Shore Diving Loch Fyne - 07
Eight hours driving, three shore dives, eight hours back…………crazy?
Quite possibly!
Loch Fyne had been very high up on my list of things I wanted to do this year. Like many of the sea lochs in Scotland the photographs I had seen told of a wide variety of marine life that was lurking below the surface. During the course of the year nothing had come up that fitted in round work. The main problem was that it was best part of a day’s drive there and the same back, meaning that it had to be an extended weekend.
In spite of having many dives blown out and weekends lost to the poor weather conditions I’d had a brilliant August spending two weeks diving Shetland off Halton. So I wasn’t too disappointed with my diving year however, I still hankered after a trip to Loch Fyne. With the end of the year looming into sight I thought the opportunity was unlikely and had more or less shelved the idea when the chance came! Someone on Yorkshire Divers had posted spaces on their club trip, shore diving Loch Fyne. After a few emails back and forth it was all sorted.
Driving up there was lovely. Once you get Glasgow behind you Scotland is the most beautiful place in the UK and the time of the year meant it was at its best. All the trees along the sides of Loch were every shade of orange, yellow and brown imaginable. As I stopped to watch the sun glinting off the water which gently lapped against the rocky sides of the loch, I knew it was going to be a super weekend.
Unusually for me I wasn’t going to camping this time as the group had arranged self catering accommodation at a lovely place not far from the dive sites. Following much discussion the night before it had been decided that the first dive was to be Furnace Quarry.
Carting all my kit down piece by piece and putting it together before kitting up near the water’s edge always made me rather envious of the people who could kit up near their cars, then fearlessly stride across rocky shores to enter the water. I eyed up the green slimy rocks that I still had to cross. I always viewed these sorts of entries with great trepidation not just because a fall would result in a nasty injury but I was worried about damaging my camera. However, there is rather a convenient slab of rock at this particular site and should the tide be just right you can sit on it and get your kit on before dropping into the water. Finally kitted up and ready to go I set off following the shore to the right. Despite the brightness of the day above and the reasonable visibility the dark boulders tumbling down the sides of the loch and scattered across the bottom contributed to the rather gloomy light. As I worked my way along the gently sloping sides the considerable amount of rubbish that has been dumped was very much in evidence. Tin cans and tyres dotted the underwater landscape but amidst all this junk grew the most fabulous deeplet anemones.
Like flowers struggling to grow on a rubbish tip, every so often one of these huge anemones would appear sitting atop a boulder, its creamy whiteness almost glowing like a beacon in the murk.
Many of the rocks were dotted with sea squirts and other anemones whilst small edible crabs peered out from over hanging rocks at the black clad visitors disturbing their world again.
Dozens of pairs of claws (belonging to squat lobsters), lay hanging out of cracks and crevices, but it was rare to catch the owners of these sitting outside their lairs as they usually do. Not far from the entry point I came across a large wrasse who for sometime kept swimming about in front of me. Having tried unsuccessfully to take some pictures of him I eventually gave up. Turning my attention back to the boulders along the sloping sides of the loch I suddenly felt the side of my head collide with something. Initially I thought I had somehow hit my head on a rock but soon dispensed with this idea as the culprit swim into view…..it was the wrasse! Not feeling I was giving him enough attention he had head butted me! Managing to give Mr Wrasse the slip I continued on for a little while before retracing my steps a little higher up and returning to the entry point.
After a quick look at the water by the tearooms and some discussion over a hot chocolate it was decided that we would try the dive off the jetty in the caravan park. Kitting up during frequent downpours of rain we gradually traipsed down the jetty and into the water. A nice easy entry with the jetty being a convenient place for ones camera whilst popping fins on etc. We had been advised that there were some boats that had been sunk to make an underwater feature; some vague waving of arms out across the water was meant to indicate the general position. I knew with my navigating skills it would be more luck than judgement if I should find these but nevertheless thought it would be good practise, so I set off in the general direction. When, after five minutes finning, I found myself getting shallower rather than deeper, I decided to surface and found that I had actually been swimming at right angles to the direction I had wanted to go. Setting out once again I eventually came to the area where I thought the boats might be. Huge lumps of concrete held anchor chains in place for the moored boats above but of the boats that had been sunk….not a sign. However, when I started investigating these concrete lumps I found not only were they covered with some beautiful sea squirts and sponges but various fish and hermit crabs were scurrying around on the top as well.
Meanwhile a closer look at the silty seabed revealed a whole host of life bustling about. Shore and spider crabs scampering away as soon as camera lens got anywhere near them darting off amongst the hundreds of horse mussels, razor shells and scallops that littered the seabed.
So despite being a bit of a disappointment for those that were hoping to find the sunken vessels, (I was not the only who was unsuccessful), if you like macro photography it was great! The following day we decided to return to Furnace Quarry which gave me another opportunity to take a few more snaps of the deeplet anemones although my strobe started to play up. Having had an eight hour drive up to Loch Fyne and with work the following day I decided to cut the last dive and head home. This turned out to be a good move as the traffic on the M6 was at a standstill at times and it took me nearly 10hours to get back. However, later looking at the pics of the anemones it had been worth it just for those.
More pics Loch Fyne
