North Sea trip

17-18/6/2023

The first trip of the new season… And once again we found ourselves on our favorite North Sea diving vessel, the Divestar, with some of the TDX team members.

The first trip of the season always has something special. Even though we had

Day 1

The first wreck of the weekend was the very familiar SS Melrose. It was a British cargo ship that was mined in 1940. When diving you can still see the large steam engines.

The visibility was pretty good and we had plenty of opportunities to get in the cargo rooms in the wreck and swim through. Some congor eels and plenty of spider crabs were hiding around the wreck… We went down on the back of the wreck and found the very impressive rudder and propeller at a depth of about 35m. It’s definitely a nice wreck to start of the weekend!

In between the dives we had Anja’s world famous spaghetti. The simple lunch is something we look forward to every time from the moment we start our decompression stops at the first dive.

This day’s second wreck we visited was the SS Trifels, a German cargo ship that got torpedoed in 1941. This is a well known cargo ship that we dived regularly. This dive as well we went down to a depth of 36m to find the rudder. The propeller has been removed already, but it still remains an impressive sight to be next to the impressive rudder.

Day 2

The first dive of the second day was on the wreck of the MV Garden City.

Once again we had good visibility. It’s a wreck where we always pass by the impressive rudder and 4-bladed propeller. We jumped in the water early in the morning, at 8.50AM. What a great way to wake up on a Sunday morning, although I’m sure many non-divers would respectfully disagree with me.

For the first dive we were on our way again to one of our favorites: the SS Pepinella. It’s a cargo ship that sunk in 1958 after a collision with another ship.

After that excellent first dive it was time for something even more important…Anja’s world famous spaghetti! A great lunch to get some energy again and to get ready for the last dive of the weekend.

Because of construction works at the Nieuwpoort harbor, we had to be back at port before 7PM or we would be locked out of the harbor! There is a flood barrier being build, which will protect the harbor and inland against storms and high tides. It’ll be a different look getting back into the harbor when it’s finished!

Wrecks

Thanks

A huge thanks as usual to the whole Divestar crew. We cannot express how grateful the whole team is to have them managing the diving, catering, music, … They just create the perfect circumstances for some relax wreck diving at the North Sea.

Also thanks for the TDX team for the great atmosphere and the safe dives!

Impression

We didn’t bring our video equipment this trip, so unfortunately we don’t have any under water footage. We just have some pictures capturing the great circumstances and atmosphere on board.