The park was established in 2004 to protect the extraordinary underwater life of the south coast. It runs for 7km, from the Marine Science Centre aquarium to the Royal Diving Club, and has around 20 dive sites. The most famous are the wreck of the Lebanese cargo ship Cedar Pride, scuttled in 1985 at the suggestion of the current King Abdallah II, now rich in soft and hard corals, the Japanese garden with its blooms of soft coral and mray eels, and Paradise with its red coral and cave-dwelling glassfish.