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Xlendi Bay · Gozo

Xlendi Tunnel

A 70 metre natural passage bored clean through the north headland of Xlendi Bay, shallow enough that you can pop your head up inside it and bright enough to photograph without a torch. For a lot of divers it is the first time they swim into rock and come out somewhere else entirely.

Open Water🕳️ Cave6 to 10 mShore access: hardPopularity: mediumAlso called Xlendi Cave, Xlendi Tunnel Cave
Plan this dive

Sea conditions

90

Excellent right now

Flat, sheltered and calm

Forecast for the site, updated 01:33 AM

Waves
0.3 m
from SE
Wind
8 km/h
SSW, gusts 14
Swell
0.2 m
5 s period
Sea temp
28 °C
air 27 °C

Next 7 days

Today🌦️58 0.6 m
13 SW
Sat☁️79 0.4 m
14 SSW
Sun🌦️83 0.4 m
8 ENE
Mon☁️94 0.2 m
15 NW
Tue☁️70 0.4 m
26 NW
Wed🌤️97 0.7 m
22 E
Thu🌤️100 0.6 m
10 NNE

Sunrise 06:47, sunset 19:06

Exposed to wind and swell from: SW (225°), W (270°), S (180°). The bay is tucked between cliffs and is calm most of the year, but a southwesterly puts swell straight into the mouth and shuts it down. Avoid the day after heavy rain, when runoff turns the inner bay milky. Best season: May to November, with the clearest water from September into early November..

The dive

Xlendi's tunnel is the gentlest introduction to overhead diving anywhere in Gozo, and it cheats in the nicest way: the roof is cracked in several places, so shafts of daylight drop in along the route and you are never really in the dark. The bay-side mouth opens at about 5 metres, a ledge lifts you to 3 metres just inside, and once you are over the tumble of boulders the floor settles to around 8 metres of smooth stone and shingle.

Getting there is half the dive. You kit up on the concrete platform on the south shore, drop in, and cross the bay with the headland on your right. The crossing is shallow, no more than 10 metres at its deepest, and it runs over patches of Posidonia and pale sand that make a perfectly decent warm-up in their own right.

Pop out the seaward end and the water changes character: cleaner, bluer, a proper open coast. Turn left along the cliff face and you are on Xlendi Reef, which is why most people plan the two as one dive rather than two. The tunnel walls themselves are worth a slow pass, encrusted with golden zoanthids, red sponges and fussy little nudibranchs that reward anyone willing to hover and squint.

One honest warning: after heavy rain or a blow, the bay silts up and finding the entrance turns into a guessing game. Save it for a settled day and the light show is the whole reason you came.

  • Seventy metres of passage with daylight pouring through roof cracks
  • Air space inside, so it never feels like a committed cave dive
  • One of the best photo backdrops in Gozo at only 8 metres
  • Links straight onto Xlendi Reef for a two-in-one dive
  • Sheltered enough for a first cave experience on a course

Typical plan

Giant stride from the south platform, drop to 8 metres and cross the bay on a northwesterly heading, keeping clear of boats above. Find the mouth at 5 metres, ease over the ledge and boulders, then take your time through the passage at 6 to 8 metres, pausing where the light shafts come in. Exit seaward, turn left and follow the cliff at 10 to 15 metres along the reef for as long as gas allows, then reverse the crossing. A single 12 litre of air is plenty; reckon on 45 to 55 minutes and a maximum around 12 metres.

What the bottom looks like

04912m🤿1234567320 m from entry
  1. 1Posidonia patches across the bay floor10 m deep · 100 m out
  2. 2Bay-side mouth of the tunnel5 m deep · 200 m out
  3. 3Shallow ledge just inside, good for a breather3 m deep · 215 m out
  4. 4Boulder tumble mid-tunnel8 m deep · 240 m out
  5. 5Cracks in the ceiling letting daylight through7 m deep · 262 m out
  6. 6Seaward exit onto the open coast6 m deep · 285 m out
  7. 7Cliff face leading left towards Xlendi Reef12 m deep · 320 m out
Cartoon cross-section along the usual route from Concrete dive platform with metal steps, south side of Xlendi Bay. Depths are approximate.

Smooth water-polished rock and shingle through the passage, giving way to boulders, sand and Posidonia across the bay.

Who you might meet

Getting in and staying safe

Drive down into Xlendi village and park along the promenade or in the bays near the head of the inlet, which fills up fast in summer. Kit up at the concrete dive platform on the south side, reached on foot along the waterfront path; metal steps drop you into the water and are usually lifted out over winter, in which case it becomes a giant stride and a ladder-free exit. Cafes, bars and public toilets are a two minute walk back in the village, so it is an easy site to combine with lunch.

  • Boat and swimmer traffic crossing the bay; stay deep or tow an SMB
  • Visibility collapses after rain or heavy swell, making the tunnel mouth hard to find
  • Surge inside the passage when there is any sea running
  • Silt stirred by fins in the narrower section
  • Slippery platform and steps when wet
  • Overhead psychology: short, but still a ceiling for nervous divers

A bit of history

The passage is a sea-worn fault in the Upper Coralline limestone that caps this stretch of Gozo's southwest coast, widened over millennia by swell forcing water through a weakness in the headland. Xlendi Bay itself sits below a seventeenth century watchtower and has been a fishing inlet for centuries, long before anyone thought to swim through the rock for fun.

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Further reading: Malta Dives, Xlendi Tunnel · Atlantis Gozo, Xlendi Cave and Reef · Blue Waters Dive Cove, Xlendi Bay and Tunnel · PADI dive site, Xlendi Bay