Poseidon's Parlour: Northern Exposure - Part 1

Thursday 4 May 2017

Northern Exposure - Part 1 - 28/04/2017

With summer nearly upon us my club, Eastwood Sub Aqua Club, has planned a trip to Loch Sunart in the Scottish Highlands. Despite its relative close proximity (around 140km as the crow flies) it takes almost four hours to get there due to a combination of traffic, ferries and single track roads. As such, we took the opportunity to stop two thirds of the way up at The Slates, Loch Leven.

The Slates is one of my favourite dives and I was especially excited for two reasons:

I had finally managed to repair my camera
I was going to be the buddy of Campbell who was returning to diving after a medical break

We took our time and kitted up making sure the Chairman (Campbell's new nickname) was comfortable before checking kit and heading into the water. We were keeping it shallow (20m) and it really paid off with a nice catshark, pink spotted sea cucumbers, sunstars and a compliant ballan wrasse. The Chairman was performing admirably and seemed pretty comfortable, but as we started our ascent he signalled he was cold - not surprising, the bottom temperature was about 4c.

We surfaced and dekitted, where he decided to call it quits for the day. With a number of other divers also doing the same it meant that it fell to myself and the Barrman to restore the pride of club. We kitted up, buddy checked and headed down.

As we reached about 12m I looked right and spotted one of the most brazen octopus' I had ever seen. Sadly, the Barrman hadn't seen it and as I fiddled with camera I realised he was about to fin right over the to of it. I violently shook my torch but sadly it was too late to prevent a silt tsunami.

I kept my eye on the octopus and waited for the cloud to disperse as much as possible, but it was too late to great picture. I mean, I got a snap, but I was later accused of simply having photographed a red rock by a rather mean spirited Shiny.

We continued round enjoying the pleasant drift and admiring a lovely selection of Devonshire cup corals, before emerging cold and ready to enjoy the warmth of the cars up to our base for the weekend, Resipole.