Initially we were seven, but as the sun was shining, Wyn decided to make hay, but by kick off time of eight o’clock, Carl had a sore throat so we were down to five, namely Carol, David, Anja, Peter and Irfon.
We were diving just after mid-tide on a spring, there was a swell and a lot of seaweed along the seashore, people were starting to get desperate, looking for any excuse from a sore back after doing some gardening to the possibility that they ‘might’ of forgotten some vital part of kit. But Irfon rallied and got everyone back in line and heading seawards. In the meantime Hugh turned up to provide shore cover with Carl. Whilst kitting up, David asked what the maximum dive time was to be? To which Irfon replied “A minimum of an hour and a half and I want to see empty cylinders when you come back.” Now all but one of us took this in the spirit that it was intended, whilst one hadn’t – more of later.
David and Carol were first in, followed by the triad of Peter, Anja and Irfon. Both groups decided to avoid the reef because of the swell and head straight out from the end of the jetty onto the sandy bottom. The first pairing logged a dive time of 38 minutes with David grumbling about the limited life that they spotted. However the threesome had seen an abundance of life, ranging from the smallest pipe fish, a clawless lobster, an array of crabs, flatfish a cuttlefish and the highlight was a squid which had just caught a fish and decided that he enjoyed the warmth emitted from Irfon’s torch so much that he took a good rest on it.
Now what started as a mid tide dive ended on high water slack as Peter, who was leading the dive, took Irfon’s words quite literally and ended the dive at exactly 90 minutes, luckily the shore party hadn’t instigated a search and rescue mission, but given another ten minutes or so, I’m sure they would have. It was now twenty past ten, it was dark and nearing last orders, so a quick change and we were off to the Lion for a de-brief, a pint, some crisps and the obligatory packet of pork scratchings.
Irfon.
The forecast for today was in our favour and on approaching Porth Coleman, ‘Mickey’s favourite launch site of which I shall explain later’, the sea was calm, the air warm and the sun was trying to put in an appearance. For all you fellow divers who thought the weather was going to be like Saturdays, missed a very good day. The plan was to have two drift dives around Bardsey and I would like to mention that my interpretation of a drift must be very different to others:
: drift meaning- gentle movement through air or water!!!!
However, the day also incorporated some hands-on boat handling for myself of which I must thank everyone for their patience and David J for the tuition. We arrived at North side of Bardsey which first appeared aliitle harrowing for me but Peter J soon injected some confidence and said ‘ don’t worry you’ll be alright!! The first to enter were Peter J and Julie with Mickey and John followed by those on the second dive Irfon, David J and David H . A prompt descent was needed if we were to escape the wash and soon found ourselves at quite a depth.
The marine life and topography was fantastic with large lobsters and crabs everywhere, even the biggest dog fish i have ever seen. If I had time to study the fish that whisked passed me I might have been able to name a few. I can claim to have seen a crayfish sat in a large rock crevice but there were some disbelievers are board. David H had a new gadget to try and was looking forward to shooting some good photos hence the speeds that awaited him. Our accent was Erie moving along with the current but once on the surface, despite the variable drift speeds we were back at the start.
All claim to have seen lots and enjoyed the first part of the day, although, there was some discrepancy over the vis and I think to compromise we shall agree it was somewhere between 5-10mtrs. We headed to the light house for lunch and listened to the dulcet tones of the seals which infact was a lovely sound.
The second dive we headed to the south side if Bardsey. Irfon informed us that there are some great gullies, huge rock formations with plenty of life. A man true to his word, although, for me the drift was too fast in places to appreciate the jewels. David J, Irfon and David H took to the water with the camera and this time Irfon leading giving good precise instruction as to what their plan would entail and what to look out for. It all sounded very interesting then 15 – 20 mins into their dive, two SMB’s were deployed almost simultaneously and only about two mtrs away from each other. The gap between the SMB’s soon widen and the dive appeared to continue. Peter and I did at that stage relate to the text book but thought they must have a good explanation for this which on their return was : you never stray from the dive leader and he who is never in the wrong. I think they will agree to disagree!
The day ended well and we headed back to Porth Coleman only to witness extreme frustration, anger and few expletives at the tourists who blocked Mickey in and couldn’t manoeuvre the trailer. This I feel has finished Mickey and never again does he ever want to launch at Porth Coleman.
Hey-ho to the next Marshall / organiser.
Julie
With Peter held up in traffic on his way back from Derby, it left the threesome of Irfon, David and Carol (which was to be her first dive of the season) as the only club members who were up for a dive.
The water looked remarkably clear considering the weather of late and the viz did prove to be good at about 7m. Life was again abundant with the usual suspects being spotted but the Pollack’s were much more docile than usual, allowing us to come right up close to them. Unfortunately David’s torch decided to flood after about 20 minutes so we made a u-turn and headed back to shore.
It would have been nice if more members were present but probably many had looked at the forecast and decided against it, but remember, weather forecasting isn’t always right and sometimes all it needs is a look out of the window.
Irfon.
Having missed two weekends, and not having got properly wet for two weeks, Mickey was starting to show the first signs of cracking up when I spoke to him on Monday evening. So plans for a relaxing little shore dive at Porth Ysgadarn were replaced by a relatively ambitious plan, given the weather forecast, to take the boat out on to the north coast reefs. Irfon reported calm conditions there on Tuesday afternoon so we went with it.
They say that fortune favours the brave and so we got our just rewards, being met by a relatively calm sea albeit with a biggish swell. The afternoon crew of Mickey, Dave H & Peter did a fast N-S drift in about 22 -25 metres using, for some reason, two SMB’s both of which got caught up on the same pot buoy. The consequence was that a lone diver, whose name I couldn’t possibly mention, surfaced shortly thereafter, while the other two put up a second buoy and continued to disappear over the horizon while I picked up the single diver and recovered the two SMBs. Viz. was reported at about 5 metres, not bad for a big spring tide after days of wind and rain, although this was later amended down by a metre or two by the rest of the group, who also had the delights of a couple of brittle star beds.
We then picked up Irfon for the evening dive which was to be off the magnificent Dukey’s reef, hopefully on about slack water. Peter, who was diving on nitrox, decided that he had had an adequate surface interval and joined Irfon and I. We dropped right onto some huge rock and boulder formations in about 22 meters and soon came across a family of 5 assorted sized lobsters living in an area the size of a kitchen table. Slack lasted for only 10-15 minutes so we were soon travelling over a variety of reefs, including crab alley. Other hightlights were a couple of huge bullhuss, a shoal of juvenile sea bass and loads of squishy things that we delighted in describing to Mickey. The dive lasted 54 minutes and was in about 5.5 metres viz., which Peter confirmed to be an improvement on the afternoon.
We were back in Porth Ysgadarn by 8pm and had the boat parked up outside the front door to Pendre well before dark ( Malcolm was rearranging the yard to accomodate a second, bigger and better caravan due to yet more double bookings of the holiday flat!!) But he did break off to join us for a quick one, or two, in the Pen y Bryn, where he discovered, thanks to Peter, and immediately became addicted to, pork scratchings. His excuse for gorging on so many was that it drowned out Mickey reliving the details of the World Cup final. Anyway, the main object of the exercise, to keep Mickey going until the weekend was achieved with some success.
David J.
S**t. Cancelled again.
Mike.
