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Malta

Merkanti Reef

A twin ridge of reef breaking almost to the surface off St. Julian's, riddled with overhangs and crevices, divable shallow all day or reached by boat from the hotel strip.

Open Water🪸 Reef10 to 20 mShore access: mediumPopularity: lowAlso called Divewise House Reef, Dragonara Reef, Mercanti Reef
Plan this dive

Sea conditions

100

Excellent right now

Flat, sheltered and calm

Forecast for the site, updated 02:18 AM

Waves
n/a
Wind
3 km/h
SSW, gusts 6
Swell
n/a
Sea temp
n/a
air 25 °C

Next 7 days

Today☁️100 ? m
11 SW
Sat☁️100 ? m
11 SSW
Sun🌦️92 ? m
5 E
Mon☁️100 ? m
9 WNW
Tue☁️99 ? m
17 NW
Wed🌤️92 ? m
22 E
Thu🌤️100 ? m
10 NNE

Sunrise 06:46, sunset 19:04

Exposed to wind and swell from: N (0°), NE (45°), E (90°), SE (135°). This coast faces north east, so it is comfortable in a westerly or south westerly and choppy in anything from the north or east. The reef tops break the surface, so even moderate swell makes the shallow section surgy. Best season: May to November. Early morning is strongly preferable in high summer, before the watersports fleet is awake..

The dive

Merkanti is the reef that hides in plain sight. It sits a couple of hundred metres off one of the busiest stretches of Maltese coastline, between the Dragonara and the Hilton, and most people swimming above it have no idea there is anything down there worth a tank. There is: two parallel ridges running along the shore, both rising almost to the surface, with a canyon between them and an enormous amount of small structure to poke through.

The joy of the place is that it does not need depth. You can spend an entire dive between six and twelve metres, working along the overhangs and crevices, and never feel short-changed. Cuttlefish sit in the sandy pockets, octopus fill the crannies, bream hang in the canyon and morays own the deeper cracks. If you want more, the ground outside the outer ridge drops past twenty metres onto sand.

Getting there is the decision. Boat is the civilised option and most dive centres do it that way. From the shore it is a long haul: the entry is in the small bay near the Merkanti Beach Club, and the reef is roughly three hundred metres out, so you are either surface swimming a long way or navigating underwater and hoping your compass work is honest. Plenty of people do it and consider the navigation part of the fun.

What you must not forget is a delayed surface marker buoy. This is jet ski and speedboat territory in summer, the reef tops out shallow enough that you will be under the traffic, and a marker is the only thing between your hood and somebody's propeller.

  • Two parallel reef ridges with a canyon to swim between them
  • Overhangs and crannies packed with octopus, cuttlefish and moray
  • A full dive possible without passing twelve metres
  • Marker pole on the outer ridge as a handy navigation aid
  • Surprisingly wild ground right off the St. Julian's hotel strip

Typical plan

From a boat, drop onto the outer ridge near the marker pole, work the canyon between the ridges at ten to twelve metres, then finish along the inner ridge in the shallows. From the shore, enter at the Merkanti Beach Club bay, snorkel out on the surface to save gas, then descend and navigate roughly three hundred metres out, staying at six to ten metres, and use the canyon as your return corridor. Sixty minutes on a single 12 litre of air is entirely achievable at these depths. Carry a DSMB and deploy it before you ascend, every time.

What the bottom looks like

081622m🤿123456420 m from entry
  1. 1Posidonia patches on the approach9 m deep · 120 m out
  2. 2Inner ridge, tops nearly to the surface3 m deep · 180 m out
  3. 3Canyon between the two ridges12 m deep · 205 m out
  4. 4Overhangs and crevices along the canyon walls10 m deep · 215 m out
  5. 5Outer ridge with the marker pole2 m deep · 245 m out
  6. 6Sand beyond the outer ridge20 m deep · 360 m out
Cartoon cross-section along the usual route from Small bay between the Westin Dragonara and the Hilton, near Merkanti Beach Club, approximate. Depths are approximate.

Two rocky ridges heavily encrusted with growth, separated and surrounded by sand and patchy Posidonia.

Who you might meet

Getting in and staying safe

Two ways in. By boat is straightforward, with a short run from St. Julian's or Sliema and a drop directly onto the reef, and most centres choose this. From the shore, park in the St. Julian's hotel area (paid and painful in summer) and enter at the small bay between the Westin Dragonara and the Hilton, near Merkanti Beach Club. From there it is roughly three hundred metres to the reef, so plan either a surface swim in your snorkel or a compass run underwater. There is a marker pole on the outer ridge that helps enormously once you find it. Cafes, toilets and everything else are in abundance, this being St. Julian's.

  • Heavy boat, jet ski and watersports traffic, especially in summer
  • A DSMB is essential given the shallow reef tops
  • Long surface swim or committed navigation from the shore entry
  • Small overhangs and crevices that tempt divers into tight spots
  • Fishing line and hooks caught on the reef
  • Currents can run along the outer ridge
  • Jellyfish in late summer
  • Difficult and expensive parking near the entry

A bit of history

Merkanti has a mixed natural and artificial pedigree: large concrete blocks were placed here as a breakwater measure and have long since been colonised, so what looks like plain reef is partly structures the sea has adopted. It also has a grim moment in its record. In 1955 the passenger ferry Star of Malta ran onto the reef, with two lives lost. Environmental authorities classify the area as ecologically important, and a 2005 survey put Merkanti among the thirty most visited dive sites in the Maltese islands.

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Further reading: Malta Dive Sites: Merkanti Reef · Wikipedia: Merkanti Reef · Malta Tourism Authority Dive Site Report 18: Merkanti Reef · PADI dive site listing: Merkanti Reef