SeaLogIreland · wall · intermediate
A hundred metres of vertical shore wall east of Grey Rock, dropping to 27-28 m in the Annaghvaan channels.
East of Grey Rock is one of five dives Galway Dive Club lists under Annaghvaan, in the island-and-causeway country of south Connemara where Eanach Mheain, Lettermore, Gorumna and Lettermullan are strung together north of Galway Bay. The club's entry is short and specific: just east of the point 100 metres east of Grey Rock there is an area for mid-range diving, where the shore drops vertically to 27 or 28 metres, with plenty to see at various levels on the wall.
It is worth being clear about the relationship to its neighbour. The club lists East of Grey Rock and Grey Rock as two separate dives with different profiles - Grey Rock is where you anchor or tie up in 4 to 5 m, and the drop-off there goes to about 38 m, deepening westward to a maximum of 50 m - but they are the same shoreline roughly 100 m apart, worked off the same boat on the same day. Our two pins sit 240 m apart. Anyone planning a day here should read the two entries together rather than as separate trips. Gurraig Sound, the drift dive of the group, is another 430 m away.
The club works these sites by boat from Picnic Island at the south-west corner of Inishtravin, an uninhabited island. The setting matters for planning: NPWS describes the surrounding Kilkieran Bay and Islands SAC as a much-indented coast whose bays and channels are subject to strong tidal streams as the sea funnels between islands, which is precisely why the neighbouring sound is dived as a drift. NPWS also rates Kilkieran Bay as one of the most species-rich marine areas in Ireland studied so far, second only to the Kenmare River, with maerl beds, Zostera marina and native oyster beds among the reasons.
There is very little written about this specific wall - four lines from one club, and nothing else we could find. Confidence here is low by design. Treat the depths as indicative and dive it with somebody who knows the channel.
Boat dive. Galway Dive Club work the Annaghvaan sites from Picnic Island, the small island at the south-west corner of Inishtravin, and anchor or tie the boat at Grey Rock in 4 to 5 m of water. Annaghvaan itself is one of the south Connemara islands linked to the mainland and to each other by bridges and causeways - NPWS refers to the bridge at Carrickaglegaun on neighbouring Lettermore Island. There is no dive centre on these islands and no facilities at the site.
You can reach the site independently.
The site lies in the waters of the Kilkieran Bay and Islands complex, designated as a Special Area of Conservation (site code 002111) under the EU Habitats Directive for Annex I habitats including reefs, large shallow inlets and bays, tidal flats and coastal lagoons, with harbour seal and harbour porpoise among the qualifying species. We found no permit requirement for recreational diving. NPWS lists free-living maerl beds, Zostera marina and native oyster beds in the bay - none of them things to anchor into or fin over.
No source we read gives months for this dive, so none are set. Sitting in sheltered channels rather than on the open Atlantic, it is less swell-gated than the Clare and Kerry sites in this catalogue; the practical constraints are tide state and water temperature rather than a weather window. Plan the day around the stream rather than the month.
Sheltered inner-Connemara water rather than open Atlantic: these are channels between islands, so the fetch is short and the variable is tide state rather than swell. NPWS records mixed kelp forests of Laminaria hyperborea and Laminaria saccharina forming a canopy in the very sheltered parts of Kilkieran Bay. The water is cold year round and drysuits are the norm on this coast.
On current: The club's entry for this specific wall says nothing about current, but the setting does. NPWS describes the Kilkieran Bay channels as subject to strong tidal streams where the sea funnels between islands and through channels, and the club's neighbouring Gurraig Sound is dived only as a drift, at what they call a fair old rate. Plan around the tide. Nothing published gives a slack window or a spring rate here, so the stream should be treated as unquantified.
Galway Dive Club describe the shore as dropping vertically to 27 or 28 metres here, with plenty to see at several levels on the wall. That makes it the mid-range dive of the Annaghvaan group. Grey Rock itself, 100 metres west, goes considerably deeper - about 38 m off the drop-off, and up to 50 m further west.
Galway Dive Club list them as two separate dives with different profiles, so we have kept them separate. In practice they are the same piece of shoreline about 100 metres apart, worked from the same boat on the same day, with Grey Rock as the anchoring point in 4 to 5 m. Read the two entries together when planning.
By small boat. Galway Dive Club work the Annaghvaan sites from Picnic Island at the south-west corner of Inishtravin, an uninhabited island, and tie up or anchor at Grey Rock in 4 to 5 m. Annaghvaan is reached by road across the south Connemara bridges and causeways. There is no dive centre on these islands.
The club's entry for this wall does not mention any, but the setting is tidal. NPWS describe the Kilkieran Bay channels as subject to strong tidal streams where the sea funnels between islands, and the club dive the adjacent Gurraig Sound only as a drift. No published source gives a slack window or a rate here, so plan conservatively around the tide.
The club says only that there is lots to see at various levels on the wall. Records for this patch of Kilkieran Bay include ballan, cuckoo and goldsinny wrasse, tompot blenny, edible sea urchin, velvet swimming crab, common starfish, native oyster and a heavy cover of sponges and sea squirts. NPWS rates the bay's overall diversity as among the highest in Ireland.
We found no permit requirement for recreational diving. The site is inside the Kilkieran Bay and Islands SAC (002111), designated for reefs, large shallow inlets and bays and other Annex I habitats. That brings no diving prohibition we could identify, but the maerl beds, seagrass and native oyster beds NPWS lists are fragile - do not anchor into them.
Not really. It is a vertical wall to nearly 30 m reached only by small boat, in channels with tidal streams, with no operator, no facilities and almost nothing published about it. A diver comfortable in cold water with good buoyancy and local guidance will enjoy it; someone on their first Irish dives should start somewhere shallower and sheltered.
| Species | How often | Records |
|---|---|---|
| Amphilectus fucorum | occasional | 12 |
| Pachymatisma johnstonia | occasional | 11 |
| Phallusia ingeria | occasional | 9 |
| Calliostoma zizyphinum | occasional | 9 |
| Microcosmus squamiger | occasional | 9 |
| Clavelina lepadiformis | occasional | 8 |
| Aplidium punctum | occasional | 8 |
| Echinus esculentus | occasional | 8 |
| Raspailia (Raspailia) ramosa | occasional | 8 |
| Cliona celata | occasional | 8 |
| Labrus mixtus | occasional | 8 |
| Ascidia mentula | occasional | 7 |
| Corella parallelogramma | occasional | 7 |
| Ctenolabrus rupestris | occasional | 7 |
| Labrus bergylta | occasional | 7 |
| Polymastia boletiformis | occasional | 7 |
| Ascidia virginea | occasional | 6 |
| Ciona intestinalis | occasional | 6 |
| Necora puber | occasional | 6 |
| Nemertesia antennina | occasional | 6 |
| Henricia oculata | occasional | 6 |
| Dysidea fragilis | occasional | 6 |
| Haliclona (Haliclona) simulans | occasional | 6 |
| Turritellinella tricarinata | occasional | 6 |
| Botryllus schlosseri | occasional | 5 |
| Bougainvillia muscus | occasional | 5 |
| Amphipholis squamata | occasional | 5 |
| Parablennius gattorugine | occasional | 5 |
| Hemimycale columella | occasional | 5 |
| Aurelia aurita | occasional | 5 |
| Archidoris pseudoargus | occasional | 5 |
| Bittium reticulatum | occasional | 5 |
| Nucula nucleus | occasional | 5 |
| Ostrea edulis | occasional | 5 |
| Tritia incrassata | occasional | 5 |
| Steromphala cineraria | occasional | 5 |
| Metaphoxus simplex | rare | 4 |
| Dendrodoa grossularia | rare | 4 |
| Marthasterias glacialis | rare | 4 |
| Stelligera stuposa | rare | 4 |
| Polymastia mamillaris | rare | 4 |
| Tanaopsis graciloides | rare | 4 |
| Thyasira flexuosa | rare | 4 |
| Mycale (Aegogropila) rotalis | rare | 4 |
| Protosuberites incrustans | rare | 4 |
| Kurtiella bidentata | rare | 4 |
| Dercitus (Dercitus) bucklandi | rare | 4 |
| Halisarca desqueyrouxae | rare | 4 |
| Stelligera montagui | rare | 4 |
| Ampelisca typica | rare | 3 |
| Metaphoxus fultoni | rare | 3 |
| Diplosoma spongiforme | rare | 3 |
| Antennella secundaria | rare | 3 |
| Leptosynapta inhaerens | rare | 3 |
| Ophiothrix fragilis | rare | 3 |
| Thorogobius ephippiatus | rare | 3 |
| Hymeraphia stellifera | rare | 3 |
| Raspailia (Clathriodendron) hispida | rare | 3 |
| Tethya aurantium | rare | 3 |
| Tethya citrina | rare | 3 |
Tie the boat in five metres, swim a hundred metres south, and the bottom falls away almost vertically to 38 m — and deeper the further west you go.
A tidal channel drift over stony bottom at 15-20 m, with a north wall to hide behind when the stream is running.
Three reefs running north-south off a small Greatman's Bay quay, worked from the shore on the tide — the deep end of the Coral Strand shoreline.
The Coral Strand: a seven-metre shore dive over maërl gravel and eelgrass, the standard training and photography dive of the Carraroe peninsula.
A quiet beach entry on the Casla Bay side of Carraroe, dived at high water over rock, sand and a seagrass meadow.
SeaLog imports your dives from your dive computer or Apple Watch, tracks every animal you see, and keeps your logbook safe forever.
Download SeaLog
