The original plan to dive from Campbeltown was scuppered by the weather but Allan and Val came up trumps by switching to Tarbert. Being that bit further into Loch Fyne we were pretty well guaranteed some diving and so it turned out.

Al kindly offered to act as chauffeur, taking Doug, Davie H and me along. The drive over on Friday night was fairly uneventful and we arrived at the B&B (Southcliffe with genial host Mike, a former diver himself) around 9.45. After a quick freshen up and dumping of the bags in the room, we joined the rest of the group (Louise, Craig S, Charlotte, Barrie and Val) in the Corner House for a beer or two. 

Saturday started with an enormous breakfast then we headed to the harbour to meet up with our skipper Malcolm and his crewman Darren. With the wind getting up a bit, Malcolm decided we should keep close to Tarbert and took us round to North Bay which was quite sheltered. This was a nice little wall dive with a sandy bottom and some scallops in evidence.

On surfacing, the wind had whipped up and we made heavy weather of the return to Tarbert. Unfortunately, this then meant that there was no more diving that day.

The afternoon passed pleasantly enough with coffee and buns in a local café, relaxing at the Cuillins courtesy of Al and Doug’s hostess, then dinner was at the Sea Bed restaurant attached to the Anchor Hotel – excellent. 

Sunday dawned somewhat calmer so we headed off for our morning dive. Another relaxing wall with plenty to see – huge crabs, plenty of wrasse and what I think is a dragonet from looking at the books when I got home.

Pictures by Al and Charlie – Click on a thumbnail to see the larger image.

After lunch we headed out to the wreck of the Arran 111 – a small puffer which ran on to Sgeir Leathann reef by Barmore Island in December 1932. The wreck is well broken up but an interesting dive all the same. Resident conger ‘Curly’ was keeping a low profile, though we think we caught a glimpse of his tail. 

So 3 dives out of 4 – pretty good for this time of year and with the usual good company, a very successful and enjoyable trip.

This was also my first experience diving off a hard boat – An extremely civilised way to dive with hot coffee and choccy biccies when we got back on board courtesy of Malcolm and Darren who have to be congratulated for their efforts to provide us with good dives in spite of the weather. (Any chance of fitting a lift to the club RIB? )

Thanks to Allan and Val for the original organising and for having the foresight to switch location to salvage the trip when the weather gods tried their damnedest to blow us away. I think everyone on the trip is keen to come back to this area as there are plenty of sites still to explore.  

It’s that time of year again: -

Click here to download a pdf file of the poster.

The original plan had been to organise a weekend’s trip to St Abbs, but what with one thing and another that became impossible. So Kevin “hijacked” the idea and organised a day trip and, on an unusually warm September Saturday, nine club members hauled themselves down to the Borders for an 11 am dive time.

We’d been told to look out for “the only red boat in the harbour”, which would have been easy if the boat hadn’t been out with a 9 a.m. group when we arrived. Plenty of time to admire the clear water and excellent vis, get kit together, find a cash machine and coinage for the car park, and change. Eventually the Stingray returned, loading was quickly achieved with the dockside winch, and off we went to the Black Carrs area of the St Abbs and Eyemouth Voluntary Marine Reserve. I was looking forward to seeing the wolf-fish for which the area is famous.

There was certainly plenty to see: sea fans, urchins, wrasse, ling, brittle stars, northern prawns jumping about on the rocks and one huge lobster. I was fascinated by the tube-worms that closed their “doors” as they sensed our approach, so that a brown/grey rock became progressively whiter the closer we got to it. Other underwater life included shoals of photographers with some very impressive camera and lighting rigs; a very rare species around Catterline. Aside from a minor kit problem at the end (a hyperactive octopus that spewed air so fast you could watch the gauge needle falling, necessitating a switch to my pony) I really enjoyed this dive. James found the lack of scrap metal tedious, but you can’t have everything.

(Right click below and select ‘Go Fullscreen’. Click with your mouse or use cursor keys to move between pics. Click on the icon on the bottom right of the picture to flip it over and see a description. Hit escape or right click and select ‘Exit Fullscreen’ to return. You’ll need Adobe Flash Player installed to view this.)

The afternoon dive, slightly to the north of the morning one, was marred by a bad fill for many (Chris and James had their own supplies) and less-good vis. Having thought my kit would prevent my doing a second dive I was very grateful to Chris for lending me his spare regs, and to James and Mark for sorting me out. James and I had an adventurous swim through the kelp forest, following several blind alleys and going over, round or through several apparent obstructions. We came up in the right place in the end, which was a relief! We saw a school of herring (?) but not a great deal else – definitely no wolf-fish, which was disappointing. On the plus side, my (and Chris’s) kit worked.

Some people felt that £15 a dive was high for a 5-minute trip out, ditto back, plus a cuppie and biscuit, but Mark was converted by the boat’s lift which made exiting the water a doddle. The bad fill was definitely a minus: they need a bigger compressor to cope with the sheer volume of bottles they were filling that day. Apparently the damage was caused by the compressor over-heating. But otherwise it was a good day and I hope to go back for a full weekend next year.

Many thanks to Kevin for organising the trip and to James for being a good buddy when things went awry.

(Words by Charlotte Fleming. Photography by Mark Skea, Charlotte Fleming & Kevin Prudhoe.)

With the weather smiling on us (for once) it looked like we’d get a decent dive off Lunan so 9 of us duly reported to the Ferryden slip – Barrie, Val, Al, Fiona, Charlotte, Mike, James and myself for diving – Colin kindly volunteering for boat handling despite suffering from a cold.

Well you didn’t expect it to run smoothly did you? Yellow boat arrived and was launched but the Nav system refused to play. Colin and Barrie nipped back to pick up Barrie’s boat and we set off in both boats, since Yellow Fever was already loaded with all the kit and was seaworthy in all other respects.

On The Way To Phineas Beard

Barrie homed in on the Phineas Beard and the shot was dropped on target (Barrie says). Val and Fiona, Al and Charlotte were also dropped as they were already kitted up in the floating banana. Then James and Mike transferred and kitted up leaving Barrie and me to go.

Read the rest…