Helengeli News
Dear Divers !
It has been a couple of months (and several feet of snow) since your heard of us. In the last few months we have seen some highlights under water but also one very rare one above water in the sky. On the 15.01.10 we had an annular eclipse of the sun! It will take more than a thousand years before we can see it again and I'm not sure if we will still report from Helengeli then. Fortunately the underwater highlights are more frequent.
In the last few months the weather was actually very good although we all have the feeling that the monsoon was 3 to 4 weeks later then usual. But should we complain about the weather?? Truly it was now and then a bit cool..........
We did have quite often a lot of waves and strong currents, but they came with superb visibility. Most days we have been able to use two dhonis in the morning and in the afternoon so everyone had a choice of dive sites.
On Maha Thila we found again a red frogfish (Thanks to Irene from Konstanz). It seems to be once again a "Walking frogfish " but so far we have found him most of the time.
Kuda Thila seems to have established itself as the kindergarten for little sharks: 4 small sharks resting there under a coral block. Often they were guarded by a large Honeycomb Moray Eel.
Channel diving at KKK offered frequent sightings of a school of eagle rays and a few white-tip sharks and once even the lucky encounter with dolphins.
We have been even luckier at Miyaru Faru there we saw a little tiger shark swimming in the middle of a group of gray reef sharks. And at both sites the amazing visibility of up to 50 metres allowed us glimpses at a couple of sail fishes in the deep blue.
All our day trips to Bodu Hiti Thila have been very successful thus far: on almost every dive we had Mantas! Therefore we offered 2 trips over to the west side every week in January and February. Once we saw a huge whale shark passing us slowly. Of course slowly is probably not the correct description for the gentle movement of a huge shark. When some divers tried to catch up with it, it looked more like a steam train trying to go as fast as an express train.
Now we can just hope that the manta season at Fairy Tale in the summer will be as successful.
We always had some leaf fish at Hani Kandu Thila and Trix Cave and they are still there and on top we found some new ones at Bodu Thila and Hani Kandu Corner. And at Ali Reef and Bodu Thila we discovered two baby Leaf fish with a size of approximately 3 cm! We hope that we can watch them growing up to join our regular leaf fish family.
Ghostpipefish season has started too and we encountered them quite frequently at Doris Cave, Aladdin Reef and Trix Cave and even in our lagoon we saw one of those rare animals.
We revisited also some "old" dive sites which we have dived only sporadically in recent years because some of them had suffered quite a lot from coral bleaching in 1998.
2 months ago we tried Maha Faru once again and were surprised how well the corals have recovered from year to year. Especially in shallow areas many new corals have established themselves again, and because Maha Faru also convinces us with very large number and variety of fish we are visiting this place regularly now.
Many of you have read in recent news that shark fishing will be entirely forbidden in the Maldives from 01.07.10. But even more importantly the export of shark products will be also banned form that date onwards. Initially the date has been the 01.03.10 but the Parliament has changed that date to find a solution for the approximately 200 fishermen who are specialized in shark fishing. We will keep you updated or you can check the news on :http://minivannews.com/category/news-in-brief/
Of course we have also good news for you for this summer! This year we have another summer special:
From 16.05.10 to 26.06.10 there are 20% discount on all dives and courses (excl. boat trips and equipment)!
Super travel offers for summer 2010 you will find with your tour operator or on:
We wish you a happy Easter!! Hopefully see you soon ..... on Helengeli
The ladies from the left : Dörthe, Giovanna and Manya ............ the guys from the left : Lars, Mike, and Uwe
Ocean Pro Helengeli makes all divers happy
Manja,Giovanna,Dörte,Lars,Mike und Uwe
Ocean Pro Team Helengeli
Hello divers
Diving and enjoying the underwaterworld with a visibility of nearly 40 m is what you can expect in Helengeli these days.
Helengeli is a beautiful classical diver island with many very interesting dive spots which are at their best at the moment: "KKK" with eagle rays and grey reef sharks, "Bodu Thila" with very clear blue water, lots of fish and corals and sometimes sailfishes at the end of your dive
Bright sunshine and a calm ocean with the same colour as the sky invite you to undertake a daytrip to Boduhithi Thila.
Being spoilt by a very good manta ray season there are still many more big fish to be found. Try for example a trip to Miyaru Faru to watch grey and whitetip reefsharks.
And to keep little divers happy we offer dive courses for children with special equipment for children.
If you are looking for interesting varied dive spots around an island with a personal and informal atmosphere Helengeli is the place to go. Specially in the coming summer because.....
For the next summer we have a special offer on Helengeli: From 16.05.10 until 26.06.10 we offer 20 % discount on all Dives and Dive Courses (excl. boat trips und Equipment)!
We hope to see you on Helengeli to show you our wonderful underwater world
Ocean Pro Team Helengeli
Dear Divers!
At the end of the year here some news from diver's paradise Helengeli.
In general we had a very nice summer. We just had a few rainy days which was also an advantage for a couple of our guests. Some of them got a new rain coat after 20 years or more!
We also had some changes in our dive team: Liene and Gio left for Ocean Pro Veligandu where Gio will become the new base leader. We wish them a successful time and say thank you for their good work here in Helengeli in the past year.
They are replaced by a new couple from Germany: Lars and Dörthe.
The young ladies from left: Dörthe, Giovanna, Manja. The old guys from left: Lars, Mike, Uwe.
The last months showed that every dive and every year is very different. Last year we reported a lot of manta rays at Fairy Tale. Unfortunally we didn't have too much luck this year and we have seen mantas only for a short time. Let us hope that the next season will be better.
But we had once an unforgettable dive with 15 of these giant rays at Asdu Canyon!.
Now we are waiting for the monsoon to change allowing us to visit Bodu Hithi Thila on full day excursions diving and snorkeling with mantas.
We already dived KKK and enjoyed big groups of eagle rays and many white tip reef sharks. Soon we will go to Myiaru Faru to see gray reef sharks
At Doris Cave we found a new cleaning station and in the overhangs we had many of different ghostpipe fish.
Hani Kandu Corner was really good with outgoing current: quite often we had a couple of Eagelrays in the blue water of the channel and at the overhang with the soft corals we saw quite often one or too grey reef sharks. Incredibly lucky have been the divers on the 16th December 09 ( as you can see in the picture below) !
Our first trip to the Wreck Erlangen was successful. At the wreck we had good visibility and at the second dive at Gaffaru Kuda Kandu we dove with Eagelrays white tip and grey reef sharks .
For the next world cup summer we have a special offer on Helengeli: From 16.05.10 until 26.06.10 we offer 20 % discount on all Dives and Dive Courses (excl. boat trips und Equipment)!
Special offer for Helengeli you will find on our Island webpage
www.helengeli.net
We wish you a marry Christmas and a happy new year 2010 !!!! Hopefully we see us again on Helengeli.....
Dear divers!
Even in Helengeli the winter season ends finally !
As you can see above we have been very busy again this high season!!
In the last 4 months Helengeli was simply at its best. We had just a few short rain showers and almost no waves. 90% of the time there was ingoing current offering fantastic visibility we didn't have for such a long time. In particular our channel dives were really fascinating! Our special dive spot "KKK" was a thrill: Apart from the usual white tip and grey reef sharks we encountered up to 25 eagle rays in flying formation and 5 silvertip reef sharks as well! Any dive at KKK was absolutely stunning!
Unfortunately "Miyaru Faru" our shark channel did not feature as many grey reef sharks this season but plenty of white tip reef sharks instead which were very interested in divers and were getting very close to them.
Generally the sharks were very busy this season: at Kuda Thila we found 4 baby white tip reef sharks under a small coral block!
There is also some very good news for all friends of the sharks: From now on reef shark fishing is banned in all the atolls! And by the end of this year the Maldivian government wants to prohibit all shark fishing so that also the big oceanic sharks will be protected. This announcement is definitely a step in the right direction and we hope that this will increase the number of shark encounters in the future.
The Maldives are participating in the "New 7 Wonders of Nature" competition. You could vote for this beautiful country on the following web page: www.new7wonders.com
The manta season at Bodu Hiti Thila was absolutely great this year! Every time we organized this full day trip to the west side of the atoll we encountered many mantas. We were even lucky to observe them doing their "honeymoon dance"! Sometimes they came so close we had to protect our heads! So hopefully we will have a lot of manta babies next season especially at our manta spot Fairy Tale.
Hani Kandu Thila is still one of our most beautiful dive spots with plenty of recovering hard corals, an amazing number of fish and as special guest since almost half a year two leaf fish.
Bodu Thila is also with ingoing current one of our highlights. But now we can not wait for the current to change so that we have the chance to meet the grey reef sharks at this top dive spot.
Maha Thila belongs too to our top five dive spots and is getting even more beautiful every year! Especially the top reef from 4 to 10 meter offers a great variety of hard coral so it is really nice to spend the last 15 minutes in shallow water. It is simply amazing and astonishing what nature can create in just 10 years! Some of you might remember the times after El Nino.
For all of you who didn't visit us in the last years here is another good reason to do so:
From 17.05.09 to 28.06.09 you get 20% discount on diving rates and courses (excluding boat trips and equipment)!
For more summer special offers contact your travel agent or check the Helengeli webpage:
We wish you happy Easter and hope to see you soon in Helengeli.......
Ladies from left: Liene, Giovanna und Manja ............ Gents from left: Uwe, Gio und Mike
Dear divers!
Just in time to the end of the year we have some news from "diver's paradies" in Helengeli.
In general we had a very good summer with only occassionally some drops of rain; but most of the time the sun was shining!
During EURO 2008 we were supporting our favourites Bodu Thila and Maha Thila but this summer an underdog won the title: Fairy Tale offered us fantastic Manta dives from end of July until the middle of October. Sometimes we encountered so many Mantas that we thought of introducing some traffic signs to avoid accidents!
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Our harbour sometimes also offers special encounters: we found some small bat fish which changed there appearance drastically in just a few weeks.
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almost invisible
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yes, this could be a fish
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here we are: a bat fish!
We have also been very busy this summer by changing our markers at the entry and exit points of our house reef. Now the markers are bright yellow with the number of the entry on it!
At the moment we are still waiting for high season to come with its perfect weather condition and ingoing blue water. As soon as the monsoon has chnged KKK and Myaru Faru offer fantastic dives with white-tip and grey reef sharks. We are also looking forward to visit Bodu Hithi Thila during the next months to dive with mantas and, hopefully, whale sharks too! Like last season we will also undertake day trips to our wreck, MS Erlangen. In January and February 08 we have been very lucky to meet the very rare Humphead Parrotfish there.
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Also Hani Kandu Thila surprised us this summer with three Leaf Fish; especially the very very rare red Leaf Fish excited all divers!
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Our dive team has changed a little too this summer: Liene and Gio are working in Helengeli since August and they settled very well in our team. They have been working for Ocean Pro in Veligandu before. After a one-year break Manja has come back to Helengeli! She spent some educational time in England and Canada; Learning what..? Exactly English and French !
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Our new team. In front (from left): Liene, Giovanna and Manja
behind (from left): Uwe, Gio und Mike
Last but not least two more very good news for you.:
1. We changed our discount system and from now on you get 10% from the 2nd, 15 % from the 4th and from the 8th visit 20 % discount on diving rates. This offer is valid on all Ocean Pro Diving Bases and naturally we will change your membercards accordingly for visits in the past.
2. An we will have a summer special next year: From 17.05.09 until 28.06.09 we offer 20 % discount on all Dives and Dive Courses (excl. boat trips und Equipment)!
We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2009 !!!! Hopefully we see you again on Helengeli.....
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Manja, Giovanna, Line, Gio, Mike and Uwe