Sound Of Mull

I’m just looking at getting some interest together for Sound of the Mull. This is a trip I intend to run in 2025.

When: looking at June 2025, 4-5 days diving, about 5-6 days total

Where: Sound of the Mull, Scotland

Who: open to Sports Diver and above. DL+(twins/ADP) to get the most out of it. Up to 12 people

What: diving

Cost: approx £450 for diving and accommodation. Food + transport + air extra

TLBSR version (Too Long But Still Read):

When:

I’ve enquired about availability for June 2025, I went in June before and it was what you’d expect of Scottish weather. There was a few times it was a bit rocky and wet, but the majority of the time it was calm and sunny. There were no dives called off. This may change, depending on availability.

Where:

Sound of the Mull, based in Lochaline. I’m looking at accommodation at the ‘Highland Basecamp’. This is in Movern and very close to the harbour (though nothing is out of walking distance in Movern). They have nice bunk rooms for grabs, two people per room and with their own ensuite. We’d be staying in Movern for the duration of the diving, and leaving/returning to the Movern harbour. After our last dive of the week we’d drive back to Oban and stay there for the night, before continuing back to London.

Who:

This is plenty doable by a Sports Diver with no further SDCs (I did it as an SD on a 15L, as did others on the trip). However, to get the most out of it twins could come in handy.

What:

This is purely wreck diving, off a hardboat. The Peregrine is fully set up diving boat – as you’d expect – it has a spacious kitting up area; toilet facilities; somewhere inside to keep dry; onboard air compressor. The dive centre isn’t really kitted out for technical diving – with some heads-up they may be able to source oxygen for ADP, but they don’t have any ‘proper’ nitrox blending facilities (that I’m aware of). There are some wrecks which you could go deep and/or penetrate and spend a lot of time on. But overall, you can enjoy the trip without doing any advanced diving and without even going into deco.

There will also be some scallops around, along with the ‘usual’ diving sighting such as lobsters and crabs; and over the last few years the sighting of basking sharks has become more usual. Above water it’s very beautiful, and there’s other life to be seen, such as otters and eagles.

Cost:

The diving itself is £550 a day – so split across 10 people for 5 days that’s £275. The boat can take up to 12 people, and Sound the Mull is often popular, so £275 is the max you’d be paying. We may decide we’d rather do 4 days also – I’ll gather some interest and then we can discuss.

The accommodation is at £380 per room for 5 nights, so £190 each. Currently the booking only goes up to November 2024, but this cos is the same the whole year, so should give a good estimate for next year.

Other costs include air fills. It doesn’t clarify online the cost of these – I’d assume they’re not included, and, if I remember correctly from last time, they were totalled up at the end… but I can’t remember the cost of these. I will need to find out.

There’s also food, Movern is very small. There is a shop, but it’s mostly frozen food and isn’t always open. I’ll need to check our self-catering facilities. There is also a pub – this is normal pub food at normal prices.

Fuel – everyone’s car’s different! Last time I did 1,100 miles and it cost £113, split between 3 people in the car. But that was a few years ago and fuel has gone up now…

I have a few people interested, as noted on the dive planning sheet. Please let me know if you are interested (and if you’ve already written your name down, please reaffirm you are still up for it). Any questions, let me know and I can try and help best I can.

Thanks 🙂