If you had heard the rumour that a few hardy souls were planning a dive last Sunday at the NWIDC you may be wondering how they got on. Well, it turned out that most of the hardy souls were anything but. The excuses ranged from “I’ve got a bad cough, through man flu and my gear won’t fit together to I’ve been throwing up all morning”, so in the end only the hardiest two individuals, one being Peter which won’t surprise anyone the other being me just might, turned out to find the quarry surprisingly quiet with only another 5 or 6 cars there. Most appeared to be serious techies who glanced with sad amusement at my 10 litre. We had plans of a sort. Peter’s was to get wet but stay dry as he was actually in a dry suit. Mine was similar but was far more technical as it included a 20 metre or so swim along the wall to the left of the platform. Sounds easy, but after several months layoff it was actually an 18 to 22 metre swim. Amazing how the buoyancy becomes hard work. We continued as far as the end of the promontory before returning along the causeway, where the 6 metre safety stop was initially a 3 metre stop, just. That bloody buoyancy again. We managed 33 minutes with my computer reading 7 degrees while Peter’s came up with 43 degrees. Either way it felt pleasantly toasty and we both enjoyed the outing.
So, recognizing the need to build on that, and to give others the chance to test their kit as well as their buoyancy, another dive is planned for this coming Sunday morning 9th March, meeting up at 10.30am, at the same place. The idea is that there are trainees at SD, DL & AD levels who need to get a dive under their belt before we start training dives with the aim of getting quite a lot done in the early Spring before the boat takes over. Anyone who is interested should give me a call on Saturday evening between 6.30 & 7.30pm.
David
