A right load of plates

[Fiona]

Just back from 3 days of fabulous diving in Salcombe, diving from X-Dream skippered by Paul Pike and his trusty crewman Nigel. There had been much ribbing about one of our planned dives which was the wreck of the Maine, we knew they were just having us on and I am happy to report they were, we had a great dive on her.

I buddied with Lou and Caroline for my dives and we did the following.

Maine - max depth of 35m, dive time 55mins
Herzogin Cecilie - depth of 6.1m, dive time 31mins. Shallow dive turned in to a great one because I found a Thornback Ray in the sand.
Riversdale - max depth 41.8m, dive time 72mins. My longest ever UK dive
Soudan - depth 21.5m, dive time 45mins.
Newholme - depth 37.3m, dive time 66mins.
Soudan - depth 20.7m, dive 40mins. So good we did it twice.

I'll add some detail later but a few photos to start it off.

Lou, Caroline and NickB



Fiona (Pink & Fluffy), NickB and Nic (Tootricky)



It wasn't all diving



Not content with one footy shirt, Howard wears two



A few pics from the Soudan









I set out on Sunday morning in bright sunshine, so the prospect of a few good days diving was the order of the day. On the way down I had arranged to meet up with Adrian Kellend as Lou was buying his torch, so after a brief stop at Exeter services I arrived in Salcombe just after lunch. Lou and Caroline had booked an apartment for the week and as I had only recently booked on to the trip they let me stay with them. The apartment was lovely nice kitchen / living room and two nice bedrooms plenty of room.

After sorting out my bags we walked into the town as there was a festival on for the weekend, we walking along the little main street and had a short stop off at the band stand to listen to a little of the music, then we headed off up the road to see if we could see the Gig racing, we choose a gig each and unfortunately Lou's came in a dismal last although they did have a disadvantage as they were a mixed crew.

We had a nice ice cream and headed off back up the hill luckily there was a nice view part way up so there was an excuse to look out over the harbour and finish our ice creams. After having some dinner we headed off back down the road to meet up with the other guys, we sat in the beer garden having a drink and then went back down to the bar and met up with Nick and Nic, introductions done we sat and chatted until Mark and the Dude arrived. The it was back up the hill for an early night, I can't say I enjoyed the big walks up and down.

Monday morning and because the car park is officially closed we off loaded our kit and took them back up the hill (again) and parked them at the apartment, we were the luckily ones everyone else had an even longer, steeper climb. Back down the hill and we loaded the boat, Paul produced a piece of wood for the benches for me, as I had problems when we dived with him at the bank holiday, I didn't think he would have remembered (top man).

The first dive was the Maine, a well documented wreck load of plates the dive was great and the wreck had lots of life on it. Back on the boat Paul had put together a little buffet lunch, which was not expected at all. Second dive was the Hertsgoin Cecillia, unfortuately we went down on a sandy bottom as it was a shallow wreck, we searched for a few minutes and then I lost Lou and Caroline I continued to search and found what I thought was a dogfish lying in the sand I wafted some of the sand away and discovered a large Thornback ray, I watched it for a while and then he flapped his wings and off he went. A little further on a large shaddow appeared and I had found the wreckage.

[ScubaSue]

Fab pics Fiona!

[Kent Tooling]

Fab report Fiona,

Can not wait for the rest of the pictures

[Paul Oliver]

I missed out on day 1 and the Main but had some quality dives on Day's 2 and 3 with the Dude keeping things amusing

Riversdale - Max depth 42m (my MOD stopped us going deeper on this huge wreck) and a very enjoyable 77 min run time with 5-6m of Dark viz.

Soudan both days was a max of 20m for 45 min and a very nice light 7-8m of viz.

The Newholm was a max of 41m and a run time of 82 min on this very big wreck in a dark 8m+ of viz.

Top marks also to Paul on X-Dream for some top quality surface interval chilli

Top diving and a top couple of days

[Fiona]

When we got back in to the harbour we had to go and get the cars again which meant yet another slog up the hill and off to in convoy to find the dive shop, Salcombe has very narrow street and 4 cars trying to find the dive shop was a bit tricky on the parking.

Now this is where it got interesting, the dive shop had changed hands that very morning and Mark was informed when he phoned that we could have air but the new owner wasn't able to blend nitrox, so poor Mark had to do the owner and gas blending course and was there filling cylinders until about 9.30pm as the Oxygen didn't arrive until 6pm. Needless to say the rest of us headed off to the Ferry Inn where we sat in the sun overlooking the estuary and had a few beers (sorry Mark ). Dinner was fish and chips which must have been the worst in Devon but the local cat was quite pleased.

Tuesday started off nice and sunny again but by the time we were kitted up it was raining we did the Riverdale when we came back from the dive Paul had made us baked potatoes and chilli it was just what we needed - topman Paul, second dive was the Soudan which was full of nudibranchs and in the pipes of the large boiler were lots of lovely little Tompot blennies, right at the back of a hole in the boiler was an enormous conger with lots of prawns. The evening was spent in the Fortescue, NickB and Howard eat in the tv room watching the footy and the rest of us ate in the pub. After the meal Lou, Caroline and I headed off back up the hill and we finished the evening off with a small malt nightcap.

Wednesday was our last diving day and we were doing the Newholme and wanted to do the Soudan again, for lunch Paul had once again come up trumps and we had sausages and onions, chilli and rolls.

Back off the boat for the last walk up the hill to collect the cars and offload the boat, we said our goodbyes and that was the end of 3 great diving days.

Thanks to Mark for the late space, organising the O2 and blending course for the lady in the shop so we could do the dives on the mixes we wanted. Paul Pike is a cracking skipper so if your looking to dive from Weymouth give him a shout.

Chavs in town

[Mark Griffith]

Sounds like you had a good trip.Nice report Fiona.
cheers
Mark

[Mark Griffith]

It came to me while reading Fi trip report that we can sort the entire UK illegal immegrant invade in one move.Simply place a poster on every beach in the Uk warning of our native homegaurd.

..


..


..

..

..

cheers
Mark

[parahandy]

Nice report Fiona sounded like a top trip.

[Adrian Kelland]

If you didn't find the pile of plate, he put you on the wrong wreck. I'd ask for my money back

Glad all went well. 'Herzogin Cecilie' by the way. Quite a big ship in it's day - 4 masts IIRC. Not that you could tell now. The local National Trust place has some pics of it if you are ever blown out in the area.

Adrian

[Fiona]

Thanks for the correct spelling Adrian, yes I think there was a picture in one of the books, something like an acre of sail. There seemed to be lots of wreckage and much of it seemed to be covered by sand with some large pieces exposed, it was a bit surgey on the dive so a lot of the weed made the viz a bit odd.

I did come across the Dude tying himself in knots while doing line laying practice with Mark

All the wrecks were covered in life with plenty of plumose anemones and dead mens fingers and I have never seen so many nudibranchs before.