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Dives from Dinas Head to St Davids Head: |
Dinas
Head - Drift:
What a dive to keep me
keen on diving around Pembrokeshire. The weather was perfect, the sun was shinning
the sea was calm and the atmosphere was relaxed. At 10.30am six club members and two
family passengers set off to a new dive location off Dinas Head.
My buddy and I ventured into the unknown; the depth started at 11 metres and very
gradually progressed to 19 metres. The visibility was 3 - 4 metres, which was
fine for a nice gentle drift. The terrain was varied with fascinating rock formations.
If I thought after diving these waters for nine years that I could see nothing
new, I was wrong! For the first time I saw a sponge feeding (I think) - it had
a beak like feature with little tentacles in a fan shape sweeping the waters around
it and I watched in amazement for quite a few minutes. Following this I saw the
tiniest shrimp gearing up for a fight with me, which made me chuckle. I then saw
the biggest lobster I have seen in a very long time, fields of dead men's fingers
and urchins the size of footballs. I could go on and on but, alas, without the
help of our club member Steve Myatt's book Underwater Pembrokeshire as a reference I feel I could
not possibly correctly identify everything.
After 45 minutes diving my buddy and I returned safely to the boat and couldn't
wait to share our diving experience with the other members. Just to top off the
perfect day, as we were having refreshments a cheeky seal popped up close to the
boats to say hello.
Rebecca Hughes
Dive Leader and Club Instructor |
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Last
invasion wreck found by divers: |
Members of Red Dragon Divers look
set to re-write history following their discovery
of an unidentified shipwreck off Strumble Head.
Until recently historians believed that no ships
were lost during the French invasion in 1797 but
the wreckage found by the divers to date suggests
it comes from a large warship of the Napoleonic
era.
We
have already found copper drift pins attached
to fragments of wood, large structural pieces
of iron, a swivel gun and, most exciting of all,
three cannons, the largest of which is about eight
feet long.
The find has attracted interest from a
number of official bodies. Cadw, the Welsh Assembly's
historic environment agency sent a team
of specialist archaeologists to the site and the Nautical Archaeological Society is
hoping to carry out a survey of the wreckage.
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The Government's Receiver of Wreck
appointed Red Dragon Divers the official
guardian of the wreck and authorised the club
to donate the drift pins and other small finds
to St Mary's Church Hall, Fishguard, as part of
an exhibition of Last Invasion artefacts.
The wreck, which lies in 30 metres of
water, was found by chance in 2003 by Richard and Rebecca Hughes of Merlin's
Bridge, Haverfordwest but because of strong currents and adverse weather conditions
they were unable to return to the site until last summer, when they were joined
by other divers from the club. After several false starts they eventually located
the wreck and over the course of several dives began to get a good idea of the
importance of their discovery.
Richard is the club's diving officer.
He says: "Strumble Head has a legendary reputation for wrecking trading
ships and is just as dangerous today as it was hundreds of years ago. Conditions
for diving are rarely favourable so expeditions to this area have to be carefully
planned. Underwater visibility is often very poor with no surface light and at
times we can only see what is visible in the beams of our torches. The day we
first discovered the wreck visibility was unusually good, otherwise we would
never have found it."
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Strumble
Head:
Since originally
discovering what seems to be a Napoleonic ship
wreck in 2003 it has been a club project
to survey the site in greater detail. We organised a three-day exploration, concentrating
on surveying the site and trying to locate what
we believe to be cannons. As it is a 35m dive
all experienced sport divers and higher were invited
to take part.
On our third
and final day we were all having briefings about
the morning's diving and what were the targets
of the day. My buddy and I decided to just have
a drift dive to see where the current took us.
It seems that every dive I have at Strumble Head
is different. Just imagine what
it is like to float peacefully at a gentle pace
over varied terrain, from a kelp forest, fantastic
rock formations, boulders and gravel to reefs
rich in marine life.
As I had
seen four octopi this season my buddy joked before
going into the water about seeing another. I said
I'd try my best.
On nearing
the end of our wonderful relaxing dive I saw something
flash past me. As I focused I realised it was an octopus
in full flight… In a split second I looked
for my buddy who was right beside me but looking
the other way. I had a million thoughts flash
through my mind, about how to signal octopus and
point it out but I knew by the time it would
have taken we would have missed it. I decided
to gently grab her arm and fin like mad towards
the octopus. To our amazement it just stopped
and sat on a rock right in front of us. We watched
it for a minute or two - it was breathtaking.
Without further ado off it went into the distance.
As it was the end of our dive we ascended slowly
to the surface with big satisfied grins on our
faces. What an excellent end to an exciting three-day
tour of Strumble Head.
Rebecca
Hughes
Dive Leader
Red Dragon Divers
July 2005
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