Short Trip Report Kalkan Turkey

[colinpjenkins2]

Trip report Kalkan (Turkey) June 2004-07-02

I had originally been in contact with Dolphin with whom I had dived with previously over there but when I arrived the owner was in Istanbul sorting out problems with his new boat, however I was approached by an English couple Andrew and Jane asking if I was looking to dive. The clue was I had an Island Divers (Tenerife) T shirt on. They explained they and the owners brother were looking after the business at present and if I want to dive they could sort it out, cost would be £20 per day for two dives off the boat with lunch included as I had my own kit or £25 with their kit and if my wife wanted to tag along it was £8 for lunch and use of mask, fins ect. This was agreed and they picked me up next day from my hotel on time. The overall diving has improved vastly since I was last out in Kalkan 3 years ago when there was very little life. I had 5 day diving on various sites with max depth 27m. This include dives on to the Duchess of York wreck which is really just a bunch of plates sticking out of the sea bed but on the other side of the reef I could see down at 40m plus the wreck of the Sakarya which is featured in a report in Diver Dec 2003. The ship looked in a fair condition and Andrew said that they had dived it and it’s a fantastic dive. He also said that for the “right” people it was possible to arrange to dive it. It’s not for the inexperienced at it starts at 40m and goes down to 60m and its on air as no mixed gases are available. Over the 5 days I saw Octopus, lots of big Grouper, Trigger Fish, Tuna, Jacks, Barracuda, Turtle, Flying Gurnard (sp), some big Fire Worm, Moray, Scorpion Fish, plus lots of other stuff.
Would I recommend it? Well not for a dive holiday but to do some diving on holiday yes. The kit I saw on the boat was top class and a lot of it was new. Andrew and Jane were very hospitable and easy going but their practices were safe.
What about Kalkan, well its upmarket Turkey. No beach as such in the resort, but two beaches can be reached with the local “Dolmush”. One club only and several bars not too loud, the life is round the restaurants which are very good but not cheap for Turkey. Expect to pay from £25 for two with a bottle of reasonable wine the most we paid was £48 but that was with drinks before, bottle of wine, and drinks after and the food was top class.

PS same report on Divernet