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PADi scuba diving courses in bedfordshire, hertfordshire and cambridge

PADI Dive courses and trips

Underwater Adventures is a scuba diving club offering scuba diving trips in the UK and abroad and PADI Dive school with meetings in Bedford and Cambridge. We have meetings at the Park Pub in Bedford, and the Red Bull Pub in Cambridge, plus pool sessions at the Polam swimming pool in Bedford and the Abbey Leisure Complex in Cambridge. Offering PADI scuba diving courses for all levels from beginner to instructor, UK scuba diving trips all year round plus many foreign dive trips. We offer full equipment servicing and compressed air or nitrox fills delivered right to your door as well as scuba diving equipment rental and servicing plus discounts on courses and dive trips for club members.
Contact us for more info
Scuba diving training Bedfordshire

WHAT OUR CUSTOMERS SAY

Humongous thanks to the most tolerant and supportive instructor I could ever have wished for! Today's dive in the Lake was awesome and I loved every minute! Next dive - Hikkaduwa in Sri Lanka in 3 weeks!!!
Underwater Adventures have blessed me with a whole new world. Please ensure you contact them for all your scuba inquiries! Stephen is an exceptional instructor and the other
divemasters involved really have been outstanding throughout my 6 months of training and preparation... it has been a long road but I am over the moon. I am now a PADI open water scuba diver and immensely proud of myself!

Aiden Lunnon, Hertfordshire 5 out of 5 stars
padi scuba diving courses in hertfordshire bedfordshire and cambridge
PADI Scuba diving training Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Cambridge

LATEST EVENTS

15thMay
We have loads of awesome dive trips and dive club social events planned over the next couple of months, and below is a list of them. if you would like to join the dive club and take part in all of these trips, please click here

17th/18th May Stoney Cove qualifying weekend

Open water and deep divers courses, plus all club members are free to come along for a couple of fun dives, and we will find you a dive buddy for the day or weekend :-)

23rd May, Cambridge beer and cider festival

This is the annual Cambridge beer and cider festival on Jesus Green in Cambridge. A great chance to meet other club members and try a few different beers or ciders.  A good idea to bring a chair or blanket to sit on as we sit outside and shoot the breeze.
Arrive for 7.00 pm and try some new beers and ciders with good company.
The last train south to Letchworth and Stevenage is 23:53
The last bus to Bedford is 23:15

30th of May to the 1st of June Deep Spot, Poland dive trip





Deep spot is the deepest scuba diving pool in Europe and the second deepest pool in the world. Follow this link to find out more https://www.underwateradventures.co.uk/2025-02-

8th of June Dry suit course at Stoney

Learn how to scuba dive in a dry suit with this one-day course at Stoney Cove. The morning will be spent in the pool learn how to use a dry suit safely, and then we will be spending the afternoon in Stoney Cove itself for two open water dives where you get to practice scuba diving in your dry suit. Follow this link to learn more https://www.underwateradventures.co.uk/PADI-dry-suit-diver

14th/15th of June, Wraysbury qualifying weekend

Open water course and fun dives, but if you are interested in doing a PADI speciality course towards your PADI Master Scuba Diver qualification, please let me know, and we can work out some dives towards your next PADI speciality qualification.

15th June BDMLR course

BDMLR’s Marine Mammal Medic Course (MMMC) is open to anyone over the age of 18, and you do not have to be a diver. It is a full-day training program designed to provide you with the basic knowledge, skills and expertise to enable our volunteer teams to respond to a callout and act on behalf of that animal’s best welfare interests. On completion of the course, you are added to BDMLR’s Marine Mammal Medic database, which is used to alert medics of nearby animals in distress. However, even if you do not live by the sea, it is a fun way to learn the correct first aid techniques to help marine mammals should you come upon an animal needing help. Contact us for more details https://www.underwateradventures.co.uk/underwater-adventures-contact

28th June Dive club social BBQ

From 3 pm onward, we will be having our annual Dive club BBQ, which corresponds with Steve's Birthday. Bring your own chair and beer, and we will provide the food, games, and fun chat

5th/6th July Capenwary qualifying weekend

PADI open water and Advanced open water courses, as well as fun dives. If people are interested, we will also run a search and recovery and a DSMB course over this weekend.

12th/13th July, Intro to UK diving weekend out of Weymouth





A weekend of easy shallow dives from the RIHB Typhoon, designed for new divers and those who have not dived in the UK before, to build up experience so you can enjoy some of the amazing diving we have around our shores.
You don't have to do all the weekend dives, just pop down for 1 or 2 dives over the weekend if you want. We want this to be as relaxing as possible, so you can take it easy

19th of July dive club social, Cambridge comedy festival

A chance to see
FERN BRADY
TOM DAVIS
DANE BUCKLEY
LOU SANDERS
AMY GLEDHILL
Tickets are £30.25 and gates open at 18.15
We will probably go for a meal first and then have a few drinks afterwards, seeing as it will be finishing around 10 pm.

2nd/3rd of August Swanage weekend

A chance to build up your UK sea diving experience with some really cool dives out of Swanage on Mary Jo. Saturday, we will be diving the Kyarra and the Clan McVay, and on Sunday, we will be diving the Valentine tanks, and for those who wish to, we can do a final dive under the pier or you can head home early. Each boat trip is around £35 and spaces are limited, so please let me know as soon as possible if you want to join this trip.

9th of August, escape room and meal in Milton Keynes

A fun Night out starting with an escape room escape room followed by a lovely meal at a nearby restaurant. We will pick the escape room when I know numbers, and hopefully we can get into Turtle Bay for the meal, which was excellent the last time we went, followed by a few drinks. A great chance to meet other scuba divers.

22nd of August M2 + 2nd dive on Sidewinder out of Weymouth

A dive on the M2 Submarine wreck, followed by a second dive to be decided on the day. Here's a video from a previous M2 wreck dive https://youtu.be/4erdpsRcDwo?si=GxI-FzXsv5kNKFfv
This is probably the best wreck dive I have done in the UK so far, even if the viz wasn’t great on my dives; in fact, the darker conditions made it feel more eerie and gave it more of an atmosphere. It's £80 for the day's diving, you will need two tanks for the trip, and a 50% deposit is needed to confirm your Place. It is also below 30 metres, so you will need your deep dive qualification, which you can get at one of our qualifying weekends

30th/31st of August Special wreck weekend





A chance to dive a few very special wrecks that are rarely ever dived. Follow this link to find out more about each of these wrecks https://www.underwateradventures.co.uk/2025-05-wreck-diving-weekend

6th/7th  of September, Capernwray Qualifying weekend

Probably the last UK qualifying weekend of the year, and when the water is the warmest at over 20 degrees Celsius. Also, a great place to come for fun dives, and here's a little video to give you an idea of what diving at Capernwary is like https://youtu.be/_6bWh6yhtSA?si=Hf1eRkcJO2xfVcZB

26th October to the 1st of November, Sardinia dive trip

A lovely little end-of-season dive trip open to all levels of scuba divers. Follow this link to find out more about this trip https://www.underwateradventures.co.uk/2025-03-dive-trip-to-sardinia





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08thMay
At the end of August, we will be running a trip to Swanage to dive some really interesting and rarely dived wrecks: the Netley Abbey and Azemmour on the 30th of August and the Aeolian Sky on Sunday the 31st of August.


Netley Abbey





The wreck of the large iron steamship lies four miles south-southwest of St Alban's Head on the Dorset coast; the wreck site is well known but not regularly visited. Those who have been there may know it by various names and popular dive guides refer to it as Start or Hartburn. Subsequent research has disproved these theories now as these two wrecks have since been identified. Using information gathered from both the current day wreck site and referring back to original documentation, numerous other possible candidates have been identified and eliminated. This leads to the conclusion that the identity for this shipwreck is Netley Abbey sunk by collision with HMS Surprise in 1899.
The Netley Abbey was a single screw, iron steam collier listed in Lloyds Register at 1620 gross tons, 1,012 net tons. At the time of her demise she was 21 years old.
This wreck has a maximum depth of 38 metres at the sea floor but the boilers, engine , and masts rise 3 to 4 metres off the sea floor.


SS Azemmour




The SS Azemmour was a steel freighter built in 1909 by the Short Brothers in Sunderland. It was powered by a triple expansion steam engine with two single ended boilers and a screw propeller. The vessel was 62.56m in length and 10.05m in width, and was capable of an average speed of 10 knots.
On 18th March 1918, the Azemmour departed London for Nantes with over 1200 tonnes of cargo; 716 tons of general cargo and 500 tons of steel. There were 28 crew aboard, including Captain Jean Guillaume. On 20th March, the vessel was south of the Needles when the German U-boat UB-59 moved in to attack. At 4.44 am, the crew felt a shudder as if the ship had been struck by something. Some minutes later, the periscope of a submarine was seen, and the captain ordered the ship to head away from it in a vain attempt to escape. Less than a minute later a torpedo slammed into the ship’s port quarter.

The commander of UB-59, Fritz Wassner, noted in his war diary that the first torpedo launched against the Azemmour failed, but the UB-59 pursued the ship and hit it with and with a second torpedo. The damage was extremely severe and the captain ordered the crew to the lifeboats. They had no time to use the ship’s 90mm stern gun to return fire, as the vessel slipped beneath the waves in four minutes. Some of the crew saw the surfaced submarine before they were picked up about 30 minutes later by the Admiralty Yacht Maid of Honour. Five of the 28 crew were recorded as missing.

The wreck of the Azemmour lies approximately 15 miles to the southwest of St. Catherine’s Point at the southern tip of the Isle of Wight. The wreck is at a depth of 40m and lies upright, rising six metres above a flat seabed. It is reasonably intact forward of the engine, though the area around the bow leans out towards the seabed. The engine is the highest part of the wreck, and aft of this, the wreck site is more disparate,e with the remains becoming level with the seabed


MV Aeolian Sky




The Aeolian Sky was a Greek-run freighter built in 1978, which collided with another ship near the Channel Islands and, after a failed attempt at salvage, sank off the coast of Dorset, England, in a storm in late 1979.

In late 1979, the Aeolian Sky sailed from Hull, via Rotterdam, to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, Africa. On 3 November 1979, while travelling 20 miles off the coast of Guernsey in the Channel Islands, she collided with the German coaster Anna Knueppell in fog, during a storm at 4.30 a.m. A French tug based at Cherbourg, the Abeille Languedoc, went to the scene and managed to get a line aboard. Plans were initially laid to tow her back to the French port; only lightly damaged, the Anna Knuepell stood by to render assistance if needed.

At 9.30 in the morning a Royal Navy helicopter arrived and evacuated most of the crew; it then had to withdraw to its base at Lee-on-Solent with engine problems, leaving a handful of crew aboard the now sinking vessel. By this time the ship had drifted some distance and was sinking at the bows, so the initial plan was abandoned and the tug headed for The Solent.

However, the port authorities of Portsmouth and Southampton, concerned that the ship would sink, fouling their busy waterways, declined permission for her to enter either port. With the weather at gale force, the tug started to tow the Aeolian Sky into the storm to try to make the shelter of Portland Harbour. However, at 3.45 a.m. on 4 November 1979, she took on too much water and sank 5 miles south of St Aldhelm's Head, still 12 miles from the safety of Portland. She settled on her port side in 30 metres of water with her bows facing south

Since her sinking, the wreck has become a popular dive site[3] as she is accessible from Swanage, Weymouth and Isle of Portland-based diving trips. At the time of sinking,g she lay 9 metres below the surface, but salvage work, and explosives used to reduce the risk of her becoming a hazard to navigation, have lowered this to 18 metres. Her bows were blown off during this activity and lie separate from the main body of the wreck.

To join this trip, the 3 boat dives are £145, and I will need a £30 deposit to hold your space. You will need UK sea diving experience and deep diver and wreck diver certifications. The spaces are limited, so please don’t hesitate to book your space as we don’t run this sort of trip that often and the chances of us being able to do these 3 wrecks over the same weekend again are very low.
To Book on the course, you can contact us by CLICKING HERE
 
20thApril
Dive Right In: Your Scuba Adventure Starts in Cambridge!

Ever gaze at those breathtaking underwater documentaries and feel a tug of curiosity? Do vibrant coral reefs and the silent glide of marine life spark a sense of wonder within you? Well, fantastic news, aspiring aquanaut! Your dream of exploring the underwater world can absolutely become a reality, and it might be closer than you think – right here
with Underwater Adventures at the Abbey Leisure Complex, Whitehill Rd, Cambridge.




 
For those just dipping their toes into the idea of scuba diving, the Abbey Leisure Complex offers a fantastic starting point: the exhilarating "PADI Discover Scuba Diving." Try dive. Think of it as a sneak peek into a whole new dimension. In a safe and controlled pool environment, under the watchful eyes of experienced and friendly instructors, you'll get your first taste of breathing underwater. It's an exciting opportunity to feel the weightlessness, learn some basic skills, and simply experience the magic of being submerged. The instructors are brilliant at ensuring you feel comfortable and at ease every step of the way, answering all your questions and guiding you gently through the initial experience.
 
Click here to book your Try dive with Underwater Adventures




 
Perhaps the "try dive" has ignited a passion within you, and you're ready to take the plunge (pun intended!). Underwater Adventures also provides comprehensive PADI Open Water courses. This internationally recognised certification is your passport to exploring dive sites around the globe. The course equips you with the essential knowledge and practical skills needed to dive safely and confidently in a variety of underwater environments. From understanding dive theory and equipment to mastering crucial in-water techniques, you'll be guided by expert instructors who are passionate about sharing their love for the underwater world.

Click here to book your PADI open water course with Underwater Adventures
 
What makes learning to scuba dive with Underwater Adventures so appealing? It's more than just a course. You'll benefit from:
 
Quality Training: Experienced and certified instructors dedicated to your safety and learning.

Modern Equipment: Access to well-maintained and reliable scuba gear.

A Welcoming Community: Connect with fellow diving enthusiasts and share your underwater adventures with the Underwater Adventures dive club



Whether you're a Cambridge local or live in the surrounding area, Underwater Adventures at the Abbey Leisure Complex offers a convenient and supportive environment to embark on your scuba diving journey. It's a chance to discover a thrilling new hobby, challenge yourself, and unlock access to the incredible beauty that lies beneath the surface of our oceans, lakes, and quarries.
 
So, are you ready to trade the familiar sights of Cambridge for the mesmerising world beneath the waves? Your adventure starts here. Learn to scuba dive at the Abbey Leisure Complex with Underwater Adventures and prepare to be amazed!


Click here to contact us for more information