L'Ahrax Point · Malta

Tunnel

The doorway into the Aħrax inland sea. A short rock passage, dark from outside and glowing blue once you are in it, shallow enough that snorkellers can do it on one breath.

Open Water🕳️ Cave🪸 Reef7 to 18 mShore access: mediumPopularity: mediumAlso called Coral Lagoon Tunnel, Dragonara Tunnel, L'Aħrax Point Tunnel

Plan this dive

Sea conditions

100

Excellent right now

Flat, sheltered and calm

Forecast for the site, updated 02:29 AM

Waves: n/a
Wind: 4 km/h; S, gusts 8
Swell: n/a
Sea temp: n/a; air 25 °C

Next 7 days

Today☁️100 ? m
14 SW

Sat☁️100 ? m
13 SSW

Sun🌦️92 ? m
5 ENE

Mon☁️100 ? m
13 WNW

Tue☁️95 ? m
20 NW

Wed🌤️92 ? m
22 E

Thu🌤️100 ? m
10 NNE

Sunrise 06:47, sunset 19:05

Exposed to wind and swell from: NW (315°), N (0°), NE (45°), E (90°). The entrance faces the open north, so swell from that half of the compass funnels straight into the passage and makes it genuinely unpleasant. Go on a southerly or south easterly when the sea at the point is flat, and the transit is effortless. Best season: June to October. Midday sun is best for the light show, and late summer gives the warmest water inside the lagoon..

The dive

From the open sea the entrance looks like a bad idea: a black slot in the rock somewhere around ten or eleven metres, with the reef wall rising above it. Swim into it and the whole thing flips. Within a few metres the passage lifts towards the surface, the walls start throwing back light from the lagoon beyond, and by the time you are halfway through you are looking at a blue and green window ahead of you.

Because the roof breaks the surface in places, this is one of the few overhead-ish features in Malta that a snorkeller can honestly enjoy. On scuba it is a thirty second transit, but nobody swims it in thirty seconds. Everybody stops, rolls onto their back and watches the bubbles spread out under the rock. The walls are dense with tube worms, sponges and cup corals, and the sheltered water inside sits a degree or two warmer than the open sea, which encourages the whole community.

The dive normally runs as a loop: reef outside, tunnel in, a circuit of the lagoon with a surface stop under the collapsed roof, then back out and along the reef to eighteen metres or so. It is a beginner site by depth and a photographer's site by content, which is an unusual combination.

Short, bright passage that works on scuba and on a single breath
Walls plastered with tube worms, sponges and cup corals
Water inside noticeably warmer than the open sea
Natural loop dive: reef, tunnel, lagoon, reef again

Typical plan

Drop on the reef outside, run out to eighteen metres for the first ten minutes while your gas is plentiful, then work back in to the tunnel mouth at eleven metres, transit slowly with a torch, and spend the back half of the dive between two and six metres in the lagoon. Fifty to sixty minutes on a single twelve litre with no deco concerns. Air is fine, and a wide angle lens earns its keep.

What the bottom looks like

1Reef shelf leading to the entrance7 m deep · 55 m out
2Seaward mouth of the tunnel11 m deep · 100 m out
3Mid passage, roof rising towards the surface8 m deep · 118 m out
4Exit into the lagoon3 m deep · 152 m out
5Collapse debris on the lagoon floor5 m deep · 175 m out
6Reef stepping down outside14 m deep · 250 m out
7Sand and seagrass at the reef foot18 m deep · 290 m out

Cartoon cross-section along the usual route from Rock shelf below the White Tower headland. Depths are approximate.

Smooth scoured limestone through the passage, with rockfall and coarse sand on the lagoon floor and seagrass patches outside the reef.

Who you might meet

Getting in and staying safe

Shore divers park on the open ground near the White Tower at the end of the Armier track, then walk about a hundred and fifty metres over rough limestone to the shelf. From the water it is roughly ten minutes of finning to reach the tunnel entrance, which is why most centres prefer a boat drop straight onto the reef above it. No ladders, no steps, no facilities beyond the seasonal kiosks at Armier.

Surge through the passage in any northerly swell, which can push you into the walls
Low roof in places, so trim and buoyancy matter more than usual
Snorkellers and swimmers dropping through the lagoon above you
Sharp limestone and urchins on the tunnel walls
Long swim from shore before the dive even starts
Small boats entering the lagoon in summer
Slippery rock shelf on exit

A bit of history

The tunnel and the lagoon behind it are the same story: a sea cave cut into Upper Coralline limestone by wave action, whose inner roof eventually collapsed and left an open shaft to the sky. The tunnel is the surviving seaward stretch of the original cave. It is often described locally as a miniature version of Gozo's Inland Sea at Dwejra, formed by the same process on a much smaller scale.