By Ste Davies
The trip started with a David Attenborough esque display from a large pod of dolphins all the way from St Abbs Harbour to the wreck of the Glanmire. Some staying ahead doing almost synchronised jumps, and a large number behind playing in the boats wake.
Just as we were kitting up at the dive site another hard boat full of divers pulled up giving us some reassurance that along with the dolphins, we weren’t the only fools braving the 6° water of the Scottish coast on a brisk January morning.
The skipper having timed impeccably well with slack water, allowed divers to jump in two by two. Featuring a wide array of equipment, twin sets, side mount, rebreather, stage cylinders and pony’s galore. Descending the shot line, a steady 30m to the wreckage below, we found a surprising 6 to 7 meters viz and not too far to look before seeing torch beams from fellow divers.
With large parts of the wreck easily identifiable it made for a very enjoyable dive, viewing the carpeting of dead mans fingers and spotting the various crabs and lobsters hiding underneath wreckage and wedged in cracks. The odd codling and wrasse were easily spotted hiding from the various torch beams. The wreck lies North to South so makes it simple to navigate around.
With some divers making it back to the shot line and some sending up dsmbs to be picked up we regrouped on the boat for coffee and cake. With some having treasure to show off.
After a 90 min interval, skipper Paul positioned us just off Cathedral Rock our second stop. After showing us a map of the dive site, he gave us a bearing of SW to get us under the archway and to explore the surrounding rocks and scenery, with a bearing of NE to get us back to be picked up.
Cathedral Rock itself is a giant archway and when seen it becomes clear where the name comes from, the viz was still good considering the poor weather conditions on the run up to the trip, in parts it was even better than the previous deeper dive. There was a wide variety of life to be seen, from various crab types and lobsters and a good selection of anemone, starfish, and urchin. Once all divers had been collected, we had a short ride back to the harbour swapping stories and warming up.
Overall, the trip was a great success with good dives all round and some training and experience goals completed. All very positive for a cold January Sunday and a great start to the year.
