It all started when we thought it would be a good idea to form a Dive center with more of a personal service. A daunting task when there were so many very big Dive Centers in Sharm, but we gave it a go, and it worked, and us still operational on our 18th Birthday gives testament to what we provide the new and experienced diver is what they want and what you want if you are reading this. 27th August 2005 Elite Diving was born. The logo and websites have all been created by Graphic Designer Greg Bottle, and he still works with elite diving today, and designs our art work for adverts and promotional items. Meet our first ever Divers who dived on our first dive trip out of Sharm Graham Morgan from Bingley West Yorkshire, pictured above in the blue shirt was a very talented footballer in his youth and also loved diving in his later years. He was one of the first ever to dive with Elite Diving on a boat trip out to Ras Mohamed out of Travco on M.Y. Sabeel. There were two brothers also on that trip. Do anyone recognise them? Of Course the photo above of the two young brothers with me, Alun, is Gwyn and Huw AKA G&H, Moyra and my son's. H worked with us at elite later for a spell and G is now our dive center manager and works in Sharm still, with Elite Diving. ,Top left. H and myself in the early days. After the boat we would go for a beer (much as we do now) As we didn't have a dive center as such in the early days, we went to a beach bar to socialise, have some light refreshments and talk about the marvelous day we just had on the boat. Also we used to finish any paperwork, so that beach bar was nicknamed "The Office". Top middle. Alec listening to one of my briefings, when he was a mere apprentice. He soon progressed to Instructor and delivered accomplished Dive briefing's himself. Top right. The Count. Also called Alin, but spelt different. He work with Elite for several years before moving on to be a technical guide using his rebreather. We nicknamed him the count as he had a distinctive accent coming from Transylvania. He also taught us all about Vlad the Impaler! Bottom left. Alec. supposedly working at the 2010 NEC Dive show for Elite. Bottom middle. Walid was the only asset worth having when Elite Diving took ownership of Divers United. Walid learnt to dive and did his Divemaster course with us before leaving to join the petrochemical industry. Bottom Right. A coming together of two Tiger sharks on our South African Shark Safari in 2008. Our Success over the years has been down to many factors, namely our dedicated staff that enjoy what they do so much and delivers a great but safe service to our faithful divers. Then there are our faithful Divers themselves, that keep coming back much of that due to our dedicated Dive and Boat crews. There have been many epic trips and there are so many groups and individuals that come and dive with us on a regular basis and now we have resumed business as usual after non direct flights and the pandemic, we have welcomed so many old and new faces recently. A special thank you must go to the divers that kept coming when there were no direct flights and kept us motivated enough to keep going where many dive centers folded. That's a big factor in us reaching our 18th Birthday. The photos above give you a taste of the fun that we have had with a bunch of clowns, boarded by pirates, a safari full of flower power divers, wear your Tutu Days, a Pink Safari and so many night dives. One even with a naked diver on her 100th dive (no photographic evidence, we're a family business LOL) A Big part of our identity was having our own boat where we could hand pick our crew. The stories of why the crews came to us will have to be kept for the book, but all who dive with us will agree that Captain Yahia and his second in command Zenga forms the basis of one of the best dive boat crews in the whole wide world, without even mentioning Zenga's chocolate cake. Our several Worlds best Dive center awards are attributed to all our Dive center staff from the office, tank personnel, boat crew and dive instructors alike. Most Divers would like to see sharks and we have been very lucky running several Shark Safari's. Top Left. Hammerhead Shark Cocos Islands 2015 Shark Safari. Top Middle. South Africa Shark Safari 2008. Top right. Red Sea Shark Safari 2017 Bottom Left. Cocos Island trip 2015. Dressed in our Elite Diving shirts for dinner. We have 22 divers booked on the 2025 trip. Will they be as smart I wonder? Happy Birthday 18th Elite Diving. Just coming of age. What's in store for us next?
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Alun EvansOwner of Elite Diving with Divers United, has a wealth of diving experience and has been diving since 1984. Archives
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