Your Instructors

We are a small but friendly team, who all share a common view of the style of diving that we undertake here. We are all focussed on making sure that you have a great time in absolute safety. Our diving keeps within a series of safe diving practices which have ensured that we maintain a very high safety record. Here then is an introduction to your instructors.

Brian Goldthorpe - Owner and Chief Instructor

Brian has been diving since the mid-90's and is both a BSAC Advanced Instructor, and a PADI Instructor; as well as being a BSAC Advanced Diver and a Nitrox Instructor. Before coming to Gran Canaria he dived in the UK at most of the popular sites including the Farne Islands, St Abbs, Oban and the Scottish West Coast, Plymouth, and of course inland sites such as Gildenburgh, Capernwray and Stoney Cove. He was Chairman of Harrogate BSAC and is a qualified boat handler.

His main interest today is digital underwater photography, for which he is also an instructor. In 2006 he was awarded a 'Certificate of Recognition for Excellence' by PADI for the teaching of their Digital Underwater Photography Course.

You can read his Personal blog on Gran Canaria here.

Eduardo Vera Gonzalez

Eduardo has been diving for over twenty years, most of this here in the Marine Reserve at Arinaga in Gran Canaria. He is a BSAC Instructor and also a PADI Divemaster, and took his first ever dive, in the bay of the Playa del Cabrón back in the 1980's. He believes he has completed more than 5000 dives but stopped counting a long time ago! He has been involved in several special wreck explorations including the expedition to Florida in 1997 to examine the wreck of the 'Valdabena' - a ship which was carrying many emigrants from the Canaries to the USA which sank in 1919. He has also logged more that 200 extreme dives on the 'Alphonso XII' which lies in 60m of water and where stories of lost Gold coins and other jewelry still persist. Ed lives in Arinaga, overlooking the sea, and his two sons both follow the other major local recreational activity - windsurfing. His knowledge of the marine reserve, its tides, currents and weather, and the marine life here are encyclopedic and he is highly regarded among the local divers here.

Annette Goldthorpe

Annette learnt to dive when she first came to Gran Canaria, but in such a beautiful environment very quickly matured into a competent diver and then qualified as an instructor. She is both a PADI and a BSAC Instructor, and has dived in the Red Sea, Thailand and Florida, where she took her PADI instructor exam in an alligator infested inland pool!. At the end of 2007 she moved back to the UK and is sadly missed now by us all. She lives near Blackpool with Chris and her dog, Aston, and has no intention at the moment of trying diving in UK waters!

Andy Batty

Andy has been diving for over six years and has been working in Gran Canaria as an instructor for the last four. He is a PADI Master Scuba Diver Trainer, an Emergency First Response (First Aid) Instructor and an ITDA Advanced Sports Instructor. Before joining us he worked on the west coast of Gran Canaria where he dived on a daily basis sites such as Pasito Blanco, the Mogan Wrecks and El Pajar.