| Imported post
As dawn broke over Edinburgh I checked my alarm clock and immediately sprang into action by switching it off and going back to sleep.
At this point some two hundred miles away Marco was on the road to Dave's house to get to the famed location that is St Abbs.
As Marco forced his way through the road-works and heavy goods traffic I snored and dreamt of (the following has been edited due to the fact that Mrs Gavster or "Fiona" might read this and use her new dive knife.)
At seven I finally got up and made Fi's breakfast (what a new man I am) and then eventually packed the car and got on the road to Abbs.
We arrived a few minutes after nine and immediately were confronted by Marco (a dead ringer for Omar Sharriff) and Dave Williamson (A dead minger ... sorry Dave but the gag was there!)
Introductions were made and it was decided to wait for Billy's boat at eleven. That gave us time to generally have a chat and wait for the arrival of Paul C.
Paul arrived at 10.30 and after a furious bit of kitting up we managed to get on Billy's boat and off the Skellys.
This was a fabulous dive. No need to go deeper than 16m and 45 minutes of clear water, limited drift and surge, loads of life and me and the missus nearly spat our regs we were both smiling so much.
Even the weather turned and the heavy-ish drizzle that had dominated the morning was replaced by bright sunshine and a delightful rainbow. It really doesn't get much better than this people.
After a surface interval that included a Cheese-Burger from Alison(Billy's charming wife) and a can of coke. We had to kit up in about 2 minutes to catch the boat again. My tank nearly slipped from it's keeper and another passing diver managed to rescue me. It did mean me having to bend over right in front of him whilst he adjusted the tank that got some very strange looks from people walking their dogs. Hadn't they ever seen a man dressed in rubber bend over in a car-park before!
Anyway, the next dive site was a tunnel ten minutes from the harbour. The entrance was a wide fissure that narrowed and darkened as you went further in. There are two chimneys and me and Fi ended up using the first one. This brought us to the surface and a wee belly-scramble through and then re-descend, cut back a bit and through the other side. Great fun.
After exiting the tunnel we ended up cutting through a fairly dense kelp forest but after some weaving about I saw a clear path and descended down to about 16m and beneath the kelp.
The area opened up again and despite the viz not being as clear as the first dive it was still more than acceptable.
We saw load of fish, Wrasse, Pollock a three and a half foot Ling and loads of Crabs but it was Fi's spotting of a fairly large octopus that really made the day for me.
I actually managed to swim over it but Fi gave me a tug on the fin I turned to see the creature in full flight. It settled on the side of a rock and I lay on the deck just watching it pulse.
Unfortunately, the group of divers that we had shared the boat with came over a disturbed the beastie and we decided at that point to continue. With Fi's 12 almost empty it was time to stick up a blob and have a long safety stop due to the up-and-down nature of the dive.
Again the sun was out and the diving had been completed for the day. After packing cars we all adjourned to The New Inn for a beer and a chat. After saying our goodbyes (one very temporary 'cos we'll be seeing Marco in Sharm in a week) everyone shuffled off.
In the car on the way back to Edinburgh I said to Fi that the Internet must be a powerful thing. Divers from all over the country meet up, have a great day and all because of a website.
We'll be back at Abbs as soon as we can, just gotta get the Red Sea out of the way first.
(Edited by Gavin Yates at 12:24 pm on Sep. 9, 2002)  |