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Mgarr ix-Xini · Gozo

Blat ta' Bologna

A proper deep wall and drop-off just outside Mgarr ix-Xini, falling past fifty metres with big fallen boulders strewn along its foot. The grown-up dive of this stretch of south coast.

Advanced🪸 Reef🧱 Wall30 to 50 mShore access: hardPopularity: mediumAlso called Blat ta' Bologna, Bologna Reef, Mgarr ix-Xini Reef
Plan this dive

Sea conditions

84

Good right now

Some chop (0.3 m SE)

Forecast for the site, updated 01:45 AM

Waves
0.3 m
from SE
Wind
n/a
Swell
0.2 m
5 s period
Sea temp
28 °C

Next 7 days

Today🌤️66 0.6 m
0 N
Sat🌤️79 0.4 m
0 N
Sun🌤️83 0.4 m
0 N
Mon🌤️94 0.2 m
0 N
Tue🌤️100 0.4 m
0 N
Wed🌤️94 0.7 m
0 N
Thu🌤️61 0.6 m
0 N

Exposed to wind and swell from: S (180°), SE (135°), SW (225°), E (90°). Open south coast, so any southerly component puts swell on the site. Local notes call it generally sheltered but warn about surge from the southeast. Northerly and northwesterly weather leaves it calm, which is when boats run it. Best season: May to October, with the best visibility and the calmest southerlies from late summer into autumn. Winter southerlies shut it down regularly..

The dive

Everything that makes Mgarr ix-Xini gentle stops at the mouth of the inlet. Blat ta' Bologna sits just outside on the open coast between the bay and Ras in-Newwiela, and here the seabed gives up pretending. A reef shoulder in the twenties rolls over into a wall and drop-off that keeps going past fifty metres, with house-sized blocks piled at its base where the cliff has collapsed over the millennia.

The diving is classic Maltese deep-wall stuff: keep the rock on one shoulder, run the contour, and let the topography do the work. Crevices and undercuts in the wall hold groupers and morays, and the boulder field below is riddled with dark gaps where lobsters wave their antennae at you. Out in the blue, amberjack and the occasional barracuda cruise past, especially early in the day. Visibility on this coast is usually excellent, which makes the drop-off feel even bigger than it is.

This is not a beginner site and depth is the whole risk profile. Average working depth is twenty-five to thirty metres, narcosis is real, and gas and no-stop time disappear quickly. Most clubs run it as a boat dive with a planned maximum, a nitrox or trimix fill for those going deeper, and a shallow stop back up on the reef shoulder. Shore diving it from Mgarr ix-Xini is possible for strong, experienced teams but it is a serious swim and adds a lot of workload to an already demanding dive.

If you want one dive on Gozo's south coast that reminds you the Mediterranean has depth in it, this is a good candidate.

  • Genuine wall and drop-off past fifty metres
  • Huge collapsed boulders with lobster and grouper holes
  • Typically superb south coast visibility
  • Blue water cruisers passing offshore
  • A serious dive only minutes from a beginner bay

Typical plan

Boat drop on the reef shoulder, descend to the lip at around twenty-five metres and run the wall with the rock on your left, aiming for a planned maximum of thirty to forty metres depending on training and gas. Turn on thirds or when no-stop time gets thin, work back up the wall and finish the dive on the shoulder between fifteen and six metres where there is still plenty to look at. Nitrox 28 to 32 makes a real difference here, and anything beyond forty metres wants proper technical planning, staged deco gas and a delayed SMB for the ascent.

What the bottom looks like

0214358m🤿12345210 m from entry
  1. 1Reef shoulder before the edge16 m deep · 60 m out
  2. 2Lip of the main drop-off25 m deep · 95 m out
  3. 3Vertical wall with crevices and undercuts35 m deep · 125 m out
  4. 4Collapsed blocks at the foot of the wall48 m deep · 160 m out
  5. 5Sand and rubble slope running deeper56 m deep · 200 m out
Cartoon cross-section along the usual route from Boat drop directly over the reef, or a long shore transit from the Mgarr ix-Xini beach. Depths are approximate.

Rock reef and vertical limestone wall giving way to a boulder-strewn slope over sand below fifty metres.

Who you might meet

Getting in and staying safe

Realistically a boat dive. Clubs and centres run out of Mgarr harbour or drop divers straight onto the reef from an inflatable, which keeps the working depth and the swim sensible. A shore approach from the Mgarr ix-Xini pebble beach is done, but it means a long transit out of the inlet before the dive even starts and an equally long return with reduced gas, so it is only for fit, well-practised teams. Parking, toilets and a kiosk are at the beach; there is nothing at the site itself.

  • Depth: easy to exceed plan on a wall that keeps dropping
  • Nitrogen narcosis and rapid gas consumption at 30 m and beyond
  • Surge from the southeast can make the shallower shoulder uncomfortable
  • Current can run along the drop-off, particularly around the point
  • Long swim and no easy exit if you shore dive it
  • Boat traffic on the surface, deploy a delayed SMB before ascending
  • Decompression obligation builds fast if you linger deep

A bit of history

No wrecks and no legends, just geology. The wall is the underwater continuation of the tall Ta' Ċenċ cliffs, a slab of Upper Coralline Limestone sitting over softer beds that erode out beneath it, which is why the face keeps shedding blocks onto the slope below. The same process is what built the boulder fields divers now swim through.

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Further reading: Calypso Sub-Aqua Club site notes · divinginfo.mt Gozo dive site listing · MaltaDives, Mgarr ix-Xini area