Duo-Divers

This is the 'type' of bottom which I was talking about, formed from loads of worm tubes, it's quite soft and sandy so can feel crunchy if your buoyancy control is poor.

A plaice (Pleuronectes platessa), an unusal sight for the northern diver and if big enough most frequently seen impaled on a knife!

Wreckage is strewn all over the site, generally if it is 'big things' then it will have been from SS Abessinia a german ship sunk en-route back from it's internment in WWI

Girders and bits and bats that have flattened onto the bed-rock in the main gully

The front end of the helicopter, there are loads of 'things' to see, most of which have been stripped by divers!

Sea Hare (aplysia punctata) you get loads and loads of them on the south side of the point feeding and breeding!

More wreckage that has just collapsed in on itself

More s'cenic stuff 'showing the hull rent where the engine room has been blasted open.

A common Hermit crab (Pagurus bernhardus), this one seemed to have a load of eggs around the outer edge of the shell

Mid-way along the site is an area of angular boulders which go further up the wall (?) they appear new, with very little life attached' but have been there over 30 years. Look carefully and you will find crustaceans among the jumble.

Some sort of winching arrangement, this is a large section of wreckage within a short distance of the boilers

Into Staple Sound and providing there is no current its just coarse sand and fist sized stones with some Dead mans fingers (Alcyonium digitatum) and other small creatures, not worth the swim guys!

Well on the way but too shiny for my liking.

An internal photo of SS Breda

There was a bit of solder 'snot' but this was easily removed by turning and gentle work with a dremel.

Once inside there is plenty of room to move about without many intact bulkheads you'd struggle to loose your buddy too. The floor was wood with no metal plate behind so it's rotting away rapidly.

By late summer the once bare stems of the kelp are little microcosms of weeds and small animals, the winter storms smashes everything up but twelve months later it's all back.

In this case the camouflage of the Pogge (Agonus cataphractus) wasn't good enough and this live fish was caught by a Velvet swimming Crab (Necora puber)

A bit of a view from the wall out, you can see the bloody lobster pot string and maybe see that the topography at this point is 'saw tooth' even though the height change is less than one meter.

A very large, well the largest that I have ever seen Common Octopus (Octopus vulgaris), she was sitting on-top of a rock pretending to be weed but had the 'wrong' colouration, the skin texture was right though!

I - And after lots of investigation into various oils I opted for high quality Danish Oil rather than Tung oil or similar

Not a great photograph but this little critter is a Fifteen Spined Stickleback (Spinachia spinachia) it's really camouflaged and only became apparent when it made a dash for some kelp! A small fish maybe 10cm long I am sure that they are more common than they first appear!

Drop in from Black Rock, swim North and the bottom starts off as fist size cobbles with occasional large boulders which are swathed in kelp.