Language
Currency
France4 dive sites
You dive from May to October. The water goes from 13°C in February to 23 to 25°C in August. June, September and October are the best months at Port-Cros, with water at 19 to 22°C and fewer boats.
Park entry is free. A guided dive with full gear costs €77 in Giens and €110 for the Rubis. Unguided, with gear provided, budget €45 to €51, and a try dive costs €90 to €92.
You arrive through the airports of Marseille, Toulon-Hyères, Nice or Figari, or by TGV to Marseille and Toulon. Every site is dived by boat from the nearby harbors. At Port-Cros, you need a free permit, requested online or by the dive center.
FranceWallAt La Gabinière, in Europe's first marine park, the groupers do not flee: they watch you arrive and stay within arm's reach, because nobody may fish them here anymore.
FranceWreckThe Liban is a 91 m liner that sank on June 7, 1903 off the southern tip of Maïre Island and now lies at 28 to 36 m in Calanques National Park.
FranceReefMérouville is a granite shoal southeast of the Lavezzi Islands, in the Bouches de Bonifacio reserve, between 17 and 36 m, where resident dusky groupers, some over 30 kg, come to hover one or...
FranceWreckThe Rubis is a Free French Naval Forces minelaying submarine, scuttled in 1958 off Cap Camarat, that sits upright and intact on the sand at 41 m, wrapped in anthias.
From Marseille to Bonifacio, the French Mediterranean is dived in protected areas. Calanques National Park, created on April 18, 2012, has about 300 sites and more than 16,000 guided dives a year, including the Liban wreck. Farther east are the Hyères Islands and Port-Cros National Park, created on December 14, 1963, Europe's first marine park, with La Gabinière, its groupers and its barracuda. Between Cavalaire and Saint-Tropez lie the big deep wrecks of the Var, led by the Rubis submarine, resting at 41 meters south of Cap Camarat. In Corsica, the Bouches de Bonifacio nature reserve, created in 1999 over about 80,000 hectares, protects the Lavezzi Islands and the Mérouville shoal, ranked the number 1 dive in Corsica.
You dive from May to October. Surface water is 13°C in February and rises in August to 23°C in Hyères and Marseille, and 24 to 25°C in Cavalaire and Bonifacio. At depth, the thermocline keeps the water cool all summer, hence a 5 mm in season and a 7 mm or a drysuit the rest of the year. The mistral can drop the surface temperature in a few hours in Marseille. The east wind makes La Gabinière undiveable, and the Rubis is exposed to every wind. L'Atelier de la Mer dives all year in Marseille.
Fly into Marseille-Provence, Toulon-Hyères or Nice airports, or take the TGV to Marseille and Toulon. For Corsica, Figari airport is the closest to Bonifacio, and ferries leave from Marseille, Toulon and Nice.
A guided fun dive with full gear costs €77 at Ulysse Plongée in Giens, plus a €12 supplement for La Gabinière. The Rubis costs €110 at Mio Palmo in Cavalaire. A morning of two dives at the Lavezzi costs €124 at Bonifacio Plongée, with rental €36 extra. At L'Atelier de la Mer in Marseille, a guided dive down to 20 meters costs €57, without gear. Unguided divers pay €45 to €51 with gear provided. A try dive costs €90 to €92, and a Level 1 course €500 at Ulysse. There is no entry fee in the parks.
At Port-Cros, diving in the park's core requires a free personal permit, obtained online on CaPeL or signed by the dive center. Each site takes 40 divers at most, anchoring is banned within 100 meters of the sites, and there is no feeding, no touching and no turning over rocks. In the Calanques, you moor on the free buoys, touch nothing, feed nothing and take nothing, and two archaeological zones are closed to diving. In the Bouches de Bonifacio, diving is free in the enhanced protection zones and requires a permit in the no-take zones. Everywhere, dusky grouper and brown meagre are under a fishing moratorium.
Hotels, apartments and rooms around Hyères, Tour Fondue harbor, the starting point for dives at La Gabinière, with current prices.