Whether you are an experienced diver, or freshly hatched and clutching a shiny new certification card, choosing a liveaboard dive holiday is never easy. Since I've hit most of the pitfalls over the years I may hopefully be able to help you avoid them.

Liveaboards should carry a health warning: they are highly addictive. Once converted to the ease of diving from a custom-designed boat, and being gently rocked to sleep by the sea, it's damn hard to give up.

From a liveaboard you are usually diving in more remote, uncrowded, less-dived areas, well beyond the range of port-based day boats. The longer the trip, the more important on-board comfort becomes. If you are not sure if liveaboard diving is for you then dip your toe in the water with a shorter trip. But I warn you that, unless the sea does something horribly unseasonal, you will be hooked - and for life!

Choosing your liveaboard
If you are travelling by yourself or as a couple, you will enjoy your trip most if the rest of the passengers do not constitute one single homogenous group (e.g. a German women's football team). Advance planning can sort this one out. By quizzing your agent or talking to the owners (if you book directly) they will give you an indication of the spread of nationalities / sexes and the like on any one trip.

Work with an agent who knows the area, the boats and the crews well. Ask how many times they themselves have visited the area. Each destination has its best season, so ask a reputable agent to help pick the month for you. If they cannot answer your questions or seem vague, don't use them.

Rock'n'roll
Avoid lightweight, high-sided wooden vessels with no keels - often those of a traditional design. They will roll in the swell and induce seasickness. Anyone who has ever had a bout of seasickness will never forget it even though it usually lasts no longer than 24 hours. But sea sickness need not mar your holiday at sea as it can easily be avoided. The important thing to remember is to take preventative medicine before the onset of any nausea. Nothing will work if you wait to take it until you are hanging over the side awaiting a merciful death.

Crew, Safety and Equipment
Select a boat that has an experienced and well qualified crew. The longer they have worked in the area, the more knowledge they can impart to you about the places you will dive and where to find critters, bright colours or sharks once you are there. Check that the boat carries a full range of safety equipment (life rafts/jackets, oxygen, radio and navigation equipment). Compressors are vital for diving, of course. A good boat will have two, one for backup. An added bonus is an electric compressor which is extremely quiet and unobtrusive.

The Diving
How many dives a day are scheduled and when? Is there a divemaster or instructor aboard? How much experience is needed? Do I need to bring all my own equipment? Is equipment available for hire in an emergency? Which is the best season to dive?

Getting the answers to these questions can make the difference between having a good diving holiday and having a fantastic experience. Not all boats are organised around the "dive 'til you drop from dawn to dusk" routine. Even on those that do, offering as many as five dives a day, there is no obligation to do any. Investing in a dive computer before your trip will allow you to dive safely to the max. However if you would rather get up late and lie in the sun or have a gin and tonic, no one will pressurise you.

Choose a boat that will cater for your level of expertise. If you are relatively inexperienced then divemasters to lead you on some of your dives would be a bonus. They can introduce you to the reefs that they know very well and you can build confidence in your skills. Most boats can offer on-board training if necessary, but I would recommend getting your qualifications at home and using your hard-earned cash to fully enjoy the diving without the interference of a training schedule.

The southern part of the Egyptian Red Sea, towards the Sudanese border, offers stunning diving on a world class level and is a place that I have been returning to for the past ten years. It is still a wild and undeveloped desert coastline and the only way to explore its undersea riches is by liveaboard dive boat. You join the boat at Ras Ghalib, five hours' transfer by bus from Hurghada, on Egypt's eastern coast. Since the best diving is some twenty miles offshore and the Red Sea can be rough as hell at times, you need to be confident that your chosen boat can handle the seas. Ghazala Voyager is one of the top liveaboards working in the Red Sea today. From March to November she cruises out to Fury Shoals and St John's reef, only ten nautical miles from the Sudanese border. You can expect big fish action here. Hammerhead sharks are commonly seen schooling in large numbers. Sadly, by the time of year I got there (June), the water temperatures had warmed to the high twenties and driven these magnificent sharks deeper into cooler water.

Large barracudas are commonly seen and, contrary to popular belief, are neither man-eaters nor especially attracted to women's jewellery. Pelagic - or deep-water - fish, like jacks, come into the reef to feed, flashing by like silver arrows. Gaudy red and blue spotted groupers lie in their territorial hunting places to catch unwary reef fish, and hawksbill turtles flap leisurely over the reef.

Clown fish, living in symbiosis with a host anemone, are often spotted on the reefs. The clown fish are protected from predators by the anemone's stinging tentacles, while the anemone benefits from food scraps. I have even seen clown fish feed their hosts with shrimp although this has never been reported in scientific literature.

Clouds of orange anthias hover in their millions above the reef tops, their common appearance belying their complicated sex lives. All anthias are born hermaphrodite but mature as functioning females. Each group of females is dominated by a supermale who jealously guards his harem of females from nearby marauding males. Should the supermale die in battle, however, the largest female has the capacity to change sex, become a supermale and lead the group.

It's worth stopping and floating nearby to catch a glimpse of the amazing social life of these common little fish. For me, it's these guys that characterise diving in the Red Sea, by adding so much colour to the reefs.

Ghazala Voyager was our home for a week. Martin de Banks is the 28-metre vessel's very experienced Captain and his partner Jo is the second most important person on the boat: the cook, who supplied us with three delicious meals a day. Completing the team are divemaster Dave and hostess Vicky. The rest of the seven-person crew are there to make you and your fellow guests' stay aboard as pleasant as possible. All eight cabins are ensuite and air-conditioned, accommodating a maximum of sixteen guests in real comfort. Just keep your fingers and toes crossed that, sea and wind conditions permitting, Martin can take you out to Four Metre Reef at Fury Shoals, one of Egypt's best-kept secrets. You won't forget it.

Red Sea factfile

At certain times of the year quantities of reddish algae colour the waters of this steep-sided sea; hence its name. Relatively young, the Red Sea is a graben - a valley-like depression or trough caused when part of the earth's crust subsided 25 million years ago to form Africa's Great Rift Valley.

On the whole the sea is shallow, particularly in the south, but there are a few areas which exceed 2,000m in depth. Over 2,200km long and 320km wide at its widest point, it continues to eat back into the surrounding desert by about two to three centimetres each year.

Noted for its high year-round temperatures, the Red Sea is surrounded by desert or semi-desert with little localised enterprise (except near Suez). However the sea supplies small fish for coastal cities. There is some shark fishing and pearl diving, while black coral is extracted for the making of prayer beads.

Within its waters, there are condominiums of hard stony coral, filigreed branches of gorgorian coral that provide nurseries for many plankton feeders and, about 50m down, whip corals that corkscrew through the waters. Many of the reefs are built like wedding cake tiers and forests of algae grow like fir trees.

The myriad marine life includes small crustaceans, spiny sea urchins, giant carpet-anemone, brightly coloured exotically named fish, blue spotted stingrays and the 180kg hump-head wrasse. The orange butterfly fish is one of the occasional visitors from the Indian Ocean.

Published in Travel Africa Edition Ten: Winter 1999/2000 Text is subject to Worldwide Copyright (c)