Certified Diver Trips in Side & Antalya

Every Side Diving boat day follows the same all-inclusive formula, and certified divers slot straight into it. We run five full-day trips along the coast: the flagship Side Underwater Museum trip (€45, 7 hours) over the sunken-sculpture park, Kumköy close to Side (€43, 6 hours), Kemer with its PADI-certified instructors (€43, 8 hours), Antalya with reefs, caves and fish shoals (€50, 8 hours) and Alanya's rocky reefs in the Cleopatra Beach waters (€43, 8 hours). Whichever you choose, the day includes two guided dives, all equipment, a fresh lunch cooked on board, free two-way hotel transfer, passenger and diving insurance, and a proper safety briefing before anyone gets wet.

The boat day is built so mixed groups can share it, and depth follows the diver rather than the trip. Beginners without a licence make a relaxed first dive at 5–8 metres for 15–25 minutes and a second dive to about 13 metres, always beside an instructor — 13 metres is the beginner ceiling. As a certified diver you are on the same boat but on the real profiles: around 30 metres on standard certified dives, and down to 60 metres on the deep sites if you hold the qualification for them. Your card also changes the day in practical ways. You skip the beginner-pace skills work, your guide can give you more freedom within the dive plan, and groups stay small — three to four divers per instructor — so nobody is herded around the reef. After each dive we sign and stamp your logbook, so your Mediterranean pages come home filled in properly. The full price list for all five trips is on our prices page, and if a certified friend travels with a non-diving partner, boat visitors join at a reduced rate and eat the same lunch with the same sea view.

The coast between Side and Alanya packs surprising variety into a single holiday. The headline act is the Side Underwater Museum: a sunken-sculpture park of around 110 statues resting at about 12 metres, arranged in rows that turn every fin stroke into a gallery walk — and the fish here are so used to divers that hand-feeding is part of the dive. It is the reason our museum trip is the flagship of the fleet.

Head west and the water changes character. Kemer is known for the clearest water on this coast, and it shows at the Lighthouse reef — a 3–18 metre site with a 9-metre swim-through tunnel and busy cave life — and at Three Islands (Üç Adalar), where reefs and caverns stack on top of each other and dolphins are sometimes spotted on the crossing. Antalya's own sites add reefs, caves and shoals of fish in deeper blue water.

East of Side, Alanya offers two very different flavours. The Amphora site near the harbour scatters ancient clay jars across the bottom — a genuinely old seabed where octopus, grouper and moray eels are often seen holding territory between the relics. Alanya's underwater caves, long associated with the Mediterranean monk-seal story, bring atmospheric rock architecture in the waters off Cleopatra Beach. One honest note: this is the open Mediterranean, not an aquarium. Octopus, turtles and dolphins appear on their own schedule, and no operator can guarantee a sighting — what we can promise is that your guides know exactly where the residents usually live.

Two of the most rewarding dives on this coast are strictly certified-diver territory, and we want to be straight with you about how they work. The MS Paris II is a WW1-era French freighter roughly 70 metres long, lying off Kemer at 21 to 31 metres — a proper wreck with scale, structure and history. Nearby sits the DO-28, a Dornier aircraft dating from 1967, resting between 19.5 and 23.3 metres: an intact-looking plane on the seabed is one of those images that stays in your memory long after the holiday ends.

Both wrecks sit well inside the range certified divers dive here, so let us be straight about who they are for rather than pretend they are out of reach. The shallow numbers belong to beginners: divers without a licence go to 5–8 metres and then to about 13 metres beside an instructor, and 13 metres is their ceiling. Certified divers on the same boats dive the real profiles — around 30 metres on standard certified dives, and down to 60 metres on the deep sites for suitably qualified divers — so Paris II at 21–31 metres and the DO-28 at 19.5–23.3 metres are dives we run here, not exotic extras. What they never are is a discovery dive: these sites are for certified divers only. Which site you actually dive on a given day depends on your certification level, your logged experience, the conditions and the day's plan, so tell us what card you hold and roughly how many dives you have logged.

If Paris II or the DO-28 is on your wish list, send us a message through the contact page or WhatsApp before or early in your holiday, so we can put you on the right boat on the right day. We will answer honestly about what is realistic for your certification, the likely depth profile and the price — and if a site asks for a higher qualification than you currently hold, we will say so and suggest the best alternative instead.

Reserving works the same way for every trip: book your seat free online, pay on the day, and cancel free of charge up to 24 hours before departure — useful when you are juggling holiday plans. Pickup from your hotel is in the morning, and the exact time is confirmed the evening before, because it depends on where along the coast you are staying.

A few health rules apply to everyone, certified or not. Diving is not possible during pregnancy or with severe asthma, heart conditions or serious respiratory problems — if you are unsure, ask us before you book. Just as important for certified divers planning an active week: do not fly within 24 hours of your last dive, so schedule your final boat day with your departure flight in mind.

Your certification also opens doors beyond the two boat dives themselves. Night diving can be arranged on request, snorkelling-only seats exist for companions who prefer to stay at the surface, and non-divers are welcome on board as boat visitors at a reduced rate — same boat, same lunch, no tank. If someone in your group wants to start where you once started, try-dives are available from around age 10, and CMAS courses from beginner level upwards can be organised on request, with pricing agreed directly with us. Browse the full programme on our tours page, check the numbers on the price list, and if anything about depths, sites or paperwork is unclear, just ask — a straight answer costs nothing.