Gota Soghayr (Small St. John's)

Most dives here start deep and work back up. You drop over the wall and descend the soft-coral face to where gorgonians and sea whips appear from around 40 metres, hanging over the blue, then track the reef up shoreward. Around 10 metres the topography changes. The wall folds into overhangs and cracks packed with glassfish and sweepers, where groupers hold in the shade and the small dome cavern opens a few metres into the reef. From there the dive crosses the reef top and finishes at a coral garden at 5 metres, the operators' designated safety-stop area below the southern moorings.

What you see depends on where you linger. The shallows hold shoals of snapper, cornetfish and barracuda over soft corals, with plentiful juvenile fish; Napoleon wrasse drift at the edge of vision and bumphead parrotfish forage across the flats. The mooring zone is the place to watch for an oceanic whitetip below the boats, a chance rather than a fixture. The soft-coral walls give the photographer a wide-angle option, the shallows a macro one. Current shapes the close: moderate flow is the norm, but circular currents to the south can make the swim back awkward, so an SMB and a planned exit pay off.

Small St John's earns its slot for three things. The first is the wall itself, a sheer soft-coral face dropping past 70 metres that gets the site rated among the best in the Red Sea. The second is the cluster of glassfish recesses, overhangs and cracks at 10 metres so dense with fish that the light dims as you swim in. The third is range: a complete vertical sweep, from deep gorgonians to a shallow coral garden, with a daylight dome cavern thrown in, all on one compact reef.

It is also the calm dive of the itinerary. Where the habili pinnacles like [habili-ali] are current-swept and advanced, this wall runs moderate, making it the scenic, lower-stress dive that earns St John's its coral reputation. Several boats may moor at the same small reef, yet the wall, the overhangs and the cavern sit on different sides, so groups spread out and it rarely feels crowded. As of 2025-2026 the wider Deep South is living through a regional coral-bleaching event, so the living cover here is harder to vouch for than older accounts suggest, but the structure and the glassfish remain the draw.

Depth is the thing to manage. The wall drops past 70 metres and it is easy to slide below a planned profile while watching the gorgonians, so set a maximum, set a computer alarm, and keep the reef in view. The dome cavern is short and stays in daylight, but treat it as an overhead: control your buoyancy, stay in the light, and do not go beyond your certification. Current is usually moderate, though circular flow to the south can make the return awkward, so carry an SMB and plan the exit or take a zodiac pick-up.

This is one of the gentler St John's dives, but it is still advanced diving on a remote reef. Operators recommend Advanced Open Water and offer in-trip training for Open Water divers on the shallower sites. There is no night diving here, because the small reef cannot be moored overnight. The nearest recompression chamber is around 200 kilometres away at Marsa Alam, so dive conservative profiles and carry DAN-style insurance.