The two weeks prior to our trip to the Garvellachs were absoluty perfect weather wise, with the exception of the wind, which appears to be an ever present reminder that the weather can be fickle to those who are not prepared.

Debbie, Madadh the mut and myself had spent that two weeks in a walking holiday travelling from the Butt of Lewis all the way down to the Beautiful Island of Vatersay, with a dive in Vatersay Bay. We had been blessed with azure blue skies, sea to match and some of the best visibility I had seen for a while. So the following weekends diving was eagerly anticipated.

However as is the norm when planning dive trips the weather changed as we made our way from Barra to Oban to meet the rest of the group and Dave Ainsley, our skipper for the two days.

Our initial plans were to dive the Garvellachs and in between dives land on, and explore the islands or at least a couple of them.

For those of you who have not been to this part of the country, we may best start with a geography lesson.

The Garvellachs are a chain of four small Islands with accompanying skerries. They are uninhabited save for the ubiquitous sheep, seals and hundreds of seabirds. In years gone by the islands were once inhabited and the ruins of a monastery on Eilean an Naoimh show the religious importance these islands once had. The most impressive ruins however are the bee hive cells or ‘Clochain’ where a lonely hermit lived his days in peace and tranquillity (no daytime T.V. then)

There are also some ruins on Garbh Eileach, which is the largest island in the group. These islands are part of a group, which are also referred to the Slate Isles.

Up until 1965 Slate was quarried on Seil, Easdale and Luing, each of these islands have slate quarry’s which have now flooded and it is possible to dive some of them, others however (namely the quarry at Ellanabeich) are not recommended as dive sites. For more information on these Islands, and most of Scotland’s  other islands a look at ‘The Scottish Islands’ by Hamish Haswell-Smith make excellent reading.

The Garvellachs are within easy reach from Oban by a decent sized RIB, but the best way to get there is by hard boat and the MV Porpoise, which is owned and skippered by Dave Ainsley is one such boat.

Dave has lived and worked in this area for a number of years, but has been a regular visitor since the 70’s.

He also is a well-known underwater photographer with some of his work appearing on the cover of this magazine. One of his reef shots is can be found on the ScotSAC membership ID card, though sadly someone has decided to alter the original picture, and very badly too.

Most of the dives in this area are cliff faces, underwater pinnacles (it would be quite difficult to dive on a pinnacle that wasn’t underwater) and drift dives. There are a number of wrecks in the area, the best known one being the Helena Faulbaums which sank in 1956, but as she is about 51 metres to the deck, it is better left to the technical squad, besides the cliffs and drifts are far better dives.

Unfortunately due to tide times and a lousy forecast the Saturday morning was an early start. ‘Meet me at the pier at 0745’ Dave said cheerfully.

So at 0745 (approx) we met Dave at Balvicar Pier not so bright eyed and bushy tailed, which had nothing to do with any refreshments that had been taken the previous evening. Balvicar is on the Isle of Seil, which lies about 15 miles South of Oban and famous for its slate (they have slate beaches here, honest) and the “Bridge over the Atlantic”, though at this point the “Atlantic” is the Seil Sound and it at best 8 feet wide. However its proper title is the Clachan Bridge and must be one of the most picturesque in Scotland.

Once all the kit was stowed, introductions completed and safety briefings dealt with, we made our way to our fist site via the Cuan Sound.

The Cuan Sound is an amazing site to see when the tide is running. Situated between the islands of Seil and Luing, the water appeared to boil around us as the Sound is effected by up welling currents. Cuan Sound can be dived, but only near slack water and with experienced boat cover. If you get it wrong, you may find yourself in a 9 to 11 knot current.

The weather wasn’t brilliant, with low lying mist almost hiding a not too distant Isle of Mull. There was also a big swell that had been predicted to get worse as the day wore on.

Our fist dive was on an underwater pinnacle called Jeanie’s Reef, named after Dave’s wife (Who said romance was dead). We dropped a shotline and entered the water.

Once we reached the top of the pinnacle we took a NW bearing and headed for the drop off, which was at about 14 metres. Once ‘over the edge’ the current ceased and we could relax and get our breaths back. The cliff face was covered in white and orange Dead Men’s Fingers, Devonshire Cup Corals, Sea Cucumbers, Sea Squirts (or Debz calls them ‘squidgies’), huge colonies of Football Sea Squirts which were more the size of a basket ball than a football. Throughout the dive we were petered by all types of Wrasse with the most noticeable being the male cuckoo Wrasse in dazzling red and blue colouring. As our bottom time was counting down and Phil indicated that he was down to 100bar we made our way back towards the Kelp, where we found, Plumose Anemones, 2 large Octopus which tried to hide by changing colour to suit there background, both however gave up and disappeared into the kelp in a cloud of black ink.

Amongst the kelp stalks we found Urchins the size of footballs, Large Cushion Stars and lots of Gobies and Blennies. Phil was now down to 75 bar, so it was time to inflate the SMB and continued the ascent to our 3 metre stop before surfacing. Once on the surface we found that the boat was close at hand, unfortunately the rest of the group had also surfaced at the same time and all within an area of 20 feet so we formed an orderly queue, and made our way up the ladder. Depths on this site can get to 40 metres.

Phil who had also been volunteered as a volunteer crewmember quickly busied himself with the kettle and we all shortly had coffee, tea or soup to help keep out the cold.

We anchored close to where the ruins were on Eileach an Naoimh, however the swell made a landing tricky, so we decided to try a little fishing instead.

The fishing wasn’t to relieve boredom though, Our second dive would be so much better if we had some fish to go in with. We appeared to find our selves in among a shoal of suicidal Mackerel, and after a short time we had enough fish for Dave’s tea and our next dive.

As we motored to our next site, Dave gave us a lesson in the natural history of the islands. Everything from the birds on the cliffs to Dolphins, Minke Whales and the increasing numbers (albeit slowly) of Basking Sharks.

On arrival at the next site, we were all giving a dive brief. These briefs are all carried out with a drawing of what we will expect on the dive. If there is not already a drawing on the boat, Dave will simply draw one, and although art is not one of his strong points, the drawings and the description are correct.

The Conger wall is another pinnacle, though not one with any great depth, but on this dive, depth is the last thing you want. When you reach the top of the pinnacle you head NW, until you come to the top of the cliff face, once on the face, you stop getting buffeted by the current. Keeping the cliff on your left side you swim along until the top of the pinnacle forms an overhang. I was carrying the goody bag with the fish heads and tails and as we all wanted to see the main attraction we all went in as one group. We were told that at a certain point we would come across a large crack in the rock. In this crack was a resident Conger Eel, who if we were lucky could be fed the fish. Each of us in turn fed which was had about an 8 – 10 inch girth. Try as we might though, it refused to come too far out from its cover. After about 10 minutes we moved along the reef when we found another Conger. This one decided that it would come out to us rather than wait for us to come to it. Unfortunately it didn’t appear to be all that interested in the fish preferring my D.V and pressing its snout up against the front lens of my mask so that I couldn’t even focus on it, it being that close. This Conger also inspected the rest of the group

Swimming very leisurely around each member of the group, but for reasons unbeknown to me it kept coming back to my D.V, maybe the smell of the fish was on my valve.

I have seen Congers out and about a number of times, but mostly all you get is a quick glance before it disappears into its hole. The only place I was aware of Congers swimming up to you is a wreck near Rathlin Island or the shark tank at Deep-Sea World. This is definitely a must do dive.

After another 10 minutes the Conger eventually realised that we had some grub, so we fed it the rest of the fish.

Saturday night was spent touring the fleshpots of Oban and having a blether albeit a short one with our Regional Coach, Don Lees. ‘We shall put this down as another Branch visit’ joked Don.

Sunday dawned much the same as Saturday with low lying mist and a heavy swell, the only good thing was that we didn’t have to be at Balvicar until 0900 (approx).

Our first dive of the day was to be on The Eagles. I thought that this was a strange name for an underwater cliff face, however we later learned of a very old Golden Eagles nest which was on the cliff face above. Sadly the Eagles haven’t bred this year or last, but it is hoped that someday one of the offspring may return to this site.

The best part of this dive is at around the 30 metre mark where there is a cliff face that disappears into the inky blackness. The face is again covered with Dead Men’s Finger’s, Devonshire Cup Corals, Plumose Anemones and other squidgies that sadly all seem to have only Latin Name and which I cant even spell let alone pronounce. There are Sea Cucumbers, Cotton Spinners, two more Octopus, Saithe, Pouting and of course the ever present Wrasse, I figured that my suit still smelled of fish as I seemed to have shoals of them following me. As we made our way up the slope and amongst the kelp the visibility dropped slightly due to a plankton bloom and also the large number of Jellyfish which were in the top 5 metres, at times it was like jelly soup. Most of the Jelly’s were the bog standard Common Jelly but there were also the Cyanea Lamarkii or as I call them the blue Lions Mane.

Again we decided to catch some more Mackerel during our surface interval, this time however it was for our tea and not the Conger. While we were fishing, and for reasons that are not quite clear, we were given a rendition of Shakespeare’s Macbeth by Dave and by our own John Gargan.

Who said that divers are not cultured?

Ali decided that while we were at anchor in a slight swell, she would barf all over John (obviously a critic) and in the wheelhouse. To add to her embarrassment Dave mentioned that it was the first time anyone had barfed inside the boat.

Always leave a lasting impression, that’s our motto.

Our next dive was to be a drift dive, The last time I was in this neck of the woods I had a drift through the Grey Dogs or Bealach A Choin Ghlas, which is a small channel between the islands of Scarba and Lunga. I was hoping to do this again, but as some of the groups have not had much experience of a good drift dive, Dave thought it best that we dive something a little more sedate.

So we made our way to the channel between Garbh Eileach and Dun Chonnuill. Here we found a nice gentle drift of 1 or 2 knots and followed the rock face on the North side of the channel.

The marine life again was spectacular with any rock surfaces covered with Dead Men’s Fingers, Football Sea Squirts, Sea Cucumbers, Nudibranchs, 2 large Dogfish, Devonshire Cup Corals and Cotton Spinners. Even with the gentle drift, this visibility wasn’t startling but at about 6 metres it wasn’t all that bad either. As we followed the face we found a Mermaids Purse or Egg cases for the Dogfish, A quick inspection revealed a yolk sac inside the egg, but we were unable to see if there was a Dogfish in it. In the past I have watched the young Dogfish wriggling to free its self of its egg case, but not this time. Towards the end of the dive we made our way up to the deco stop and the now expected jelly soup and waited a couple of minutes, before surfacing to find the boat alongside.

Later on this year or early next, Dave hopes to have the new and bigger boat ready for charter, this will allow a much wider scope for dive sites and give the passengers more room, the only problem may be that with divers, the more room they have, the more bits of non-essential bits of kit they bring.

For an area that offers such exceptional diving the Garvellachs are not that well known as a dive site. I suppose that with big wrecks around Oban, people are less likely to want to carry out some scenic stuff, but believe me it’s well worth it.

Air and equipment is available from Dave and also Mike Tye of Oban Divers, which is the longest established dive centre in Oban and by far the best.

Oban Divers has Bunkhouse accommodation and a campsite for the more hardy diver.

Oban has plenty of varied accommodation, but we opted to stay with Kevin and Fiona Hall at the Maridon House B&B, where they welcome divers and those with an accompanying mut. All the rooms are en-suite and Kevin is so easily wound up he should be clockwork.

They also have a self catering flat in the centre of Oban.

Fascinating fact of the day c/o Dave Ainsley

If your are on a dive and come across a Conger Eel, Don’t shine your mega bright dive torch at the Congers face.

Conger Eels do not have an iris, therefore if you stick your torch in its mush, you will more than likely blind it, or at the very least you will piss it off.

Not a lot of people know that !!!

	Boat Hire Dave Ainsley, MV Porpoise. Tel – 01852 300203   Air Supplies Dave Ainsley. Tel – 01852 300203 Mike Tye, Oban Divers. Tel – 01631 566618   Accommodation Kevin & Fiona Hall, Maridon House. Tel – 01631 562670 Mike Tye, Oban Divers. Tel – 01631 566618   Tourist Information Oban, Argyll Square. Tel – 01631 563122