The Tennisplatz is one of my favorite dive sites in Lake Constance. Parking 50m off the water makes it a quite comfortable place crowded by many divers, so one has to escape to the depth to be with its own . The following dive I did some days ago using my JJ CCR (as usual of course).

Located at Überlingen in the western part of the lake, the dive site is sloping down slowly until one hits a small wreck at 40m. It’s laying upside down with a broken bottom having a treasure chest inside which contains some stones only. The chest stayed open so I closed it and continued my descent. As always there is this huge burbot (Trüsche) laying near the wreck which makes me turn around and look to it for some time. The following video – done by a friend of mine in last year – gives you an impression for this part of the dive:

After seeing enough I turned right heading West and at around 50m the bottom gets more steep and you find some small walls. One starts at around 70m and the other one around 90m. The latter one is quite upright and nice, less than 10m in height. Down there is not tooo much to see (at least I did not explore anything interessting yet , just sandy plain sloping down slowly. After touching down I continued my dive at the top of the wall. Down the wall I saw an other really huge burbot which I recognized was white, not green as usual. I continued my dive and reached the cross with the skull sitting on top. Some weeks ago I found it laying around and erected it which seemed to work. Below I saw this huge tree pointing towards the depth. Slowly I got up to the other Wall to see some well known landmarks. There are fisher nets, a box and doing a first deep stop I reached this thick cable crossing the bottom hanging 1m above. At around 75m someone tied a yellow rubber duck on it. Then I hit these huge wooden planks and the steel rope. Still ascending I reached the big wall near Parkhaus Post, an other well know dive site nearby. Down there at around 50m has been enough light already to see the boulders and the wall without a torch. Some weeks ago I even had light at the 70m wall which is very uncommon for the lake where you hit the dark side at 20m more often than not. Under a big overhang I continued heading West when I saw a rabbit laying around. It looked like an easter bunny and while investigating it I found it made of clay. Satting it upright I reached the place having some miniature figures nicely placed in the landscape shortly after. The scene is guarded by a red plastic crocodile giving shelter for a small burbot. I continued my ascent and when I reached the top of the wall I turned heading East.

I felt pretty cold now, the temperature down there has been around 5°C. I looked forward to reach the shallower parts where it will be 10°C and more but I had at least 30min until then. Staying on the top of the wall I headed back. Leaving the wall to reach the 15m deco ceiling I found the temperature to be around 7°C now. Still cold and still some time to get warm. At the 9m ceiling I met a couple of other divers who did not see me so I continued without communicating. At 6m I reached the sea weed and had some company by a large school of perch (Barsch) which are very numerous in the shallow parts of the lake. Now it got warmer and quite bright. Looking up I saw the platform at the end of a old rail track but I still had to stay at the 6m level so I continued to head East. After turning and reaching the platform again I layed down and watched a large, nicely red colored sickleback (Stichling) nesting and fighting. After cleaning my deco I surfaced slowly and as usual I did breathe my oxygen rich loop until I put off stages and fins and reached the car parking nearby.

After pulling off my dry suit some other divers around told me about a wooden wrack down at this dive site which I didn’t know about yet. Anyone interested in diving it with me? Scooter preferred…