Stoney Cove- My First Visit

Stoney Cove Car Park

Having heard a lot of people taking about Stoney Cove being the in-land diving place to visit, I thought as I was in Birmingham for DIVE 2013 I should pay a visit to Stoney Cove which is just nearby.  Not knowing a huge amount about Stoney Cove I wasn't really sure what to expect.  Taking to a few people at DIVE 2013 I asked around for advise on the best parts to dive and what the general layout of Stoney Cove was.  I was then told the bad news, Stoney Cove is always busy at the weekend and to be their at 7am!!  That meant Saturday night's pub plan had be just a few pints!

Staying at a guest house just a few minutes from Stoney Cove we got a full cooked breakfast at 7am and made our way to the dive center just after 7.15am, luckily we got straight in and managed to get parked at the first car park along side the quarry.  If the car park is full you'll have to wait till people leave or you get the option of being in car park 2 which is a little bit of a walk with your equipment to the entry points.  After taking a quick look around and picking up the tanks it was time to kit up.  I was diving with my new Forth Element 7mm Proteus Semi-dry and my friend with his Typhoon Divemaster dry suit.  It was the first time I'd dived with this semi-dry so I was eager to try it out and to see if all the raving reviews I'd read about it all added up.

After buddy checks we were ready to enter the water, as it was quite a sunny day I was ready to get in as putting a brand new 7mm semi-dry suit on is a bit of a challenge! We'd decided to swim out to the Stanegarth marker buoy and then descend rather than navigating our way out to the wreck.  The visibility was reasonably good so we circled the wreck and then took a compass baring make towards the exit point.  On the way back we came across a few other bits of wreckage, an old land rover, a submarine and a swim through under the pub bench.  There was quite a lot of marine life about including little crayfish, perch and carp.


During the surface interval we grabbed some food and hot drinks from the little cafe near the entry points.  Everything that was on offer was very reasonably priced.  We dropped off our tanks at the filling station which had a quick turn around time, kitted up again then planned the second dive.  This time we went looking for the aircraft cockpit, so made an entry at the bus stop.  We descended down some old train tracks to around 25 meters, missing the cockpit on the way down we came across it on the way back up, along with a couple of big pikes.  The temperature at 25 meters dropped to 10 degrees but I didn't feel the cold at all so the Fourth Element Proteus was really living up to the reviews.  A full map of Stoney Cove can be found here.

I'd highly recommend doing some dives at Stoney Cove as there is so many interesting things to see.  The conditions are great for divers of all qualifications due to it being an inland quarry.  Stoney Cove also offer a full range of diving courses along with a massive range of kit hire.  I also used the ScubaStrapp for the first time which is a new diving product which should be launching anytime soon.  It has a use for every element of diving, I've also found many other uses for the Scuba Strapp outwith the water.

Business Enterprise Award

Recently Mungo Finlayson, the founder and managing director of Scuba Duba Dive picked up an award for Business Enterprise in his home town of Banchory.  Scuba Duba Dive isn't the first business that Mungo has run from Banchory.  During his early days of secondary school Mungo ran a mobile phone accessory business.  Mainly importing accessories from China and Hong Kong then selling them on either via a online market place or to his wide database of wholesale clients.  Mungo had a niche at being able to find accessories which weren't yet for sale in the United Kingdom and importing them before any other sellers.  Before exams Mungo's trading business ceased trading due to the amount of time it was taking up.

After exams Mungo started another business, this time it was a partnership with three friends. The partnership specialised in designing and hosting websites.  ReplicaHost was run successfully for 5 years but it became a joint decision not to renew any of the contracts due to everyone going their separate ways.  At the end of the 5 years each partner came away with a profit.  Hopefully we will be seeing some more awards soon for Mungo and Scuba Duba Dive.

Pictured Mungo Finlayson receiving a Business Enterprise Award from Provost Jill Webster

The Great Scottish Diving

This summer in Scotland we've had some spectacular weather with some days hitting over 30 degrees.  Usually the Scottish summers are very hit or miss, sometimes just having a summer of rain.  With the weather being so good it meant I had to benefit from it, that meant getting back into Scottish diving in a wetsuit! 

Portknockie Harbour

North East Dive's Boat

Conger Eel,

I've spent many an evening this summer diving in the North Sea with some great dives.  I think the weekend just past has been my best day of Scottish diving.  I was on a day dive trip with North East Dive out of Portknockie Harbour, which is near Banff in North East Scotland.  It was another stunning day and as we arrived at 10am there was children playing on the beach, this is

Scotland at the start of September!

Standard Lobster

Gearing up into my wetsuit we headed out of the harbour to the Moray Wreck, which is a scattered wreck lying at around 29 metres depending on the tide.  There isn't a huge amount left of the wreck but that didn't stop there being a lot of marine life around the wreck, especially in the boiler room.  As we went down the shot line hardly being able to see a thing I wasn't convinced this was going to be a good dive but at about 20 metres it just open out to about 5-10 metres visibility, a true Scottish dive.  We saw giant lobsters, conger eels, giant crabs and plenty of fish.

Giant Lobster

 During the lunch interval we went back into Portknockie harbour.  It was so warm my wetsuit managed to dry off during the 2 hours we spent back onshore.  Tanks changed over it was time to head out for the second time, this time we were diving Caple Rock.  Gently cruising out the harbour we came across 7 dolphins just playing around in the bay, another example of how vast Scottish wildlife can be! 

Caple Rock is a gentle reef/rock dive with plenty of life about.  The current was up so there was a slight drift which is always good fun.  Overall the day was a great success and I never felt cold in my 5mm wetsuit!  I urge those who are qualified divers who haven't tried cold water diving to give it a shot, it's defiantly worth while!  North East Dive in Banff run weekly diving days from their boat, all excellent value and excellent fun! 

Diving in the North Sea again

After just over three years of not diving locally I finally dived again last night in the North Sea with North East Dive.  I'd been meaning to go diving with them for a couple of weeks but was concerned it was going to be too cold as I was mainly used to warm water diving.

Prepared for the worse I wore a 5mm full wetsuit and a 5mm shorty with hood, on the way out to the dive site on the rib I was talking to the other dives who said on Friday the water was 16 degrees.  At that I didn't think I would need my gloves after having been in 20 degree water in Malta a month before without a hood or gloves.  The moment I rolled back off the rib and hit the water I knew it wasn't 16 degrees and regretted not wearing my gloves.  However I continued without and descended down for the dive.

The visibility was around 10 metres and it was a shallow dive along the coast.  After spending the first few minutes getting used to my kit and the conditions again we started the dive.  There was lots of little swim throughs and getting thrown around by the current near the coast was a new experience which made me feel sea sick, so had to quickly descend again to get away from the waves.  The marine life was pretty good, lots of little spider crabs around the kelp and a lots of big edible crabs in the fisherman's pots.  Navigating in and out of the coast line never really exceeding 12metres we managed a 42 minute dive.  I was starting to feel the cold without any gloves on as the actual bottom temperature was only 9 degrees! 

North East Dive's Boat- Picture from Facebook

I will defiantly be back for more dives and next time will be wearing a pair of gloves!  I urge anyone who is a qualified diver and has diving on their doorstep to give cold water diving a try.  Yes, you have to wear a lot more equipment than warm water diving but cold water diving just lets you keep up your diving experience and that next time you go on holiday diving you don't spend the first days diving to refresher courses!

Speaking with Hannah about her experience learning to dive in Egypt

Another series in the Scuba Duba Dive Blog posts of peoples first diving experiences.  This time we're speaking with Hannah who learnt to dive in Egypt.

"The first time I donned scuba kit and descended into the ocean was off the east coast of Australia at the Great Barrier Reef.  This was a novice dive during which I swam around happily looking wide eyed at a magical under water world.  I loved the underwater world and was instantly at ease with the scuba equipment.  As such, a year and half later in Cairo, Egypt, I had the opportunity and signed up to do the PADI Open Water course.  After the theory and pool sessions, friends and I traveled to Safaga on Egypt's Red Sea coast to board Legends - it is a legendary dive boat on which I spent many subsequent weekends bobbing about in the Red Sea going from one spectacular dive site to another.  At 0900, on this inaugural morning, the sky was blue and the sun radiating heating, I kitted up and stepped off the back to the boat into a clear blue sea.  El Shehr was the location of the first dive during which I swam around looking wide eyed at the magical under water world.  In fact, on every dive I swim around wide eyed looking at the colours, shapes & sizes of the majestic under water world.  Dolphins, corals, moray eels, octopus, turtles, my favourite blue spotted rays and so much more - it is breathtaking every time. "

Did this post inspire you in wanting to learn to scuba dive?  Check out the range of courses Scuba Duba Dive offers at our website

Hannah in Egypt