Tino’s Lighthouse

We’ll moor our dinghy exactly below the island’s lighthouse.

Out of water the scenery will leave you breathless: it’s a sheer drop of about 80 metres from the falaise to the sea. This verticality also continues underwater where the wall sinks on a silty bottom at about 27 metres of depth. Starting from the furrow area (wave-cut notch) until the first 5 metres, the algal population dominates, in particular that of the coral sp. Species: a bioconstructor algae that is very important to our ecosystem for the production of carbon and oxygen and as a pioneer species.

Afterwards algae decrease making room for sponges and cnidarians. This is also home to many hydrozoans that mean food for nudibranchs. In this area it’s easy to come across blennies and another small benthic fish. From 20 metres upwards we can meet several gorgonians. There are plenty of cracks that provide a safe shelter for sargos and sedentary fish like corvines.

PUNTA DEL TINO

The wall sinks vertically onto a silty bottom. Heading towards the Tino’s tip, below 20 meters, there are Eunicella singularis and Leptogorgia sarmentosa colonies. Entering the channel that separates the Tino island from the Palmaria one we’ll go over a stretch of Paramuricea clavata and Eunicella verrucosa fans.

It’s an unbelievably beautiful scenery mostly when there is an excellent visibility. On the way back, going up, we’ll meet shoals of sargos and salpa plus dens of conger eels and morays. At a depth of about 12-15 metres there are big patches of Pentapora fascialis and clouds of Mediterranean chromis too. Above 10 metres there are different areas with hydrozoans trottoir, therefore it’s easy to find various species of nudibranchs.