Cueva del Jarro

A short boat run along the Cerro Gordo cliffs ends at a mooring above a wide vertical crack in the rock face. Drop down using the crack as a visual reference and the cavern mouth opens at about 8 metres. Inside, the rock has effectively vanished: the walls and ceiling carry an unbroken orange tapestry of Astroides calycularis, and a torch is what brings the colour up off camera. The chamber is daylit and wide enough to hover in without committing to overhead penetration. Conger eels watch from cracks. Spider crabs and squat lobsters pick across the textured walls, slipper lobsters tuck into shadow, and concentrations of nudibranchs reward a slow pass.

Exit and the dive changes character. The terrain outside the cavern is a landscape of large fallen stones that slopes away to the south. Following the wall to the left adds depth quickly, with candelabra coral and clouds of anthias appearing around the 30-metre mark. From there the wall continues east, gaining a few more metres as it crosses toward Punta de la Mona. The far end of that traverse is what pushes the maximum depth past the cavern's own profile, and gas management decides how far you go. End the dive with an SMB up so the boat can find you against the cliff face.

Three things make Cueva del Jarro stand on its own among the La Herradura sites. The Astroides density inside the cavern is unusual: centre and listing sources describe the walls as completely covered, not patchy. The entrance geometry matters too — a vertical crack at 8m widening into a daylit chamber gives a contre-jour at the cavern mouth that the surrounding wall sites do not offer. And the archaeological backstory is specific to this stretch of coast rather than a generic area framing: amphorae on the seabed and a 4th-century BC bronze cuirass associated with the area sit behind the heritage designation that names this site explicitly. The site is also one of the few La Herradura profiles that genuinely works for OW certification on the cavern alone while still leaving an AOW continuation to 30m on the same descent.

The cavern's name comes from amphorae recorded on the seabed nearby, consistent with one or more ancient Mediterranean cargo wrecks buried under the Alboran sands. Centre material describes a 4th-century BC bronze cuirass said to be held in the Granada archaeological museum; the secondary literature is thin and the claim is reported as the centres tell it. In April 2008 the Junta de Andalucía formally declared the zone — "Cerro Gordo y Punta de la Mona-Cueva del Jarro" — a Bien de Interés Cultural with archaeological-zone typology. The practical effect today is straightforward: artefacts on the seabed must be left in place, alongside the marine-reserve rules that already cover the wider Maro-Cerro Gordo coastline.

The cavern is built around two photographic angles. Wide-angle work is for the contre-jour at the entrance: position outside the chamber and let the daylight push back through, framing the orange-coral interior against the silhouette of the cliff crack. The same lens covers the unbroken Astroides tapestry on the walls — without artificial light the coral reads dark against the backlight, so an off-camera or strong on-camera light is what makes the orange colour. Macro work moves to the textured walls and floor: spider crabs, squat lobsters, slipper lobsters, and concentrated nudibranch sightings reward a slow pass with a focus light. Winter is the macro window when nudibranch diversity peaks; mid-summer extends the daylight angle through the entrance for longer compositions.

Bring a torch — the cavern is daylit at the mouth but dims toward the back, and the orange coral colour only reads under a direct beam. Bring an SMB too: cliff-face surface conditions and headland boat traffic mean a marker on ascent is the standard ask, especially if the route ends out toward Punta de la Mona. Trust the divemaster on the entry side and route direction, which the day's current decides. Plan a hard turn-around depth at the briefing if you take the wall continuation, since the descending stone slope makes depth-creep easy. Do not touch or move anything on the seabed; the archaeological-zone designation has legal weight, and the wider permit is held by the centre rather than the individual diver.