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Sound Of Mull September (Soggy in Mull) Well, just got back from Mull, knackered, sore and wearing that kind of smug grin you get after several days of good diving in excellent company.
The weather tried its very best to ruin our fun, but we battled on regardless, with dives being done on the Friday night (Thesis), Saturday, sunday and Monday.
0630am on Friday and John pulls up, we find that the YBOD takes up considerably more room than his twinset and the two sets of kit will not fit in my corsa.......bugger. So john ended up driving all the way with me feeling guilty about not being able to help! We arrived in Lochaline at around lunchtime and loaded our kit onto the boat.
I went out with the guys who dived the Thesis, fun and games were had getting down on the shotline as the tide was doing funny things (springs) and Gareths suit decided to die in spectacular fashion (think zip gaping open, but he still went back in, mad git!). I was deck bitch for the boys. Later i cooked an enourmous pan of pasta, made bread and all was followed by a fruit crumble cooked by Lou. This was devoured by most. I also became soup bitch and made a big pan of broth for on the boat the next day!
We stayed in the old post office for the friday night, which is really nice, very comfortable rooms and big bathrooms.
I was on the Brendan, which now has kitting up benches and is an excellent boat to dive off. I even managed not to fall off the ladder!
Saturday dawned bright but threatening rain for later.
The entry into the water from the Brendan is a backward roll off the gunwale which is very high, to the point of you hit the water head first! I discovered that a) i didnt have enough air in my wing and was heading down rather rapidly, and b) i didnt have hold of my mask quite well enough, so was blind and heading down too! Most of the Sound of Mull seemed to be rushing up my sinuses and i could see a black shape infront of my face which i grabbed - lucky i did as it was my mask! Got hold of the inflator and pumped some air into the wing and arrived coughing and spluttering on the surface.
Diving was all excellent, the Rondo followed by a wall dive on Saturday with the vis being down a little but some excellent life on the upper sections of the wreck. We did the swimthrough and had a nice pootle about on the middle sections of the wreck, incurring a bit of deco but with the rudder in shallow water, its not a chore at all. Found a fab nudibranch hiding right where the shotline is tied up and spent a happy 10 minutes with Mark trying to get a good piccie of it.
We dropped into Tobermory in the pouring rain, transforming the national dress of the town into drysuits. We were certainly the most sensibly dressed people in the town.
The afternoon wall dive was very good too, with loads of life and nice and light. A gentle current pushed us along and we surfaced in yet more rain!
The Sunday the weather was a little drier, i dived with John who was diving his shiny new YBOD and Simon where we did the "High Energy" site. Unfortunatley this wasnt as good as it was made out to be and was rather 40watt rather than high energy!
Ashore to Craignure for a bowl of chips in the pub, john had forgotten his shoes so was barefoot in his undersuit. What a sight. A guy with the most tasteless tattoo ever was sighted among the very strange mix of people on the tour bus which invaded the pub 10 minutes after we did......a lipstick kiss mark. Yuck.
Afternoon we did a drift dive where i came across two crayfish in a crack at about 20m. After 200+ dives i thought i had about seen it all underwater, certainly the big stuff, but by christ, these things are MASSIVE! First thought was "What the hell is that?" and second was "Can we eat it?". I did, however, leave them alone and we carried on what turned out to be a rather swift and bumpy drift along a sluggie wall and then onto a flat area of brittlestars where we bagged up.
Off to the Hotel (rather grudgingly) for a meal which was excellent, however Gareth has all the subtlety of a fart in a lift when talking about extra eggs on gammon and then once we were eating talking very loudly about diving......but not scubadiving if you know what i mean. Needless to say the others in the dining room left rather promptly after their meals. Also a certain YD'er has a custard fetish. I think we will leave that one there.
Today we dived the wall on Calf Island, which is one of the best dives i have ever done. Dropping into the black in very good vis (the boat had drifted out a bit), we were expecting a wall at about 10m, 30m later we found it! Light sabers were out and we incurred a bit of deco. I was glad of my nappy as otherwise i wouldnt have had many people wanting to unzip me!
This afternoon i laid some ghosts to rest and did the Hispania. Excellent dive, brilliant vis, found a torch so anyone lost one, give me a shout.
A drive back in the rain through the mountains was breathtaking, with all the small streams overflowing down the mountain sides streaking them with white. The waterfalls in Glencoe were fantastic (where the roadworks are).
Here are some piccies of the weekend.
Caroline checking for light leaks.
Lochaline at 0715 this morning!
John barefoot on Mull.
Yacht heading down the sound.
The newspaper of choice.......
Looking down the sound.
Who is that? I cant remember.....
Gareth fast asleep. Yes he was snoring, no he didnt wake up with the flash!
Steering in a novel way....
Glencoe on the way up.
YD invades the Corran Ferry (infront Parahandy -silver car, left, Geordie Mick - purple corsa, infront of him Gizmo - the Giz-bus)
I also took some film clips on my camera over the weekend.
http://media.putfile.com/Gizmo-Jiggle
http://media.putfile.com/CL-rave
What the hell are you two on? And can i have some next time please
Big thanks to the skippers and to Fiona for taking over the running of the trip!
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then onto Oban till Sat.... Heard from other members of our group that the Lochaline diving was very good......
Originally Posted by Porg 
