Ullastres III

The mooring buoy puts divers on a summit at 6-9m where the dive begins almost as a Ullastres I lookalike — broken rocky top, a few sea bream, scorpionfish on the ledges. Few divers linger. From the rim of the summit, the north face peels into the vertical descent the site is known for, and the dive commits to the wall. By 20-25m the gorgonian forest takes over: dense red Paramuricea clavata interleaved with yellow Eunicella cavolini, fans across every rock face the colonies can hold. The boulder field between roughly 25 and 40m breaks the wall into ledges and overhangs, and this band is where the photography time concentrates. Anthias clouds work the same column. Grouper and dentex appear out of the open water side. The wall keeps going past 40m to the 50-55m base, well beyond the day's plan for most teams. The exposed open-sea position means barracuda schools cruise the column in summer; winter brings John Dory and the chance of sunfish. The return is up the wall, gas and no-decompression time on the diver's side, often where the most considered shots happen.

Ullastres I is the crevice-hunt. Ullastres II is the all-rounder with towers and a fissure. III is the wall — "casi vertical", "repleta de grandes gorgonias", an underwater spectacle that the local Spanish-language framing reaches for unique adjectives to capture. Among the three pinnacles the gorgonian cover here is the densest. The depth is also the most committing: there is no natural bottom on the open-sea face to stop a wandering eye, and the site has a reputation among local centres as the most complicated of the trio for that reason. The trade-off is that the dive concentrates. Bottom time on the gorgonian band at 25-40m is limited, the route is the wall, and weather has more vote than at the sheltered siblings. For divers who already know I and II and want the deep, exposed end of the trio, this is what III is for.

The wall has no floor at recreational depth. Plan a maximum and set the alarm before descending. Nitrox extends bottom time on the gorgonian band at 30-40m and is recommended. Bring a wide-angle lens and a torch — the gorgonian colour drops fast at depth and the boulder field at 25-40m hides ledges and overhangs that need a beam. Expect a sharp thermocline below roughly 15-20m in summer; the wall at 40m runs materially colder than the surface even in August, so plan exposure protection for the bottom rather than the deck. The open-sea position makes Ullastres III the most weather-sensitive of the three pinnacles. When surface conditions close it out, centres swap to Ullastres I or II and try again on a calmer day.