New Year - 04/01/2020

OK, so last year - with the volume of dives I did - I found it difficult keeping up. In fact, the volume of diving somewhat overwhelmed my desire to write the blog. 

So for 2020, I'm taking a different approach. I'm not going to blog every dive, just the out of the ordinary stuff, the cool stuff, and maybe some product reviews as and when I invariably buy new kit. :)

So what did I omit in 2019 that I should of mentioned? Well:

• Lanzarote Technical Dives
• Scapa Flow, Orkney
• Clyde Wrecks, Glasgow
• A second trip to Kinlochbervie, Northwest Scotland
• Qualifying as a Seasearch Observer 

Aside from that, the usual run of the mill stuff totalling 113 dives in the calendar year. For some of you full time dive pros that's nothing, but for a recreational diver who has a full time job that's not an insubstantial number.

So I've dived twice already this year - once on New Years Day with Eastwood Divers and once with Deathbox Didier.

The latter turned out to a lovely swim around Anchor Point, Loch Fyne that ended up a glorious nudibranch hunt and, by deliberate coincidence, my 700th dive. I had quite intentionally selected a buddy who:

• was more competent than me (although this is highly debatable 😃)
• wasn't a club diver who would expect me, as an instructor, to look after them
• could help me make it a fairly lengthy memorable affair (70 minutes and ultimately limited by the cold water and not air)

Old Deathbox was the natural choice and what a fine choice he was!

700th Dive Montage

Blame It On The Weatherman - 16/03/2019

I'm not entirely Bewitched were correct when they decided to blame the weatherman, but I had set aside this day as day when I'd take students training months ago. Then when the forecast came out it was for bad weather.

We were valiant. I mean, fighting throw the snow storm to get there. Kitting up in high winds and blizzard. Entering the water with a surface current and waves. Going down in what seemed like zero visibility. 

However, we were then rewarded with a calm dive around the Frames. Malky saw his first shark. We surfaced and the rest of the gang all agreed that a trip to the Village Inn seemed like a better idea than a second dive.

Apeks RK3 Test Dive - 15/01/2019

Apeks RK3

Despite sounding a little like a droid from a Star Wars film and also being the actual name of a blaster used by the Galactic Empire, Apeks RK3 are the latest fin offering from Apeks. Designed for the rough and tumble of the US Military, they are based on the pretty standard vented rubber fins popular among military, professional and technical divers.

As a club, Eastwood Divers decided to spend some cash on new fins. We bought three pairs of Scubapro Seawing Novas and three pairs of RK3s (as a starter) to allow members to try different fins before they jump in and spend the best part of £100 on their own purchase. As I happened to be diving with Gusto Leo and the Barrman on the day when the Barrman picked up the fins from the local dive shop I opted to try out the RK3s fresh from the box at Conger Alley.

I'm a Scubapro Seawing Nova user, so this type of fin is a little different for me and I'm predominantly a frog kicker due the silty bottoms I dive in. On my dive I did helicopter turns, some reverse finning, took a few photos and tried frog kicking along with standard flutter kicking. So, here's what I liked and didn't like. 

PROS

• Helicopter turns were very easy, helped by a shorter blade length than I am used to 
• Reverse finning was super easy, which helped reduce silt after stopping to take a photograph 
• The short blade also meant that flutter kicks threw up less silt than a Scubapro Seawing Nova would 
• They seemed pretty robust, and the length was certainly more compact than my existing fins 

CONS

• Frog kicking lacked power compared to my Seawings 
• Seawings are super easy to put on, RK3s aren't bad, but they certainly aren't as easily donned and doffed. 

OTHER CONSIDERATIONS

• We've bought the standard RK3. As a regular shore diver I was pleased to see they float. It means you can walk in wast deep, let go of a fin put one and then easily grab the other. If you want a heavier, negatively buoyant fin consider shelling out a little extra wedge and buying the RK3 HD. 
• Apeks also have a very generous instructor discount 

Am I going to buy a pair for myself? Well, mibbe but that doesn't mean I'm a convert, it just means I can see the advantages of them for different dives. Let's be honest every gentleman spy / scuba diver should have more than one tuxedo or pair of fins . :)

Oh, and as for the dive, it turned out to be thoroughly decent...

Carronella Pellucida 

Sepiola Atlantica 

Firework Anemone 

Facelina Bostoniensis 

Bloody Henry 

Farne Way - 14/09/2017

It’s been a few years since I last dived at the Farnes. Sometimes you forget what it’s like. I mean, you remember the visuals, average diving, seals, the village of Seahouses, but I always forget just how playful and fun loving young seal are.

I was taking young Sarah in for her first taste of seal action. I explained the rule was to always let them come to you.

We did. They came, they posed for photos, they nibbled our fins, they tried to bite our fingers, they played with us. I think 

It genuinely has to be Farne away one of the best places on earth to dive with marine mammals.

Shawaddy Wuddy - 24/06/2018

When the club headed over to St Abbs for the third time in three months, I wasn't sure what to expect. I was diving with the Wanton Hussy. It was his first dives off a boat, he was relatively in experienced. The problem I wasn't expecting was that my relatively new Sealife DC2000 was to be the thing that went wrong - It was subsequently returned, and replaced under warranty.

As a result, I have no pictures of any of the cool things we saw including the octopus. Sad times. Meanwhile, while we were under the water England won 6-1 against the mighty Panama. Apparently they're going to win the World Cup.

Werewolf Fish - 26/05/2018

I've done St Abb's already this year, but this time myself and the Wylie Fox were warming up for Scapa Flow in June so we turned our attention to the Glanmire and it's square profile.

Regular readers will know I've done it before in the Rope to Nowhere and Return to the Glanmire. In each case I never exactly covered myself in diving glory. Today I knew it would be different. Firstly, I was pretty dived up and secondly I had learned lessons.

I was right, Wylie Fox and I descended the shot line and dived the wreck and surfaced doing our 10 minutes of decompression on the way up. The dive was quite unremarkable apart from a pleasant snakelocks anemone. That was exactly the sort of experience we both wanted for our Scapa preparations. 

It was the second dive that was to be the standout however. A shallow dive (14m) at Skelly's Hole. I swapped buddies so that I could do some compass work with Walker Texas Ranger. WTR was leading as part of his ScotSAC Sport Diver training. 

The site is pleasant with a series of narrow ravine's and gullies and at certain times of the year home to the Atlantic Wolffish and Lumpsuckers. I've seen a small lumpsucker once many years ago, but an adult has always elluded me and I had never seen a live wolffish.

As we cut our way through the ravines we first saw a large male lumpsucker. It was bigger than I'd expected and way more colourful. It would not have looked out of place in the tropics.

Then one of the other members of our group signalled he'd found something. I'm not sure he knew if it was a conger eel or a wolffish, but it was definitely the latter. 

I surfaced delighted.I can't wait to return at the end of June.

Lumpsucker

Wolffish

Lumpsucker

Dahlia Anemone

Flabellina Lineata

Dahlia Anemone

Snakelocks Anemone

Eastbound And Down - 29/04/2018

Since the turn of the year I have been the "Expedition Officer" for my dive club. I'm selfish and like diving, so it is well suited to my interests. The better the diving, the better it is for me. So it was without hesitation that I booked Pathfinder for a few days throughout the year. This was the first of those days. 

Myself and Gill.I.Am had arrived the night before in the van to save me getting up too early in the morning. It's a pretty decent deal as you can park a campervan overnight for a £10 donation to the St Abbs Harbour Trust. 

In the morning I awoke to sunshine and an eerily quiet harbour. However, soon enough the troops had arrived along with groups of day trippers. I had agreed to take responsibility for a club Branch Diver and, if she felt comfortable after her first boat dive, a little instruction on the second. 

Once on the boat it all went swimmingly and the only thing that let us down was the visibility which was pretty poor (2m). However, we endured the cold for 41 minutes which meant Sarah could log her longest ever dive. 

After a quick trip back to shore for snacks and some chat we all headed out again. This time Sarah was going to finish her Sport Diver compass work before enjoying a little pootle around rocks.

It was reciprocal heading. Pretty basic stuff. It did mean that we were unlikely to get back to our starting point, but with improving visibility I could see the Black Carr Rock that was enough for a pass. From there, Sarah and I just went from rock to rock looking for the famous wolf fish residents of St Abbs. We never found any, but we did find a nice scorpionfish, beadlet anemones  colourful bloody henry starfish. Not bad for a training dive.

Parked up for the night

Setting up for the day

Add caption

My buddy

Pathfinder

Scorpionfish

Breath Damn It, Breathe! - 12/11/2017

One of the best thing about ScotSAC, and I assume club diving with BSAC, is that they train you for free. There are some exceptions to this, of course, such as 50m diving and nitrox courses. However, when it comes to safety it's pretty much always free.

• Rescue training for Sport Divers? Free
• Deep rescue training from 30m? Free
• Diver First Aid and O2? Free

It's for that reason that I'm critical of some of the commercial agencies charging for first responder courses. They aren't concerned about the safety of the dive community.

Today myself and a few others did the Diver First Aid course, most of us had first aid training, but it's always good to have a refresher. In all about 17 divers took part, a free benefit to all wider dive community.

CPR

Charitable Outreach - 10/11/2017

It is a well known (or ken't if you're from Falkirk) fact that beneath my gruff exterior I'm a charitable chap. As members of my club know ,I've taken the step of introducing as many people as possible to diving at night. People appreciate it, not everyone enjoys the dark as I do. On this occasion I took Walker Texas Ranger and Andy G out to Finnart for another dive in the dark. 

We were running late. A phenomenon that happens a lot with diving. We quickly kitted up and got into the water for a potter around.

The viz was decent as we plodded from frame to frame. We passed a nice pipefish, a few cuttlefish and a number of the usual suspects.

It was another success, and pleasantly uneventful!

Back on the surface Gill.I.Am loaded up the trailer and headed to Firkin Point, Loch Lomond to camp overnight.

The Dive Whisperer - 05/11/2017

With the Barrman finalising his instructor training he had asked me if I'd come out with the guys from the club to buddy his Landlady for a couple if dives. Now the poor Landlady has spent much of the last year or so unable to dive, while the Barrman has had the diving time of his life. This was therefore a chance for the Landlady to skill up while diving with one of the greatest dive ninjas in a very small geographical area.

With that we had a chat about what we'd do. I explained how the A-Frames works. We set some limits and off we went. On the first dive I could tell she was a bit nervous - being a little unsure of the site and not a fan of poor visibility. However, decent training always kicks in even throughout the dive her breathing rate slowed.

We came out chatted about and then set off to dive the same route again. This time she was calmer, smoother in the water. The presence of the mighty Frewbowski was making a difference.

In fact, in-depth scientific analysis* proved that her air consumption fell by 15% throughout the day. I should really call myself the Dive Whisperer.

We saw some cool stuff too:

• Highland dancers
• Lobster
• Conger

......And the Barrman passed his instructor training.

The dive crew for the day

* I calculated her SAC rate

Northern Exposure - Part 2 - 29/04/2017

Camas Torsa

With all our divers now firmly ensconced at Resipole, Loch Sunart, our second day of diving took us to nearby Camas Torsa which translated from Gaelic means Thor's Bay. I'm not entirely sure of why its called that, but I suspect it may be because of the thunderous wind. That would certainly make sense.

However, that same wind gave the Barrman the opportunity to set up the new ESAC events shelter, as supplied by Cotswold Outdoor for a great price.

Having failed to pack my camera charger, it marked the end of my underwater photography, but I wasn't too bothered given I had never dived these sites before and preferred to focus on the basics of navigation.

 

My first dive was an exploratory one with the Chairman. We made our way down to 35m and found ourselves midway down a large wall. It reminded me a little of Anchor Point, but with less life.  My personal view was that it had been dredged by a scallop dredger in the last year or so decimating much of the soft coral life that should have been present.

 

That said we had a nice dive just exploring and enjoying the life that was there:

• Giant seapens
• Macropodia Rostrata
• Edible crabs
• Queen scallops

For my second dive on the site I teamed up with Ian (who has complained he doesn't have a nickname, that may change in my next blog...) Having already explored much of the site my focus was on giving Ian as good an experience as I could given the depth limitation. With that in mind I had said to the surface marshall that we'd be down for 50 minutes wit a plan to stay at 15m until we hit 100 bar and then return the same distance at 7-5m coming up with 50 bar.

 

As it was the current had increased and we drifted for 25m barely flicking a fin and so had to turn back at 25 minutes. The return journey didn't take too much longer, but it did take a bit more work as we headed into the current (most pronounced at the point).

 

As we surfaced I made a mental note not to rush back to this site, before celebrating Ian's longest ever dive - 54 minutes.

Camas Torsa Dive HQ



Leading The Way - 29/03/2015

Some say that dive clubs are dying. Not so Eastwood ScotSAC. Today we had around 15 trainees in the water and around 25 people in total. That's a lot of people at one site all learning to dive for the measly cost of their annual membership fee (£150). It was also nice to encounter the divers of the Napier University Sub Aqua Club  who were also out learning to dive.

I doff my cap to them in particular for a very particular reason. Due to a lack of funds their small club can't afford drysuits, so they dive in.....wetsuits. Pretty hardcore in March, in Scotland. If you have an old drysuit lying around why not donate it to their cause? They aren't too concerned about styling (trust me I saw the wetsuits), but functionality is important. You'll be doing young Harriet et al a favour.

As for me I was leading divers around the site (Seal Reef). On each occasion three divers went in, and three came out. I consider that a dive leading success.

I took one photograph as it was too big a scorpionfish to leave un-papped

Scorpionfish