MEET MATT
I’m Matt — a South Africa dive instructor, marine biologist and underwater filmmaker.
AquaMatt is my way of sharing the kind of diving that still gets me genuinely excited to get in the water.
FROM TROPICAL REEFS TO WILD ENCOUNTERS
"I wasn’t chasing coral anymore. I was chasing adrenaline"
After years as a dive instructor around the world, I returned to South Africa in search of something wilder: big animals, unpredictable encounters and dives that feel like real expeditions. The shift wasn’t gradual; it was a realization that the calm beauty of the reef no longer held the same pull. I needed the raw, unfiltered energy of the open ocean.
Find the best big-animal diving South Africa has to offer.
WHY SOUTH AFRICA?
Wild conditions create wild encounters.
South Africa is not always easy diving.
The water can be cold. The swell can be rough. The currents can be powerful, and visibility can change from one day to the next.
But that is exactly what makes it special.
These conditions help create one of the richest and most dynamic marine environments on the planet, attracting an extraordinary diversity of sharks, whales, dolphins, rays, turtles and large schools of fish.
The experience is less predictable than a conventional tropical dive holiday — and far more exciting because of it.
"You never know exactly what will appear from the blue"
WHY I CREATED THIS EXPEDITION
This isn’t a conventional dive holiday.
Most dive holidays revolve around booking a hotel and diving the local reef.
This expedition was created differently. Every part of the journey has been selected to give us the best possible chance of encountering South Africa’s iconic marine life.
We follow the conditions, adapt when necessary and choose the dives offering the greatest potential on any given day.
"The goal isn’t to guarantee sightings. It’s to maximise opportunities."
NO GUARANTEES. JUST ADVENTURE.
You never know what the ocean will give you.
Maybe we’ll spend an entire dive surrounded by hammerheads.
Maybe a humpback whale will sing beneath us.
Maybe we’ll drift alongside tiger sharks.
Or maybe nothing will go to plan — and it will become everyone’s favourite story of the trip.
That is South Africa.
It is unpredictable, wild and impossible to script.
If I could promise exactly what you would see on every dive, the adventure would disappear.
What I can promise is real expedition diving, honest expectations and someone who is just as excited to discover what is waiting below the surface as you are.