SeaLogEgypt · reef
The bay next door to Mangrove Bay, dived along its northern outer side over a wide coral garden broken by blocks, then finished inside the bay.
Sharm Taahtany — Sharm Tachtani in the one dive centre's own spelling — is the bay adjacent to Mangrove Bay on the undeveloped coast between El Quseir and Marsa Alam. It is a boat dive, about 15 minutes by speedboat from the Mangrove Bay jetty, and the centre that runs it describes the dive in a single line: the northern outer side carries a very wide coral garden shot through with blocks, and you can finish the dive by coming into the bay. That is the whole of what is published about this site anywhere we could find. There is no depth figure, no current figure and no visibility figure for it.
The name is half of a pair. The house reef at Mangrove Bay itself is Sharm Fugani, and the two bays are named as upper and lower neighbours. Fugani is the developed one: a large sheltered bay with jetty access, blocks and a coral wall on the north side, a big coral garden with small plateaus on the south, diveable in almost any weather and used for beginners and snorkellers. Taahtany is the same coastline without the hotel on it — which is why the operator sells it as somewhere with several stretches of reef to dive along rather than as one named route.
The occurrence records around this pin read as a sheltered sandy bay rather than an exposed reef, and they are consistent with the operator's coral-garden-over-sand description. Heavybeak and Sinai parrotfish, sailfin tang, masked and stripebelly puffers, yellow boxfish and devil firefish lead the list; behind them are a set of animals that only live on soft ground — blue-and-red-spotted goby, ninebar prawn-goby, candystick goby, spinecheek goby and blackfin dartfish in their burrows, banded pipefish, blue-spotted ribbontail rays, and a Red Sea land hermit crab picked up at the shoreline. Twinspot snapper, lined butterflyfish, greasy grouper and clown wrasse cover the harder patches, and mono is there too, which is a fish of shallow sheltered inshore water.
Set expectations accordingly. This is a lightly documented bay on a quiet coast, dived as an outing from one resort's dive centre, not a site with a reputation. If you want a specific profile, ask at the briefing, because we could not source one.
Boat only, about 15 minutes by speedboat from the dive centre at the Mangrove Bay hotel, which is the operator we found running it. There is no road access, no beach entry and nothing at the bay. The same centre's other trips from this base run out to Maheleg at about 15 minutes, Erg Lassal at about 40 and Erg Monika at about 45, which gives you the scale of the coast this sits on.
Access to the site runs through a local operator.
March to May and September to November are the settled windows on this coast: the best visibility of the year and water warm enough to be comfortable without the heat of late summer. Winter drops the water toward 21 to 23 C and brings the northerly wind, which matters here because the site is a 15-minute open-water speedboat run and the dive is worked on the outside of the bay before turning in.
Unrecorded for this bay specifically. On this stretch of coast the water runs roughly 18 to 28 C across the year, visibility is generally good and is at its best in spring and autumn, and the bays are sheltered enough that the neighbouring house reef is diveable in almost all weather. Whether this bay behaves the same way depends on how open its mouth is, which we could not establish.
On current: Nothing is published about current, depth or visibility at Sharm Taahtany. The one description says the dive can be finished by coming into the bay, which is what you do on a coast where the outside carries flow and the bay does not, but that is an inference from a sentence rather than a measurement. For scale on this stretch, the neighbouring bay's house reef logs an average depth of about 19 m with divers recording between 15 and 32 m, water between 18 and 28 C across the year and current of roughly a knot. Those are the neighbour's numbers, not this site's, and we have left every numeric field here blank rather than borrow them.
Best months: Mar, Apr, May, Sep, Oct, Nov
It is the bay next to Mangrove Bay on the undeveloped coast between El Quseir and Marsa Alam. The dive centre at the Mangrove Bay hotel calls it the neighbouring bay and reaches it in about 15 minutes by speedboat. There is no road access and nothing on the shore, so in practice you get there on that centre's boat.
Nobody publishes a figure, and we have left the field blank rather than invent one. The only description of the site is a single line from one dive centre, which says the northern outer side has a wide coral garden broken by blocks and that the dive is finished by coming into the bay. For scale, the neighbouring bay's house reef averages around 19 m with divers logging 15 to 32 m — but those are its numbers, not this site's.
As described by the one operator that runs it: you work the northern outside of the bay over a very wide coral garden with coral blocks scattered through it, then finish the dive by coming into the bay itself. That is a standard shape for this coast — the outside carries whatever flow there is, and the bay is the sheltered end where you off-gas and look at small things.
No. Sharm Fugani is the house reef of the Mangrove Bay hotel — a large sheltered bay entered off a jetty, with blocks and a coral wall on its north side and a coral garden on its south, explicitly described as good for beginners and snorkellers. Sharm Taahtany is the next bay along, reached by boat, and the two names read as a pair, upper and lower. Our catalogue carries Mangrove Bay as a separate pin 3.7 km away.
Coral garden and soft-ground life rather than big animals. Occurrence records here are led by heavybeak and Sinai parrotfish, sailfin tang, masked and stripebelly puffers, yellow boxfish and devil firefish, with a strong set of sand dwellers behind them — shrimp gobies and dartfish in their burrows, banded pipefish, blue-spotted ribbontail rays — plus twinspot snapper, lined butterflyfish, greasy grouper and clown wrasse over the blocks.
There is no shore access, so it would have to be off the dive boat, and no source publishes a shallow profile for the bay. If snorkelling is what you want on this coast, the neighbouring Mangrove Bay is the answer instead: a big sheltered bay with an easy jetty entry, described by its own dive centre as suiting beginners and snorkellers and diveable in almost any weather.
March to May and September to November give the settled seas and the clearest water on this coast. Water on this stretch runs roughly 18 to 28 C across the year, so winter means a proper wetsuit. Season matters more than usual here because the site is a 15-minute open-water speedboat run and the dive is worked on the exposed outside of the bay before turning in.
| Species | How often | Records |
|---|---|---|
| Chlorurus gibbus | occasional | 8 |
| Zebrasoma desjardinii | occasional | 7 |
| Arothron diadematus | occasional | 6 |
| Ostracion cubicum | occasional | 6 |
| Pterois miles | occasional | 6 |
| Cryptocentrus caeruleopunctatus | occasional | 6 |
| Taeniura lymma | occasional | 6 |
| Arothron hispidus | occasional | 5 |
| Chlorurus genazonatus | occasional | 5 |
| Amphiprion bicinctus | rare | 4 |
| Paracirrhites forsteri | rare | 4 |
| Corythoichthys flavofasciatus | rare | 4 |
| Epinephelus tauvina | rare | 4 |
| Chaetodon semilarvatus | rare | 4 |
| Epinephelus fasciatus | rare | 3 |
| Chaetodon austriacus | rare | 3 |
| Rhinecanthus assasi | rare | 3 |
| Flavocaranx bajad | rare | 3 |
| Pione mussae | rare | 3 |
| Pygoplites diacanthus | rare | 3 |
| Coris aygula | rare | 3 |
| Monodactylus argenteus | rare | 3 |
| Mulloidichthys flavolineatus | rare | 3 |
| Neoniphon sammara | rare | 3 |
| Parapercis hexophtalma | rare | 3 |
| Cryptocentrus cryptocentrus | rare | 2 |
| Callyspongia crassa | rare | 2 |
| Chaetodon fasciatus | rare | 2 |
| Chaetodon lineolatus | rare | 2 |
| Chromis weberi | rare | 2 |
| Coenobita scaevola | rare | 2 |
| Fistularia commersonii | rare | 2 |
| Grammistes sexlineatus | rare | 2 |
| Heniochus intermedius | rare | 2 |
| Lutjanus bohar | rare | 2 |
| Oplopomus oplopomus | rare | 2 |
| Plagiotremus tapeinosoma | rare | 2 |
| Pomacentrus trilineatus | rare | 2 |
| Vanderhorstia delagoae | rare | 2 |
| Acanthurus gahhm | rare | 2 |
| Acanthurus sohal | rare | 2 |
| Arothron stellatus | rare | 2 |
| Canthigaster margaritata | rare | 2 |
| Dascyllus abudafur | rare | 2 |
| Naso elegans | rare | 2 |
| Naso unicornis | rare | 2 |
| Ptereleotris evides | rare | 2 |
| Siganus argenteus | rare | 2 |
| Myripristis murdjan | rare | 2 |
| Siganus stellatus | rare | 2 |
| Chelonaplysilla violacea | rare | 1 |
| Sphyraena obtusata | rare | 1 |
| Synapta maculata | rare | 1 |
| Aluterus scriptus | rare | 1 |
| Echeneis naucrates | rare | 1 |
| Hemiramphus far | rare | 1 |
| Diodon hystrix | rare | 1 |
| Hyrtios erectus | rare | 1 |
| Octopus cyanea | rare | 1 |
| Nerita sanguinolenta | rare | 1 |
A jetty, a sheltered bay and a reef that works in weather that closes the rest of the coast.
A quiet lagoon that opens into coral slopes - the site that still works when the coast is windy.
A name on the map south of El Quseir with no published dive behind it.
The south end of one resort house reef: walk in beside the jetty, turn left, sand and coral blocks giving way to a drop-off.
The northern end of one long fringing reef in Ras Allasad bay, with its own entry point reached by the dive centre's shuttle.
A hotel jetty, a reef straight off it, and almost no published numbers.
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