Baby Giant Moray Eel, Shark Reef, Ras Mohammed, Egypt

Baby Giant Moray Eel, Shark Reef, Ras Mohammad, Egypt, originally uploaded by Craig Grobler.

The giant moray is widespread in the Indo-Pacific region, being found in the Red Sea and East Africa, the Pitcairn group, north to the Ryukyu and Hawaiian islands, south to New Caledonia and the Austral Islands.

As the name suggests, this is a large eel, reaching up to 300cm (9.8 ft) in length and 30kg (66.1 lbs) in weight. While juveniles are tan in colour with large black spots, adults have black specks that grade into leopard-like spots behind the head and a black area surrounding the gill opening.

Shark Reef and Yolanda Reef are two reefs rising just off the Ras Mohammed coast. They are twin peaks of a single coral sea mount, separated from the mainland by a shallow channel.

Shark Reef is the more colorful and spectacular of the two reefs; with its wall and great marine life. Yolanda Reef is the larger of the two. Its name comes from a vessel which sank here in 1980.

Ras Mohammed is the National Park of South Sinai and located on the very tip of the Sinai Peninsula; it probably represents some of the most famous dive sites in the Red Sea with 800-metre (2,600 ft) deep reef walls and pounding current and coral gardens.