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| Thursday 6.15, Joanne and I get to the B+B after a bit of a detour (that Tom Tom thing didn’t tell me we were going to a different Marine Drive 30 miles away from the one we wanted). Just time to unpack the car then go down to the Marina to give John and Warren a hand to unhook the boat, back to the digs then “Fancy a pint”, “ oh yes oh yes oh yes”, after a warp in time its 12.15 and a Pizza started to shout at us.
After breakfast on Friday we drive down to the marina. Jo and I get the air, John and Warren get the boat in the water. We load the dive gear on the boat and we are off speeding across the Clyde to our first dive site, a wall in front of the Castle on Wee Cumbrae, great for a shake down dive – off the boat into 8 meters of water, go east and down, then go left or right at the depth you want following the ledges. Lots of anemones and different types of starfish. Back to the Marina after the dive for more air and then out again to the next site, The Lady Isabella at the bottom of Wee Cumbrae, 8-15 meters depth and full of life but you have to look for it.
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| On Saturday we go across to Cumbrae to dive the Catalina flying boat. We know approximately where it is (we have the GPS coordinates but left them at the digs) so we spend some time finding it with the depth finder. John and Warren dive first but surface after a short time saying the vis is poor and its a terrible dive, and that the only thing worth looking at was a big lobster at one end of the girder (anyone who has dived this wreck will tell you that it looks nothing like a plane but more like a steel girder with cross bracing). Jo and I go down following the Shot line (that John had got right into the centre of the girder) but at 10m I look around and can see nothing except Jo’s torchlight. I give her the up sign and she agrees. Back to the Marina for air (complaining to each other that that was not a good dive). At the air station there is a chart on the wall, marked on the chart just where we had dived it says “FOUL WATER”…
On our way to our next dive sight we pass a small power boat stopped in the water with people waving to us, and soon realise that they are in trouble; the boat’s engine had blown up so we towed it back to the marina.
Next we’re down to Wee Cumbrae and dive Trail Island, a continuation of the wall we dived yesterday. Jo and I dropped in and followed the wall in a SW direction at around 10-15m, even more anemones, turned round after 20 minutes and got back to the anchor with plenty of air and time left so we were going to go off in the other direction but noticed that the anchor had got itself well and truly stuck (no amount of pulling or manoeuvring of the boat would have freed it). I decided to sacrifice the second part of our dive to release the anchor.
Fish and chips in the town square for tonight’s supper then a couple of pints whilst we talk our way to midnight.
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| On Sunday we go down to the bottom of Wee Cumbrae and pick a spot at random (just to see what was there). Another wall full of (guess what) yes that’s right anemones and dead mans fingers. We surfaced quite a way from the boat and had a long swim back (keeps you fit is what I kept telling myself).
Our next and last dive was around a pinnacle on Cumbrae at Clashfarland Point. John and Jo both said they were cold and would pass on this dive so Warren and I went in found a wall, which changed to a slope. We continued down but the light, vis and life got less and less. At 22m I signed this to Warren and we agreed to move up and along to find the pinnacle. At 15 m we found a wall with a horizontal crack running all the way along it full of life. At one point there were large shrimp type things (technical term) upside down where the crack widened. I moved my hand in to waft them about but Warren told me to stop and look up the crack. I lowered myself to look right up the crack and could now see a huge, great conger just up from where my hand had been! We moved on to find several large crabs, lobsters and conger all watching us from the safety of their lairs.
Boat out of the water, showered, changed, a glass of wine and we are off to the town to celebrate a good weekend’s diving.
Thanks to John, Warren and Joanne for the excellent company above and below the water.
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| Chris Heywood |
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