Hurghada: Empire Submarine Boat Trip with Snorkel and Drinks
The reef never comes up to meet you — so the boat takes you down to it.
Overview
You came for the Red Sea, and so far you have seen the lid on it. Blue from the beach, blue from the balcony, blue from the deck of the boat. Everything this coast is famous for is happening a few metres underneath that, and the usual price of admission is a dive licence you do not have and a week you did not budget.
The Empire is a semi-submarine: the hull stays on the surface, and you go down a short flight of steps into it. You sit in an air-conditioned cabin with a long window at eye level, below the waterline. The boat drifts out over a reef and the glass starts filling — parrotfish working at the coral, a shoal turning all at once like a flag caught in wind, a wall of reef sliding past at walking pace. The cabin goes quiet. Everyone leans forward.
About one in eight fish in the Red Sea lives here and nowhere else on Earth. This is a nearly closed sea, warm and salt-heavy and cut off long enough to have invented its own residents, and most people who fly here for a week never lay eyes on a single one of them. That is the thing this boat quietly fixes. No certification, no tank, no learning to breathe wrong on purpose — just a staircase, and then the window.
Afterwards the boat anchors and you can get in yourself: forty-five minutes with a mask over the same reef you have been watching through glass, gear handed to you, nobody rushing. Or you can stay in your seat and watch the swimmers from below, which is its own strange pleasure — plenty of people do. Either way you go back to the hotel with the sea rearranged in your head: not a surface you lie beside, but a place with rooms and residents, getting on with something that has nothing to do with your holiday at all.
Highlights
- Sit below the waterline in an air-conditioned cabin while a living reef passes at eye level
- Snorkel the same reef for 45 minutes — mask, snorkel and fins provided
- Getting in the water is optional; you can watch the whole thing dry from your seat
- Works for non-swimmers, small children and grandparents alike
- Hotel pickup and drop-off in Hurghada, plus a soft drink and bottled water on board
- Three hours door to door, with a 10:30 or 14:00 departure
Included
- Hotel pickup and drop-off in Hurghada by air-conditioned vehicle
- Empire semi-submarine cruise with a below-waterline panoramic observation cabin
- 45-minute snorkelling stop at the reef
- Snorkelling equipment — mask, snorkel and fins
- Soft drink and bottled water on board
- English, German or Arabic speaking guide
- Free cancellation up to 12 hours before departure, and free date change up to 6 hours before
- Pickup from Makadi Bay, Sahl Hasheesh or El Gouna — add it to your booking below
- Pickup from Soma Bay or Safaga — add it to your booking below
- Gratuities
- Anything not listed under What's included
Good to Know
Pick your date
Guide language English Change
Optional. Pickup from your hotel
Free pickup and drop-off across Hurghada.
Optional Add-ons
Professional and well organized
Nothing special but acceptable
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