Mid Lancs Sub Aqua

Doesn’t time fly by so quickly !

Was it really 12 months ago that I said wouldn’t it be a jolly good idea to go to Scapa Flow ?, and in less than 4 hours of advertising the idea the trip it was full, and such was the demand a second boat was needed.

Anyhow, 12 months and a lots of preparation, phone calls, and e-mails later we trundled our way the 500 or so miles to Scrabster to catch the afternoon ferry to Stromness where we would embark on an adventure that would push the boundaries of personal experience, endurance, and resilience.

With the group split across Andy Cuthbertson’s excellent boats Jean Elaine & the Sharon Rose, the week began with the usual “I’m sure I packed it”, “It doesn’t work”, “Is it meant to do that”, “pass me another sacrificial chicken for my voodoo box”. But eventually all kit was assembled and readied for the week ahead.

The first days diving started well for all in our party, with the usual big lumps of metal, wrasse waiting to be fed urchins by divers, 10m viz, etc etc; which can be more than said for another group – nothing at all to do with Mid Lancs SAC at all (all names withheld to protect the innocent & so I can’t get sued for slander…). It started with Andy our skipper asking me – are all our divers back on board ?, obviously Yes they were; but long story short another boat had left 4 divers in the water which had thankfully been picked up by our sister boat ‘Sharon Rose’. An act which boarders on criminal neglect, but you would have hoped that lessons would have been learned from that, but unfortunately different people learn at different rates, and it would have to happen again before said people learned to count passed 8.

Anyway, with the first couple of dives on the F2 & YC21 over and done with (and very nice dives they were too), we started to embark on gradually deeper dives, Karlsrue, Dresden, Brummer, James Barrie, etc, etc. All of which had everybody saying that’s my favourite dive yet, until somebody said can we dive on the ‘Barrel of Butter’ for something a little different.

And yes it was a very different experience; we were all expecting to dive on a reef which sloped down to around 30m, which was covered in many different types of marine life. The reality of the dive was somewhat different, as I don’t think anybody ventured past 3m deep, because of the seals which came out to play, at one point we were completely surrounded by around 30 seals with the juveniles of the heard swimming close by. Fantastic.

The evenings passed by quite smoothly, with time being spend in the local hostelry, preparing the man eating crabs we’d wrestled to the surface, sipping a wee dram of fine scotch, sacrificing even more chickens for the voodoo boxes, and one person who shall remain nameless chatting to a man in a well ironed uniform who drove around in a car with ‘ECILOP’ in large letters on the bonnet.

All too soon we would be heading to our last dives of the week, the Jean Elaine to the Tabarka and the Sharon Rose to the Barrel of Butter for the seals. From a personal point of view the Tabarka will always be one of my favourite ship wrecks, not particularly deep, but very atmospheric and in some ways spooky, as the whole of the dive is conducted inside the wreck. It is best described as swimming around inside a cathedral at dusk with the lights out.

Once again many many thanks to everyone who came along to make the week so special and a special thank you goes to Andy (skipper – Jean Elaine) & Kevin (skipper – Sharon Rose) who’s witty banter and attention to detail well ok the ability to count past 8 saved a few embarrassing moments, and Mark the deck hand who was simply brilliant.

We will return…

Andy