface, "giris" at 3 to 5 metres. Thilas in particular offer an enormous number of fish concentrated on the current side of the reef. The nutrition and food arrives there with the currents, sometimes thousands of small fish feed on it, and their bigger predators will patrol in be-tween.

During the northeast monsoon (December to April) the currents are running into the atoll offering clear waters and great op-portunities to see many sharks.

During the southwest monsoon (May to November) the currents are running out. The waters are rich with plankton, plenty of food for mantas and whale sharks. In May and November, the seasons are changing.

The water temperature is on average 28 degrees centigrade and the visibility from January to May about 20 to 40 and from June to December 15 meters.

The house reef of Helengeli is probably one of the best in the Maldives. It offers six entry and exit points with cor-responding tank service. Due its location in a channel close to the outside reef the enormous number and big variety of fish and coral life are a fantastic alternative and addition to the boat dives and ex-cursions. There have been divers who spend their whole holidays at the house reef. Click here for more information

Our main manta season is from May to December
In this time, we  frequently visit our Manta spots to watch these beautiful animals. Our famous Manta ray dive sites are:

Fairy Tale(only 50 minutes by boat on our side of the atoll)

Bodu Hithi Thila (Day trip to the other side of the atoll from January to May)

Between January and May we dive our famous Shark points to see grey sharks:
Miyaru Faru 40 min., KKK 30 min, Saddle & Vashimas Thila (full day trip from May-December)

Here are a few more of our best dive sites:

Bodu Thila is located just 5 min. south of Helengeli in the channel. In particular, with outgoing current from May to November it offers diving at its best with a school of eagle rays and grey reef sharks.

Kuda Thila is very small but the number of fish is enormous and in combination with wonderful corals simply amazing.

Fairy Tale is not only in the manta sea-son worth a visit. The landscape under-water changes constantly through the dive and the main feature are two huge overhangs covered in yellow and blue soft corals.

Asdu Canyon presents not only a canyon, rocks and overhangs but also a great diversity of aquatic life from small to big fish to exotic little creatures like leaf fish and mantis shrimps.

Maha Thila is the place where you can find everything from small nudibranchs to stonefish in very nice overhangs with black corals.

Hani Kandu offers a nice channel dive, drifting either in or out of the atoll while we watch stingrays and sharks sleeping on the sandy bottom.

Trix Caves amazes you with soft corals in all colour in various overhangs and at the same time with a huge number and variety of fish.