Tobermory, Scotland, United Kingdom

Sound of Mull Wall

The Sound of Mull is studded with vertical underwater walls along its narrow channel, where glacially carved cliffs continue below the surface for tens of metres on a clean rock and silt bottom. Drop-offs near Calve Island, Auliston Point, Rubha an Ridire and Lady's Rock are classic west-coast Scottish wall dives, with rock faces falling from a few metres to 40 metres or more on a single dive profile. The walls are cloaked in plumose anemones, dead man's fingers, sponges, hydroids, feather stars, jewel anemones in patches and pink coralline algae, with kelp forests on the upper margins. Resident species include wolffish, conger eels, pollack, ling, ballan wrasse, cuckoo wrasse, lumpsuckers, lobsters and the occasional Atlantic grey seal. Visibility is reliable for Scotland, generally 8 to 15 metres in summer, and water temperatures range from 8 to 14 degrees Celsius. Currents are moderate and dives are timed around slack water from Tobermory and Lochaline charter boats. Suitable for advanced divers in drysuits.