Shetland Isles June 2011

There's nothing more beautiful than the ocean. This is the Shetland Isles at midnight - relaxing after day one of our deep wreck week.

We were doing a virgin dive on a wreck thought to be SS Park Mill, with MV Valkyrie . The wreck was possitively identified by recovery of the bridge bell by Colin Icky.

Scapa Flow 2011

APRIL 22nd – 30th

Dive the scuttled German fleet in Scapa Flow wrecks even better than the Thistlegorm and bristling with guns you won’t believe the size of them be astonished at the thickness of armour plating on the battle cruisers.
Scapa Flow offers some of the best wreck diving in the world for all levels of diver you don’t need to be a teccy to dive here the vis is usually in excess of 15M with excellent light penetration. Max depth on the wrecks is around 20M to the top and 40M to the sea bed a lot of them lie on their side so offer loads to see at any depth. A big majority of the wrecks are in a max depth of around 36M.
Seals ganets and dolphin are well known in scapa you may well find a friendly seal following you around the wreck or see the ganets plunging down to the wreck to feast on the fish they look comical as they swim through the water as tho they were flying.
Deep diver spec with nitrox is an ideal level of experience to dive scapa flow. You will get the max time on the wrecks and be able to explore them to the full obviously the deeper you go the shorter your time on the wreck.
For the divers that want even more time on the wrecks we will be offering TEC 40 & Tec 45 courses on the trip. Ask Steve / Mike for more details on these courses.
The trip is on a liveaboard Jean Elaine that is comfortable warm and probably the most stable dive platform we have ever dived from. We will moor in Stromness every night so that we can sample the local hostelries and go ashore to see the circle of Brodgar a circle of obelisk like stones erected before Stonhenge and then there is Scara Brae one of the oldest settlements ever found it pre dates Stonehenge at BC 3100.
There is a full galley where we cater for ourselves we have some decent chefs aboard who will do the cooking and all chip into buy the required ingredients fresh each day from the local shops and businesses.
All this and more for £340 a head excluding Nitrox travel ferries and catering.
A deposit of £140 secures your place once 10 places are booked we will confirm the trip.

Orkney Northern Isles Trimix week

Scubatoons have some spare places on a trimix trip to Orkney Northern Isles.

The trip is on Jean Elaine out of Stromness with Andy Cuthbertson. Dates will be 15/10/2010 – 23/10/2010 including a day for travelling either side of the trip.

We plan to dive the U102 and U92 on Sunday / Monday to catch the best tides. These Subs have only been dived 4 or 5 times previously and are bolt upright on the seabed. After the subs we'll dive a pick of some of the wrecks listed below.

We will be catching the ferry from Scrabster on the Friday night and staying in a B&B in Stromness.Then load boat at 9:00 sat morning whilst it is being cleaned. Shake down dive sat afternoon and steam out to northern isles after to do the subs this will give us an extra day on the subs if needed. We are only planning two days on the subs.

There are only 3 spare places.

The cost of the trip excluding travel, ferries and gas will be £400 a head, self-catering. We will be putting into port on Stronsay most nights and there is a B&B for £35 a head for those of you who don't want to stay on Jean Elaine. There are only 4 rooms sleeping 8 you can book early or take your chances when we are there. The PUB also does food for if we get fed up of self catering.
Gas is
He 2.3 per lt
O2 1.4 per lt
We have the flow as an absolute last resort if the weather goes bad but that would be highly unlikely. Although we can’t guarantee anything.

Other wrecks on the east side (for westerly winds)

Dagestan ( tanker ) 62m
Girilda ( freighter ) 60m
Duke of Albany ( armed merchant cruiser ) 71m
Nesus ( destroyer ) 70m
Sivinta ( freighter ) 58m
Express ( small Freighter ) as yet undived not sure of depth but it will be around the 70m mark I would think.
The subs 102 and 92 both in 80+m range
And I think by that time a 3rd sub as yet undived
There are a good few other wrecks as well as these but these are just a few for a taste!
Also you have all the wrecks out of Wick starting at 50m up to the 80ms

On the west side there are not so many as yet but they are building on it

Tosto 55m
Kingston Turquoise 62m
Pheasant 84m ( same class as Nesus but nowhere as good a dive )
Frideige 84m
U297 86m

And possibly some more further out yet to be researched

And we have all the Cape Wrath wrecks ranging from 65m to the 80ms
If some of these are a little deep there is plenty to dive in the 40 -50M range and loads a bit shallower.

Places are confirmed by deposit of £100. Final payment due by end of August 2010. Contact bookings@scubatoons.eu for more information or to book your place.
The plan is to get together for two weekends just before the trip to get dive fit and ready for the subs more on that later.