Punta San Paolo

The dive begins from San Paolo bay‚ located on the southern side of the island of Ustica. Descending to a depth of 8 m‚ we begin our dive over a large posidonia meadow. This is the perfect environment for many fish species‚ it’s easy to encounter various families of wrasse. Exploring carefully and with a bit of luck you can encounter the pipefish‚ perfectly camouflaged with the thread-like leaves of the posidonia.

We head towards the open sea in an easterly direction‚ following the seabed which descends to a depth of 25m. Here‚ the remains of a wreck about 10m long rest on a sandy bottom. The small wreck normally hosts a large moray eel and an impressive number of pentagonal-shaped starfish ‘Placenta Peltaster’.

We change direction and head south‚ following the coastline profile which slopes towards the deep blue‚ very scenic. Looking at the rocks you can encounter small nudibranchs such as the flabellina‚ umbrella slugs‚ spiny starfish‚ large specimens of octopus and various brown groupers. A glance towards the blue to spot large pelagic fish such as the amberjack.

Following the coastline profile we will encounter a deep crack that develops into the interior of the coast‚ wide enough to be visited‚ but which we will bypass as an ordinance from the Ustica port authority prohibits entry due to possible rockslides.

The dive continues following the profile up to Punta San Paolo‚ the return in the opposite direction exploring the shallower part of the rockslide‚ with the interesting presence of the peanut sponge and‚ as always‚ octopus spotting. Return to the bay where our dinghy is moored.