Wight Dolphins travelled to Ilfracombe to spend two days diving around Lundy Island; a location we have visited on numerous occasions before. We return to Lundy Island because of the clear
waters and vast array of marine life; which includes the major highlight of Grey seals. The trip to Lundy is always a fantastic social event; enjoyed by everyone that’s lucky enough to go.
We stay at the hostel called Ocean BackPackers which has everything you need for a comfortable and stress free stay and suits us perfectly. Ilfracombe and North Devon BSAC is conveniently situated just behind the hostel, where we get all our cylinders filled ready for the next day’s diving. The BSAC club also has a very nice clubhouse where you can relax with a drink and talk through our great days diving.
Our first day of diving was around the west coast of the Island as there was a strong easterly breeze making it too rough to dive on the east side. This is another benefit of diving Lundy, as you can take shelter from the weather in one of the many coves tucked beneath the cliffs.
We dived around two coves that afternoon, swimming over the kelp beds looking for the seals and taking in the other species of marine life.
During the second dive, myself and my buddy Nathan had a fantastic experience with a large grey seal which came very close to us and swam around us for quite some time. It was awesome!
The next day the wind had eased off, which allowed us to dive around the Northern tip of the Island. The first dive site was fantastic, it was an area which consisted of many deep gullies. This made for some
interesting and exciting diving. We saw various species of starfish, jellyfish, some large crayfish and a very inquisitive seal which followed us for most of the dive.
The second dive of the day was on the wreck of the ‘MV Robert’. The wreck is intact and lies on its starboard side in about 25m of water. It’s a good dive to end a very enjoyable couple of days in North Devon.
A fantastic three days in total for the 12 divers that were able to go. Some for more than first time! Lundy is a very special place. It was established as a voluntary Marine Nature Reserve in 1971, this was followed with the first Marine Nature Reserve designation in 1986. Since then, the island’s importance has been recognised further as a Special Area of Conservation in 2000 and was nominated as the first Marine Conservation Zone (MCZ) in 2010. The high level of protection at Lundy has ensured that marine life is amazing and, along with spectacular scenery, allows us to experience some of the most varied diving in the U.K.