Hanging Gardens
Hanging Gardens is one of the best dives of Sipadan. It's great for snorkeling, free diving, and underwater photography.
The reef wall is very colourful, covered in soft corals, seafans and
large barrel sponges.
The coral gives home to a great variety of smaller fish including damselfish,
chromis, sweetlips on black coral, clownfish, lobsters in cracks, tiny
sea slugs, etc.
In one dive, you can often spot 50+ turtles along with reef sharks, whitetips and a big school of Bumphead parrotfishes.
Hanging Gardens is Sipadan's vertical greenhouse — a wall so densely upholstered in soft corals, seafans and barrel sponges that the rock underneath is a rumour. The name is exact: growth hangs off every ledge and overhang in curtains, and the colour in torchlight is the kind photographers stop trusting on their own screens. Among the branches lives the supporting cast — anthias, hawkfish, morays in the crevices — with the Sipadan regulars, turtles and reef sharks, drifting the blue-water side of the show.
A dive site for all divers
What earns this site its all-levels reputation is how it layers. Divers work the wall; free divers and snorkellers get a genuinely spectacular version of the same dive from above, because the growth starts practically at the surface and the visibility — 30 metres on a normal day — lets everyone see everyone. If your group mixes divers and snorkelling partners, this is the Sipadan site where nobody compromises.
For photographers: this is the island's soft-coral wide-angle dive. Shoot up the wall against the surface light and the "hanging" in the name explains itself.
Like every Sipadan site, access runs on the daily permit system. Contact us to plan your permit day — Hanging Gardens pairs beautifully with Barracuda Point on the classic rotation.
Contact us to dive at Hanging Gardens
- Depth
- 5-40m (16-131 feet)
- Visibility
- 30 metres (100 feet)
- Location
- South of Sipadan island.
| Dive site | Min depth | Max depth | Level | Dive Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Barracuda Point | 5m 16ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Wall, Reef |
| Coral gardens | 10m 33ft | 23m 75ft | OW | Wall, Reef |
| Hanging Gardens | 5m 16ft | 40m 131ft | OW | Wall, Reef, Sharks |
| Lobster lairs | 25m 82ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Wall, Reef, Big Fishes |
| North Point | 25m 82ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Drift, Wall, Reef, Sharks |
| South Point | 20m 65ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Wall, Reef |
| Staghorn Crest | 20m 65ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Wall, Reef, Sharks |
| The Jetty | 3m 10ft | 40m 131ft | OW | Wall, Reef |
| Turtle Cavern | 14m 46ft | 23m 75ft | AOW | Cave, Reef |
| Turtle Patch | 5m 16ft | 12m 39ft | OW | Wall, Reef, Sharks |
| Turtle Tomb | 17m 56ft | 23m 75ft | Divemaster | Cave |
| West Ridge | 18m 59ft | 40m 131ft | OW | Wall, Reef, Sharks |
| Whitetip Avenue | 17m 56ft | 40m 131ft | OW | Wall, Reef, Sharks |
| Midreef | 5m 16ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Wall, Reef |
| The Drop Off | 5m 16ft | 40m 131ft | AOW | Wall, Reef |
Divers: book your Sipadan permits in advance!