SeaLogEgypt · reef · intermediate
A dive centre's own shore entry onto the Hadaba wall, the near-vertical stretch of Umm Sid coast operators dive as Pinky Wall.
This pin is a dive centre's shore entry rather than an offshore feature with a name of its own. Anar Dive Club sits on El Fanar Street at the Dreams Beach Resort on the Hadaba coast of Sharm el Sheikh, and states that its shore dives go directly into two sites, Pinky Wall and Tower. The pin is about 0.9 km south-west of our Tower pin, and Pinky Wall is published at 27.87095 / 34.32318, roughly 0.75 km from here and described as just north of the Amphoras hotel in Ras Umm Sid. Between those two fixes the water this entry reaches is the Pinky Wall stretch of the Hadaba coast. That identification is ours, drawn from the positions and from the centre naming its own two shore sites, not a statement any single source makes.
What is unusual about this piece of coast is how narrow the coral plateau is. Instead of the broad shelf that runs along most of the Sharm shoreline, the reef table here ends almost immediately in an undulating wall that Camel Dive Club puts at 180 m, broken by chimneys and overhangs, and the listing Anar contributed to padi.com describes the same drop and gives the house reef an average working depth of about 15 m against a stated maximum of 42 m. The productive part is the top of it: Sharm Club puts the best scenery between roughly 15 and 21 m, where the crevices and overhangs carry the soft corals the site is named for. The pink alcyonarian growth is dense enough that Anar calls it one of the most concentrated on this part of the coast.
Getting in is the part to plan for. Sharm Club describes the Pinky Wall entry as a hike down a rocky ravine and then a short walk across the reef table before the drop; from a boat there is no mooring, so it has to be dived as a drift. Camel Dive Club rate it a full drift suitable for all levels and recommend it as a morning or mid-morning dive for the light on the wall, while Sharm Club's own read is intermediate to advanced given the depth and the vertical profile. Take the harder reading if you are choosing on the day.
The life is wall life rather than big-animal life. Sharm Club names anthias and sweepers massing on the coral, nudibranchs, moray eels with their cleaner shrimp, bluespotted stingrays and the occasional turtle. Occurrence records around this pin are consistent and add the usual Umm Sid assemblage: Red Sea surgeonfish, ringed tang and purple tang, Picasso and orange-lined and titan triggerfish, several parrotfish, blackspotted rubberlip, sea goldies, giant clams and Rueppell's wrasse. The tuna, jacks and reef sharks that appear on the padi.com listing come from that page's generic sightings block rather than from a description of this entry, and we have not carried them.
Shore entry through Anar Dive Club at the Dreams Beach Resort on El Fanar Street, Hadaba, Sharm el Sheikh. Sharm Club describes the Pinky Wall entry as a walk down a rocky ravine followed by a short walk over the reef table. The same stretch is also dived from a boat, but there is no mooring, so a boat has to run it as a drift.
Access to the site runs through a local operator.
The entry belongs to a dive centre inside a resort. We found no published statement about whether divers who are neither hotel guests nor customers of the centre may use it, so treat it as centre-controlled access and arrange it in advance.
A narrow reef table ending in a sheer face, with the light on the wall best in the morning to mid-morning according to Camel Dive Club, and the water moving enough that boats dive it as a drift.
On current: Sources put the same dive at different levels and the difference is worth carrying. Camel Dive Club describe Pinky's Wall as a full drift dive suitable for all diver levels and note that a boat has to drift it because there is no mooring; the listing Anar Dive Center contributed to padi.com calls the house reef fine for beginners and experienced divers alike; Sharm Club rates it intermediate to advanced because of the depth and the wall. Treat it as a wall with current on it. Depths also stack rather than agree: the drop itself is published at 180 m by Camel Dive Club and 'more than 180 m' on the Anar listing, but that is the wall, not the dive. The Anar listing gives an average of about 15 m and a maximum of 42 m, and Sharm Club puts the worthwhile scenery between roughly 15 and 21 m. We record 42 m as the ceiling of what the operator claims and treat the top 20 m as the actual dive.
It is the shore entry Anar Dive Club uses from the Dreams Beach Resort on El Fanar Street in Hadaba, Sharm el Sheikh. The club names its two shore sites as Pinky Wall and Tower, and this pin sits on the Pinky Wall stretch of the Umm Sid coast, about 0.9 km south-west of the Tower entry. It is a named access point onto a wall, not a separate reef.
The wall itself is published at more than 180 m, but that is the drop and not the dive. The listing Anar contributed to PADI gives an average working depth of about 15 m and a maximum of 42 m, and Sharm Club puts the best scenery between roughly 15 and 21 m. Plan the top 20 m and treat anything below as a deliberate choice.
Through the dive centre at the resort. Sharm Club describes the Pinky Wall entry as a hike down a rocky ravine followed by a short walk over the reef table before you reach the drop. It is not a walk-in sandy beach, so expect to carry kit over coral rock and to plan the exit as carefully as the entry.
We could not find a published answer. The entry is controlled by a dive centre inside a resort, so it is not open shore access in the way a public beach is. Contact Anar Dive Club before you turn up rather than assuming you can walk on.
The sources split. Camel Dive Club call Pinky's Wall a full drift dive suitable for all levels and note that a boat has to drift it because there is no mooring; the Anar listing says beginners and experienced divers alike; Sharm Club rates it intermediate to advanced because of the depth and the wall profile. Take the more cautious reading: it is a wall with water moving on it.
Soft coral is the point, dense pink alcyonarians filling the crevices and overhangs, which is where the Pinky name comes from. Sharm Club names anthias and sweepers on the coral, nudibranchs, moray eels with cleaner shrimp, bluespotted stingrays and occasional turtles. Records around this pin add Red Sea surgeonfish, purple and ringed tang, several triggerfish and parrotfish, sea goldies and giant clams.
Camel Dive Club recommend a morning or mid-morning dive, because that is when the light conditions on the wall are most favourable. On a vertical face with the interesting detail in overhangs and crevices, that matters more than it would on a plateau. There is no published seasonal preference for this entry specifically.
You can get over the reef table and look down the wall, and the top of the drop is the colourful part, so it is not pointless. But the entry is a scramble down a ravine and over coral rock, there is no shelter or mooring, and everything the site is known for sits below snorkelling depth. Naama Bay or a boat trip is a better snorkel.
| Species | How often | Records |
|---|---|---|
| Thalassoma rueppellii | occasional | 13 |
| Abudefduf vaigiensis | occasional | 12 |
| Acanthurus sohal | occasional | 11 |
| Scarus ferrugineus | occasional | 11 |
| Chaetodon auriga | occasional | 9 |
| Chaetodon austriacus | occasional | 9 |
| Ctenochaetus striatus | occasional | 9 |
| Heniochus intermedius | occasional | 9 |
| Arothron diadematus | occasional | 9 |
| Zebrasoma desjardinii | occasional | 8 |
| Chaetodon fasciatus | occasional | 7 |
| Alticus magnusi | occasional | 7 |
| Hipposcarus harid | occasional | 7 |
| Rhinecanthus assasi | occasional | 7 |
| Pomacentrus sulfureus | occasional | 7 |
| Acanthopleura vaillantii | occasional | 6 |
| Chlorurus sordidus | occasional | 6 |
| Amblyglyphidodon indicus | occasional | 6 |
| Fistularia commersonii | occasional | 6 |
| Monotaxis grandoculis | occasional | 6 |
| Cephalopholis argus | occasional | 6 |
| Pycnochromis dimidiatus | occasional | 6 |
| Pygoplites diacanthus | occasional | 6 |
| Chaetodon paucifasciatus | occasional | 6 |
| Plectorhinchus gaterinus | occasional | 5 |
| Taeniura lymma | occasional | 5 |
| Scarus niger | occasional | 5 |
| Cheilinus lunulatus | occasional | 5 |
| Chaetodon semilarvatus | occasional | 5 |
| Coris aygula | occasional | 5 |
| Naso elegans | occasional | 5 |
| Mulloidichthys vanicolensis | occasional | 5 |
| Tridacna maxima | occasional | 5 |
| Neoniphon sammara | occasional | 5 |
| Balistapus undulatus | occasional | 5 |
| Ostracion cyanurus | rare | 4 |
| Chromis flavaxilla | rare | 4 |
| Epinephelus tauvina | rare | 4 |
| Myripristis murdjan | rare | 4 |
| Parupeneus forsskali | rare | 4 |
| Pseudanthias squamipinnis | rare | 4 |
| Acanthurus nigrofuscus | rare | 4 |
| Balistoides viridescens | rare | 4 |
| Cetoscarus bicolor | rare | 4 |
| Chlorurus gibbus | rare | 4 |
| Zebrasoma xanthurum | rare | 4 |
| Paracirrhites forsteri | rare | 4 |
| Parupeneus cyclostomus | rare | 3 |
| Grapsus tenuicrustatus | rare | 3 |
| Priacanthus hamrur | rare | 3 |
| Scarus frenatus | rare | 3 |
| Amphiprion bicinctus | rare | 3 |
| Abudefduf sexfasciatus | rare | 3 |
| Epinephelus fasciatus | rare | 3 |
| Chaetodon melannotus | rare | 3 |
| Chaetodon lineolatus | rare | 3 |
| Cantherhines pardalis | rare | 3 |
| Arothron hispidus | rare | 3 |
| Rhincodon typus | rare | 2 |
| Siganus luridus | rare | 2 |
A vertical fault in the Hadaba wall. You dive the top 30 m of a canyon that carries on past 120.
A sand slope off Sharm's southern coast where the cargo of a 17th-century Turkish ship still lies in the coral heads.
The slope 500 m northeast of Tower: a sandy shelf at 12 m with coral pinnacles on it, and gorgonians along the drop-off edge around 20 m.
A sandy plateau south of Amphoras, drifted north or south depending on the current, with glassfish pinnacles and rays parked on the sand.
A shore drift off the Waterfalls jetty on the Hadaba coast: reef top around 10-12 m, sand sloping to a drop-off at 22 to 25 m.
A dive centre's own name for its jetty entry on the Hadaba wall, a few hundred metres up the reef from Ras Um Sid.
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