Destinations
Loading...We welcome our first guest author Gary Ward, to tell us about his diving trip to Los Gigantes in Tenerife. If you also want to share an article or blog post about your favourite diving experience, just flick us an email to hello@divezone.net and we will be happy to publish your article!
Los Gigantes Dive Review
One of my favourite dive sites is one that is a little unassuming and not particularly well known. It’s a site at Los Gigantes, Tenerife which the locals call Los Chuchos. Los Chuchos, ‘The Dogs’, is what the locals call ‘The Stingrays’ and that is what this site is all about.
We dived with Los Gigantes Dive Centre and were fortunate enough to be the only ones on the dive boat due to diving early in the season. Our guide, Paul, a Brit who has made the island home, quickly got us loaded up and on our way. The short trip out to the dive site takes you along the base of the Los Gigantes cliffs, which are 2000ft sheer cliffs where molten rock was forced upwards into the sky, and then looks like its running back down, to create some dramatic cliffs. We also sailed past the local fish breeding nets, which is home to a small pod of Dolphins who seemed to enjoy playing in the sunshine near out boat.
Loaded in our boat, as well as all our dive gear, were two large bins of fish waste kindly donated by the restaurants along the marina next to the dive shop. These were tied down with the lids firmly on, as the smell when open was a bit pungent… but these would come in for good use later…
The site itself is close to the stone walls of Los Gigantes, and is a drop of about 20m (60ft) to a volcanic rocky bottom. It’s not a dramatic site, and there is not a great deal of ocean fauna to see, but all hell breaks loose when we drop the bins down to the ocean floor.
Paul took one of the bins into a small amphitheatre and carefully untied the lid, releasing the of the wish waste into the water. From nowhere we were suddenly surrounded by a throng of 5 or 6 Giant Atlantic Stingrays, another dozen Eagle ‘rays and almost every fish around the island. There was a feeding frenzy as the first bin’s contents were devoured in seconds and the rays started to circle around us looking for more. It was if they knew there was a second bin hiding somewhere….
We pulled the second bin into the amphitheatre and had the large ‘rays swimming all over us, nosing around, just knowing what was in this second bin, and you could almost see them salivating. The second bin was cracked open and we only just had time to get out of the way before the rush. For me it was a real adrenalin rush to be this close to so many big ‘rays and beat hands down the experience I had had at Stingray City in Grand Cayman. Some of the ‘rays would allow us to hand feed them, but most just kept out of our way.
We saw an Eagle Ray and an Octopus having a game of tug of war over a particularly tasty looking morsel. The octopus lost that one!
Once all the food was gone, the fish dispersed back into the blue, and the ‘rays continued to circle around us. Their belly’s full, they were prepared to put on a fantastic flying show, sweeping around and between us. In no time at all, were getting low on air and needed to start our ascent up the anchor line. As we hung around at the 5m (15ft) mark we could still see one or two of the Giants circling the amphitheatre hoping for another bin… another time perhaps….
Thank you to Gary Ward for this great review!
And you? Have you dived there? Or are you planning a diving trip to Los Gigantes? Write your feelings or questions in the comments below!
I love Diving with rays too… I am thinking about a diving trip to Tenerife. Thank you for your post ;-).
I hand feeded Rays in Tahiti it was really fun! Thank you for your nice report.