Galicia

A nice sunny day and the weather was far better than forecast; we arrived at Teignmouth as first wave (to the Bretagne) was putting out. Yas, Hilary and I went into town, to the dive shop, then round the back beach and seafront. Got a hood for Yas and we ate some pasties.

The second wave (switched to the Galicia) set off and were soon above the wreck. Geoff H and Nic got in first, then Geoff M and I, down the shot. We had good look round. The vis was not great, milky and snotty, but not too bad. It was far better and lighter than last time, the net was easily avoided. Usual encrusters: lots of light-bulbs, and white anenomes. There were a lot of smallish fish as well as larger pollock, bass, various wrasse, and a tompot blenny. I took some pictures and had a nice relaxed dive. We sent up the blob, and on the way up we found the shot.

There was time for a third wave and I was lucky enough to get on it and use Dave's spare nitrox. The wreck was slightly harder to find this time because looking into the sun and haze the transit at Holcombe above Smuggler's Cove was hard to see. I was first buddied with Dave, unfortunately he couldn't get down and I waited on the shot and joined Phil and Anne when they got in.

The dive itself was fine, relaxed and comfortable, it was also my first nitrox dive. Down we went into the gloom and at the bottom we all got our torches out. It was much darker now. Off we went, and in covering more ground, we saw how badly netted the Galicia is. There are several very large heavy nets that look like they've been there a long time; these don't seem to be a problem, but there is also lots of tangled monofilament net and line and animals caught in it. There were several dead cormorants, dead fish including a very large female ballan wrasse thrashing about, and a lobster [Clint and Helen found another tangled lobster on their dive], and sea fans amongst the rope. All awful.