Diving Similan Islands

Anita's Reef

Anita's Reef is on the west coast of this small island, just off Similan Island No.4. The reef is a rather innocuous sandy slope with some spectacular coral bommies and patches, made up of table corals and staghorn corals. On the gentle slopes you can see lionfish and the reclusive and beautiful clown triggerfish and colourful Oriental sweetlips.

There are several soft coral bommies, smothered in soft tree corals and sea fans, a good place to rest and watch the underwater sea life go about its daily cycles. Large orange seafans host longnose hawkfish, and the golden brown and purple dendronephthya corals are used as sanctuaries for glassfish and juvenile fish. Stay here a few minutes and you'll see bluefin trevally hunting with incredible bursts of speed.

Make your way slowly south across the sandy bottom and you're bound to see the fields of resident spotted garden eels. Often buried in the sand you can see blue-spotted Kuhl's stingrays. Watch out for the blue blanquillo, a type of tilefish, and the rather ugly and large greenish sea cucumbers. Shrimpgobies are very common in the Similan Islands, sharing their subterranean dwellings with snapping shrimps in a symbiotic relationship. The shrimp are short-sighted and rely on the goby to look out for danger, whereas the goby benefits from having a resident housekeeper. Sharp-eyed divers can be lucky to find a whitepatch razorfish, and look out into the blue and maybe you'll catch sight of an impressive 2 metre fantail stingray swooping past.

The scattered coral patches are made up of staghorn and bottlebrush corals, sheet corals, knobbly finger corals, with some larger coral species such as lobed and star coral. Slender grouper and Diana's hogfish hide out in the crevices. Common schooling residents are the delicate blue damsels and jewel fairy basslets, and blinding masses of slender fusiliers. Roundhead parrotfish and titan triggerfish tend to roam around, eating the hard coral, with yellowfin goatfish in attendance, guzzling up the resultant scraps.

Boulders and large table corals dominate the Similans landscape to the south where you'll find giant trevally hunting for easy lunch.

Anita's Reef has large sandy patches and easy currents, that make it an ideal site for an early check-out dive on a Similan liveaboard dive cruise.

Anita's Reef Reef Basics: Fringing reef with sand patches
Depth: 5 - 26m
Visibility: 20 - 40m
Currents: Easy
Surface conditions: Can be rough
Water temperature: 27 - 29°C
Experience level: Beginner - intermediate
Number of dive sites: 1
Diving season: October to May
Distance: ~90 km northwest of Phuket, 65 km west of Khao Lak
Access: Liveaboards and daytrips

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