Subway Dive Centre is a PADI 5* Instructor Development Centre, National Geographic Dive Centre and Project AWARE Official Partner located in the town of Bugibba on the island of Malta. I wish I could remember the details of how I selected to dive with them rather than one of the approximately 40 other dive centres on the Maltese islands… I seem to recall it had to do with their dive packages, which were comprehensive, included dives on both Malta and Gozo, and were at a reasonable rate. I also checked Scubaboard.com for reviews and tips. Being a 5 star IDC didn’t hurt either, though one can’t tell anything about the character and integrity of a dive centre’s staff just from a rating.
Subway Scuba is aptly named, being located almost entirely underground! The centre contains probably the best compressor in Malta (we saw a number of other dive centre staff visiting to mix gas – including Trimix – for their clients), an indoor pool, a shop, classroom, a gear washing area (with a grid roof open to the elements, for quick drying) and lots of space to store your rental gear (in a box labelled with your name) for the duration of your stay. I really liked that for the five days we dived with them, we used the same kit every day. My wetsuit made me look like a cross between the Michelin Man and a cowboy, but it was incredibly comfortable and had a lot of features that one doesn’t expect on a basic rental wetsuit, such as pockets, a compass, and a dive computer strap holder.
Lina Fabri handled the flurry of emails I sent in order to make our booking (I also used one of Subway’s recommendations for accommodation in Malta, Falcon Court, which was just around the corner from the dive centre), as well as some queries I sent her after we went home regarding particular fish we’d seen that I couldn’t identify. While we were in Malta, Lana Markov assisted us from day to day, and her husband Sergey was our extremely marvellous Divemaster. We also spent one day (Sergey had to rest, poor man!) diving with Publio Attard, who we loved meeting because he is Maltese and gave us his perspective on life in Malta. Olga, the owner of Subway, as well as Lana and Sergey, are all Russian, and all the other divers we dived with during our stay were very impressive Russian divers. Sergey obligingly did two dive briefings at each site, one in English and one in Russian.
The dives Tony and I did were all in the recreational range, up to 40 metres, but technical diving is definitely possible in Malta with submarines and many other sites available to those who want to go deeper. Subway offers an Inspiration rebreather course as well as advanced wreck, Trimix, cavern and cave courses. With its many overhead environments and purposely scuttled wrecks, as well as lovely warm water, I can’t think of a better place to get one of these qualifications. It seems however that for guided dives, the focus is on recreational diving.
Tony and I felt very welcome at Subway, and, very importantly, comfortable that safety was an absolute priority. Our gear was in good order, the cylinders were in date, and every time we used Nitrox we had the opportunity (which we took, otherwise we’d have been instructed to!) to check the mix, the maximum depth it permitted, and to sign our understanding of those facts. Our experience at Subway Scuba was very positive overall.
