Spearfishing in Al Hoceima — season, water temperature and where it is allowed

Cliffs dropping straight into the water, twenty metres of visibility on the good days, and a national park with a marine section in the middle of the coast. Al Hoceima gives itself to whoever knows where to stand.

21 September 2026 · 6 min read

The sea at Al Hoceima, right now

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Excellent Calm sea, little chop. Visibility likely good.

Swell 0.4m NE

Period 7s

Wind 5km/h SW

Chop 0m

Current 0.4m/s

Water 20.2°C

Hour 00:00 EXC 02:00 EXC 04:00 EXC 06:00 EXC 08:00 EXC 10:00 EXC 12:00 EXC 14:00 EXC 16:00 EXC 18:00 EXC 20:00 EXC 22:00 EXC

Swell m 0.4 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3

Wind km/h 5 6 7 6 4 3 7 6 5 5 4 7

Chop m 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.1 0.2 0.2 0

Period s 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 4 5 6 4 3

Current m/s 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.3 0.4

Water °C 20.2 20.1 20.1 20.1 20.2 20.2 20.3 20.3 20.3 20.2 20.2 20.1

Tide m -0.14 -0.28 -0.36 -0.35 -0.19 -0.01 -0.02 -0.17 -0.29 -0.34 -0.23 -0.07

Swell, chop, wind and current: the block’s highest value. Period, water and tide: the average. Colour scales match Windy’s: white at rest, then cyan and green for wind, lavender and pink for swell, through to red and purple.

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Ask a Moroccan spearfisher where the best rock in the Mediterranean is and the answer will be Al Hoceima. The coast here is not sand but cliffs that drop straight into the water, small coves between rocky points, and islets and stones close in. And the water, on the days it feels like it, goes clear enough to see the bottom from the surface.

But Al Hoceima is also the one place on the Moroccan coast where you need to know the map of the boundaries before you know the map of the rock. The reason is below.

The coast

From the town the rock runs both ways. West towards Cala Iris, a fishing village on a sheltered bay with volcanic rock below, then on towards Jebha along a rugged coast with few roads. East it runs out to the Cap des Trois Fourches, an exposed headland that deserves a calm day to itself.

The bay in front of the town and its rocky islets are what made the reputation of the place: rock bottom, seagrass, and visibility that commonly runs from fifteen to thirty metres on the clear days.

The sea conditions page for Al Hoceima gives swell, wind, visibility, water temperature and a seven-day forecast. Open it before you set off, because the drive to some of these coves is not short.

The Al Hoceima National Park

Part of this coast lies inside the Al Hoceima National Park, the only park on Morocco's Mediterranean side with a marine component. Created in 2004, it covers some 19,000 hectares of sea in addition to the islets and rocks. No-take zones have been established inside it in consultation with local fishing associations and cooperatives.

It is reported to us that spearfishing is forbidden or strictly controlled within the marine part. We have not found a public text that publishes the boundaries precisely, so we will not guess at them here. Ask the park administration and the maritime fisheries delegation in Al Hoceima before you get in, and ask for the limits as coordinates rather than place names.

This is not an administrative detail. Going in with a speargun inside a no-take zone is an offence, and it is also the fastest way to get the door closed on every spearfisher who comes after you.

The best season

Summer and early autumn, without competition: June to October. The water is at its warmest, the Mediterranean settles here for days at a stretch, and visibility is at its best.

Winter is hard. The water drops to around fifteen and a half degrees in February and March, and northerly and easterly blows dirty the bay and shut it for days.

Spring is a transition. The water is still cold, but the calm days start to return and the fish begin to move.

Water temperature and wetsuit

These are the numbers to know before you buy a suit.

Winter: about 16 degrees on average, bottoming out in February and March around 15.5.
Spring: about 17 degrees, which is still cold whatever the sun is doing.
Summer: about 22 degrees on average, rising to 23 and above in August.
Autumn: about 20 degrees, which makes October an excellent month.

In practice a 5 mm serves most of the year and a 3 mm is enough in August and September. The wetsuit page explains the difference. The real figure for your day is on the spot page, so do not go by the average.

From the shore into the water

Almost all entries here are off rock rather than sand, and that changes everything.

Get in and out at the same point if you can, and look at it before you put the fins on. What looks easy to enter can be impossible to climb out of the moment the swell comes up a little.
The rock here is slippery. Socks are not a luxury, and going down sitting is safer than going down standing.
The short chop bouncing back off the cliffs is more dangerous than long swell. It lifts you and puts you on the stone in the same movement. If the water is hitting the rock hard at your entry point, find another cove.
Some coves have no phone signal. Tell somebody ashore where you are going and when you will be back.

The fish

Al Hoceima is dusky grouper and goldblotch grouper country — what people here simply call the mero — and they are the reason the area has the reputation it does. Read both species pages properly: they grow slowly and change sex with age, and leaving them to grow is not a loss but an investment.

Alongside them, common dentex in open water above the rock, white seabream, two-banded seabream and zebra seabream on the stone, brown meagre in the caves, and gilthead seabream and red porgy along the sand edges.

And passing through: leerfish, greater amberjack, barracuda and Atlantic bonito in season.

The permit

The maritime fisheries delegation in Al Hoceima issues the permit for this district. The procedure and the documents are in the permit guide. And while you are there, ask in the same visit about the park boundaries and about any closure order in force. One question will save you a serious problem.

In short

Al Hoceima gives the best of the Moroccan Mediterranean: real rock, clear water, and fish you will not find at this density anywhere else. It asks two things in return — know where the permitted area ends, and respect what grows slowly. To anyone who does both, Al Hoceima is generous every summer.