Christmas Came Early - 21/12/2016

A conversation in Aquatron about Frocktasia not ever having seen a cuttlefish led to her and Mad Marx joining Jester and I on some St Catherines' night diving to find ourselves our target.

With Jester working late and the rest of us finishing early we headed up and did sneaky dive before Jester arrived. It was nice enough, but cuttlefish or bobtail squid as they are called in other parts of the world were conspicuous by their absence. My reputation as a cuttlefish wrangler was in tatters.

We emerged and re-tanked and went down again with Jester in tow. Then it happened, I was just swimming down past 10m when I spotted one crouched behind a rock. I signalled and we stayed and admired this stunning little creature for a bit before heading off to enjoy the rest of the site at night.

For Frocktasia it was another diving experience checked off. For me it was two of my lowest ever SAC rate - 12l/m.

Hunter Gatherers -17/12/2016

With the amateur football season currently in a hiatus, I took the opportunity to dive with the Something for the Weekend crew, who this week were diving at much more civilised hour that encouraged my participation.

We did a couple of dives at the A-Frames, Finnart. Our group consisted of Cptn Al, legendary underwater photographer and proprietor of Bridge of Weir's finest restaurant Shafiq, the Walkman and a relative scubie-newbie Hunter - not the star of 90s tv show Gladiators.

We plunged into the icy cold diving in Red Arrow formation. The vis was pretty decent but, the life was a little limited and reminded me why dark is best. After a fairly lengthy potter at 20m we got the cold signal from one of the divers. It was cold to be fair - 7c.

On the way up it went a little wrong when Shafiq lost one of his dive computers. That meant that after a short surface interval our second dive was ultimately to become a failed search and rescue mission. 

We had fun and I managed to squeeze two dives out of one tank which saved me a few bucks. So that's my win for the day. As for our scub-newb it turns out he was pretty proficient  and has dived years ago and had just returned to it saying he was a beginner. So not really a newb at all.

The camera is still out of action.

Two Season in One Day - 17/11/2016

Four Seasons in One Day by Crowded House was one of my favourite songs as a teenager. I still love it. There is a lyric that resonates with me:

"Smiling as the shit comes down

You can tell a man from what he has to say"

Tonight that was Jester and I. We arrived in monsoon like conditions despite the false promises of Accuweather for cloudy but dry. We waited 10 minutes for the downpour to restrict itself to a drizzle. At which point we made a dash for the water. It was cold - my computer said 6c.

I was still without a camera so floated between the A-Frames, just having a cold old time trying to spot interesting things for Jester.

The highlight was a catshark, but I couldn't get the idea of a more sinister shark in the water out my head. Largely because we watched the opening scenes of The Shallows while we waited for the rain to subside. Perhaps this wasn't the best pre-dive preparation. :/

We surfaced an hour after entry only to find a shift in the seasons. It was now cold monsoon with a blizzard hurrying our packing up.

Blizzard

It Flooded - 03/11/2016

OK, so not every diving experience is perfect. I think we can all agree on that. 

Tonight wasn't a great night. It started with a getting kitted up at St Catherine's in the dark, buddy check and descent down to around 8m. At which point Jester and I paused to take a picture of a cuttlefish. You can see my picture below. At that point I noticed some water inside my Sealife camera housing and my camera starting to misbehave.

I knew what was going on. I immediately went for the surface, left my camera on a rock and headed back in to continue the dive. We swept down by the bottom of the reef to around 31m and then back up the far side enjoying gurnards, nudibranchs, more cuttlefish and the resident cushion star. None of which were photographed by me. 

Instead I took up photobombing. Jester hates it. I love it. If you have a photography daft buddy here's how to do it.

1. Enter stealth mode - switch off torch 
2. Swim round buddy in the dark - they'll think you're still behind them 
3. Approach head on as they compose the photograph
4. Sit 1m from the target
5. Await strobe flash 
6. Boss it Zoolander style

We returned, I collected my camera and dekitted to confirm what I already knew. It had flooded, but not horrifically. 

I took it home, nursed it back to health, couldn't get the battery to retain charge. So I've ordered a new battery for £4 on ebay. 

The Last Cuttlefish Photo

Photobombing is fun

Free Fallin' - 20/10/2016

It was my 70th dive when I first got a real taste for night diving. My buddy was Mike Diver and while I'd done a few night dives that was the one where I found my confidence. From there diving with the Zookeeper made me the diver I am today and I passed that experience onto Jester.

I say this because Jester and I were talking about why so few people take the plunge at night despite perfect weather, sea conditions and more life. Anyway, that's their loss.

With the tide at the lowest we'd seen in a while, we briefly wondered where the loch went before stepping in and 'free fallin' down the ledge to10m.

It started well with the first of a few cuttlefish and a two types of nudibranch. We pottered about for around an hour before returning to the shore, the car and the timeless tunes of Tom Petty.  

Cuttlefish

Nudibranch

Nudibranch

Giant Shark vs Mega Octopus - 18/10/2016

With the Mermaid determined to get a few more twinset dives under her belt before heading up to Scapa for a liveaboard with her teckie other half, we headed to Loch Long and Conger Alley for a couple of day dives.

It was to be two dives defined by two creatures often featured in B-rate horror movies including Giant Shark vs Mega Octopus. However, neither encounter was as one would expect in the world of bad cinema.

The first dive saw us head down to 25m. While en route down the Mermaid was scanning with her torch when I caught a glimpse of the octopus. I was surprised at first, I've never seen one in Scotland during the day. I signalled to Avril and we stopped to watch this deep sea monster before moving on to enjoy the congers, wrasse, lobsters etc.

The journey back was a little eventful with the Mermaid being slightly under weighted. I'd gone down a little overweighted to compensate, which proved to be useful as I held her down on the safety stop. That's what buddies are for.

The second dive saw us go in looking for an illusive firework anemone, but instead turned up a gentle catshark along with the usual reef life.

Great fun.

Just hanging around

Leaving

Smurf

Conger Eel

Catshark

The Return of Fast Ed - 09/10/2016

Chuck Norris

With my chest infection all but cleared up, I took the opportunity to join the Something For The Weekend Group down to Capernwray. As always they had an absurdly early start. I mean we met at Fast Ed's new gaff at 6.15am. It is a well documented fact that I don't like early starts. Even in Starbucks I don't have the energy to say my real name. I chose Chuck. Fast Ed chose Norris for the win.

With that, our little band (Captain Al, Fast Ed, Jester and The Jackal - so named because is an international man of mystery) headed south.

The weather was fair and with Captain Al and The Jackal test driving new things myself, Fast Ed and Jester teamed up as a buddy three.

The dive, Fast Ed's first Capernwray, took us from the plane to the Podsnap, to the pig gnomes, to Helo 2 and up to famous Devil and other shallow attractions. In all honesty, I found it pretty dull. Even the new addition of albino sturgeon couldn't save the day. However, it was good to visit my Ninja Gnome, who after a while is starting to wear.

After lunch while kitting up Jester ripped his drysuit cuff. Being noble and the site slightly dull I kept him company on the surface while the others went in for another potter about.

Ninja Gnome

Pig Gnome

Albino Sturgeon

Devil

Fast Ed