Off the beach in front of the dive centre, Gili Air
Turtle Point
Our house reef, three metres off the beach — and the reason the dive centre sits where it does.
Off the beach in front of the dive centre, Gili Air
Our house reef, three metres off the beach — and the reason the dive centre sits where it does.
Turtle Point is Moana's house reef. The dive centre sits on it, so this is the one site that needs no boat at all: you gear up at the shop, walk down the beach and swim out over water that is barely three metres deep.
From there the reef slopes away gently to about twelve metres — anemone gardens and coral heads set in pale sand, with enough space between them that somebody on their first ever dive can hover, look around and take their time. Nothing here demands anything of you.
And it earns its name. Green and hawksbill turtles are on this reef on nearly every dive, grazing the shallow corals or resting on the sand, untroubled by divers who keep their distance.
What you come for
Twelve metres is the maximum depth of a Try Scuba dive, which is why almost every first dive at Moana happens here: the site never takes you deeper than the limit you are allowed to reach.
Certified divers dive it too — for a relaxed second dive of the day, or simply because a good turtle reef does not stop being good once you have a card.
We see this reef every day, in every light and every condition, and it still produces turtles. Having it thirty seconds from the tank room is the quiet luxury of this dive centre.
The same for every site on this list.
Diving works all year here. April to October is the dry season and gives the clearest water, with September, October, May and June the sweet spot; July and August are the busiest. November to March brings plankton and less visibility, and with it a better chance of something big passing through.
Small groups, four divers to a guide, and a crew that picks the site by the conditions rather than the timetable. Message us on WhatsApp and we will tell you what the water is doing today.
Book on WhatsAppEvery site on this page is dived from Gili Air, most of them within a fifteen-minute boat ride.
