The Farne Islands and Cornwall: Where British Diving Isn't About Wrecks at All
Not every great dive in British waters is a wreck. Scuba Diving Great Britain gives real space to two of the country's best living dive sites — the Farne Islands off the Northumberland coast, and the reefs off Cornwall — and both offer something a wreck dive can't: genuinely interactive wildlife.
The Farne Islands' Grey Seals
The Farne Islands are home to one of England's largest grey seal colonies, and diving there has a reputation among British divers as one of the most playful, approachable wildlife encounters available anywhere in the country's waters. Young seals in particular are naturally curious around divers — nibbling fins, tumbling past, and generally behaving more like a boisterous colleague than a wild animal keeping its distance. It's a completely different kind of dive from picking a route through a wreck, and for many divers it's the more memorable one.
Cornwall's Reefs
Further south, Cornwall's rocky reefs bring their own character — kelp forests, a wide range of marine life along the reef structure, and, in the warmer months, the chance of an encounter with a basking shark, the second-largest fish in the world and a genuinely remarkable sight for any diver lucky enough to be in the water when one passes. Cornwall's diving doesn't get the same attention as Scotland's wrecks, but it's a real, distinct strand of the country's diving on its own terms.
Wildlife Diving, Treated Honestly
Scuba Diving Great Britain treats these living sites with the same discipline it applies to the wrecks — real seasonal and encounter information rather than a guaranteed-sighting promise, since wildlife on any given dive is never certain. Between Scapa Flow's wrecks, the Farne Islands' seals and Cornwall's reefs, the book covers a genuinely wide range of British diving across its thirteen regional chapters, spanning England, Scotland and Wales as the direct sequel to Scuba Diving Ireland.