Crimea. In Search of Black Sea Treasures

by Lyubov Kuts © PANORAMA

The mysteries of marine abysses have attracted people for centuries, and thousands of daredevils from all over the world continuously join the ranks of an army of diving enthusiasts. There are a host of miraculous deep-sea nooks and crannies on earth, but you needn’t travel miles and miles away in search of underwater exotics - Ukraine’s Black Sea coast of Crimea will enchant even the most experienced divers

If you want a vacation with a touch of the deep-sea extreme, head for the Crimean Peninsula. The sea waters will gently embrace you, and the Black Sea shelf will readily reveal its historical secrets of sunken ships and ancient epochs, breathtaking underwater landscapes, caves and volcanoes, as well as acquaint you with marine life. And even though this underwater fairytale is over quickly, the memory of it will stay with you for the rest of your terrestrial lifetime.

Mysterious Shipwrecks

Like a museum, the Black Sea preserves military relics. A great number of shipwrecks were left following the Crimean War of 1853-1856 that enveloped the waters of the southwestern Crimea from Cape Lukoll to Cape Sarych. During a single hurricane in November of 1854 in Balaklava Harbour, 60 British, French and Turkish vessels sank just as they readied themselves to bombard the fortress city of Sevastopol. On that fateful day, the sea took into its embrace the pride of the British fleet - the sailing frigate Prince and . . . 20 thousand pounds sterling in gold and silver. The legend of dozens of barrels filled with gold still attracts treasure hunters from all over the world, and the frigate itself was long ago renamed The Black Prince in order to make the intrigue more exciting.

One more wonder of Crimea’s underwater realm is an English frigate, whose name still remains a mystery, that went to the bottom with a cargo no less precious than that of the Prince - numerous bottles of wine and cognac, which caused divers to christen it the Drunken Jack. Today in the wreckage of the ship, you can find a bottle of fine wine or cognac that has already been maturing for a century.

At depths from 6 to 25 metres, one finds the eternal resting place of other heroes of the Crimean War: the legendary Lord Reglan and his fair lady the Duchess of Glendaloge and the majestic warriors Gung, Pyrenees and London.

World War II also left its marks in Crimea’s submarine spaces. In 1943, the German ship Santa Fe sank near Sevastopol for unknown reasons. The vessel had on board 12 cannons, a tank destroyer and 1,278 tons of ammunition and bombs. After the war, the sunken ship was cleared of all dangerous objects, rendering it safe and for fascinating underwater excursions.

Beside the vessel rests the German submarine destroyer UJ102. Its deck is so well preserved that divers can easily recognise the once dangerous cannons.

Unforgettable impressions will remain after a visit to Balaklava, a small town in the vicinity of Sevastopol. During the Soviet era, there was a submarine shooting range there in the area of Mramorna Balka. Today, at a depth accessible to divers, one can see the remains of broken targets and unsuccessfully launched torpedoes. We also recommend a visit to the former submarine maintenance plant located inside a mountain not far from Balaklava where divers can swim along submarine water passages connected by a manmade canal.

A unique underwater exhibit is the world’s only device for laying underwater mines installed on the eve of World War II in Balaklava Harbour in order to keep hostile ships out. One more spot for submarine exploration (at a depth of 20 metres) is a 50-metre schooner that once sank near Golubaya Harbour because of an explosion. By the way, in 1961, famous director Genadiy Kazanskiy shot several scenes for the classic Soviet film The Amphibious Man there.

And not far from the Genoese Fortress (in the town of Sudak) in the mysterious Shaitan district, the entire seabed is so densely strewn with metallic debris from schooners that compasses malfunction…

To see all these wonders or to even take a photograph against their diverse backgrounds is a dream for many divers. So, arm yourself with scuba tanks and set off to conquer the depths!

Underwater Kingdom

Crimean submarine landscapes are genuine masterpieces of the most talented artist - Mother Nature. A fantastic stone garden ‘grows’ 300 meters from Cape Sarych at a depth from 8 to 21 metres. Instead of trees, there are quaint stone blocks ranging from 1 and 10 metres in diameter. Between them are numerous grottos, crevices and underwater houses.

Near Cape Ay-Ya, and at shallower depths, another garden has spread out with huge boulders that once fell from the cliffs, admirable underwater alleys and wonderful cosy little grottos with spacious deep-sea halls. If you want an adrenaline rush, you can swim along the adjoining sheer cliff. This is a real attraction for courageous divers who are not afraid to see a great depth beneath them and an overhanging cliff above.

Cape Fiolent also strikes one with its submarine beauty. There are caves, grottos and sandy glades hiding among conglomerations of stone. And not far from the coast is the Shark’s Head. This wonderful underwater area got its name from a huge stone that juts above the waterline and resembles the head of a shark. The waters near the cape are rich in interesting spoils, because in olden days, numerous ships crashed against its steep coastal cliffs.

As for the citizens of the underwater realm, you will meet them all during your undersea trip: cheerful dolphins, schools of sprats, white sturgeons, grey mullets, dogfish, greenfinches, ruffs, crabs and jellyfish.

Antique City

The ancient fortress city of Khersoness Tavricheskiy is a unique historical site on the Crimean Peninsula. Due to underwater tours, it is now possible to see not only its terrestrial part but also its sunken part. Diving along the city blocks of the ancient Khersoness (located today at a depth of 12 to 18 metres), one can see fortifications with towers and belfries, rooms connected by labyrinths of passageways, the remnants of walls and a great number of relics and monuments from ancient civilisations. Moreover, near the coast, among the remains of fortress installations, one can identify the shattered remains of medieval ceramics.

What’s more, the Khersoness Harbour has one of the biggest cemeteries of sunken ships in the Black Sea region. Nobody knows the exact number of the ships lost there. Cape Khersoness has gained the ill-fated reputation shared by the Bermuda Triangle, since numerous vessels survived the Black Sea crossing only to crash against the reefs at the harbour’s entrance, unable to reach the shore. It’s worth noting that the ‘Khersoness Triangle’ is a unique archaeological preserve. Besides the ships’ remains, the seabed also offers a huge collection of anchors, once lost by ancient seafarers trying to save their vessels. This is perhaps the world’s greatest concentration of anchors in one place: there are forged iron anchors from Medieval times, leaden anchor stocks from the Roman period and stone anchors belonging to an ancient era.

Treasure Hunting

Over the entire history of navigation on the Black Sea perhaps some 60,000 vessels went to the bottom. It is hard to imagine what treasures the sea depths preserve! In the period from 1984 to 1991 alone, divers retrieved more than 2 billion dollars worth of silver and gold coins, signet rings, chains and other objects made of precious metals from the Black Sea shelf.

Coins and gold bullion that are still being found within sunken vessels help to clear up any mysteries behind the date of the shipwreck and the ship’s nationality. The most precious discoveries are the treasures of Spanish ships, the majority of which were destroyed by Black Sea pirates.

Other unique finds waiting to be discovered in the Black Sea are amphorae, mostly of Greek, Roman and Phoenician origin. Researchers believe that they could have been either cargo or a part of the tackle of ancient sunken ships. After the contents of the amphora were used, the empty vessel was simply thrown overboard. Therefore, it is quite easy to find an amphora - or at least its splinters.

But the main attraction of travelling through the depths of the sea is that one can forget about regular terrestrial existence, experience the incomparable sensation of weightlessness, feel crazy excitement from discovering the underwater world and enjoy a deep-sea adrenaline rush… So head for exciting trips to the lost submarine world - treasures await those who seek!

Traveller’s Notes

DIVING CENTERS IN CRIMEA

Aquamarine 5 Naberezhna Nazukina, Balaklava, Sevastopol; www.voliga.ru, aquamarine-balaklava@rambler.ru; tel.: (+380 692) 53-0352

This five-star diving centre offers a wide range of diving services, including over forty diving sites (ship wrecks, underwater grottos, caves, sheer cliffs and stone gardens), diving safaris aboard yachts near the Tarkhankut Peninsula and archaeological expeditions. Certified divers can choose from a variety of programmes of different complexity levels (incl. night diving), and beginners can take PADI courses in underwater swimming and diving. (One can obtain an international certificate within five days.) The centre offers equipment for rental or sale, hotel accommodations as well as overland excursions.

Alpha 2 Nakhimova Ploscha, Sevastopol; www.diving-tour.com, navigatorz@km.ru; tel.: (+380 692) 55-0543

This diving centre offers diving tours of shipwrecks left by the Crimean War and World War II, the ancient Khersoness fortress and harbour, stone gardens, grottos and caves, and treasure hunting as part of an archaeological expedition. There are dive safaris that last a couple of days, during which the centre offers diving in the most picturesque parts of the underwater world of the Crimean Peninsula as a whole and the Tarkhankut Peninsula in particular. Scuba diving is available for children aged 10-12, as well as for adults (PADI, CMAS, CIDIP programmes). Free diving.

Krym-Marina-Service 12 Admirala Oktyabrskogo Vul., Sevastopol; www.cmsdive.com.ua, cms@cmsdive.com.ua; tel.: (+380 692) 54-0501, 54-3357

This dive centre conducts tours to various submerged objects left by both the Crimean and Second World wars, along with sightseeing to the most picturesque nooks of the underwater Crimea. CEDIP diver training and underwater swimming skills are offered (raising the level of divers’ skills). The centre specialises in conducting diving operations of different levels of complexity.

ACCOMODATIONS AND TOURIST SERVICES
www.sevastopol.info/catalog/tourism.htm