Safari Diving Lanzarote

Safari Diving Lanzarote has operated from Playa Chica beach since the early 1980s, making it one of the longest-established dive centres in Puerto del Carmen. The centre sits on the sand at the foot of the pier — gear goes from bench to beach without a walk across town. Its PADI 5-Star Dive Resort status is one layer of the accreditation picture; the others are harder to collect. Safari holds approval from the British Ministry of Defence as one of nine MOD ComMac-certified centres worldwide, the Spanish Q quality award as the only dive school in Lanzarote to earn it, and the Sport Diver Magazine Best Dive Centre in Europe, Middle East and Africa award for 2016. BSAC, SSI, NAUI, and CMAS certifications sit alongside the PADI programme.

Bart Prinsen and Marian de Jongh Swemer own both this centre and Dive College Lanzarote in Playa Blanca. That shared ownership creates a practical offer: Puerto del Carmen diving in the morning, Museo Atlantico or Flamingo Wall in Playa Blanca the next day, transport included and paid at one till. The weekly schedule is structured — named sites on named days, two departures daily — with a flat pricing rule that runs through it: shore and boat dives cost the same.

The instructor team speaks seven languages. Debora Colombo handles the photography programme, running workshops that combine theory sessions with in-water practice.

4.8 across 812 TripAdvisor reviews — 734 marked Excellent. Google sits at 4.7. Both platforms show a pattern consistent with a centre that runs repeat visitors year after year.

Location is the dominant theme: the beach entry, no transfers, no extra boat charge. Staff quality runs close behind. Instructors Tim, Marta, Marcin, and Eva are named across different seasons and activity types; Debora appears in nearly every photography review and is credited by multiple reviewers with finding seahorses on dives where other guides did not. Long-term guests — one family on their thirteenth visit, another diver on their fourth — describe the centre as a standing fixture in their Lanzarote trips rather than a one-off booking. Course reviews note safety-first briefings that explain the reasoning behind each procedure, not just the procedure.