26th August. “Russian Doll Pike!”

[Freeflow]

[Delayed, but better late than never]

Ro was desperate for a dive to wash the dust off her kit, so once again it is Guildy for the day. I had sent a text to Martyn in case him and Anna were up for a dive, but I didn’t hear back. After a coffee at Ro’s where her nearly blind Staff said ‘hello’ by bumping into my legs a couple of times the kit was thrown into the back of the car and off we go to flatland.

I was diving the twins to see how the ankle was bearing up, although plan B involved a single and my other BC. After another hot drink, a bacon sarnie for Ro, and the spiders being evicted from her kit we kitted up and entered the water, me via the big drop and Ro by the adjacent slope, which isn’t anywhere near as much fun. Dropping onto the platform I made sure I could still shut down with relative ease and then we went to the coach, lorry, Provost and to the boat. Or at least to a boat. Sitting on top of the lump we had found I had to get my knife out to see if it what the lump was-metal or wood!

Having decided on wood I led off to the coach, but instead we found another boat, the one I was originally looking for. That would explain why the first boat wasn’t the shape I was expecting it to be then. Having found me bearings we went to the coach, where the poor vis was explained by the bottom stirrers coming the other way. The vis cleared remarkably to 4m after we passed their furthest point of swim, and we were heading along a rope that wasn’t the ‘rope to nowhere’ thought we were on [I was lost again]. This one led to another boat, via a bunch of perch that were feeding from it. I was a bit bemused as to what a nylon could provide for a fish until I remembered ‘Jaws’ in my pocket.

For a bit of amusement I braided a frayed knot until Ro got the look of ‘get your arse moving or I’ll knife you’ and we hit the smaller boat that the rope led to, which was still on it’s trailer. We gradually ascended in the clearing water to the sunken trees to the East side of the lake, and played spot the pike. Ro saw a very small one, about 5” long, followed by a slightly larger one, 9-10” in length. I was wondering if they were going to get larger in stages like those Russian nesting dolls, but the next one was 3 ½ feet-but dead so I suppose it doesn’t really count. We then passed the ‘Graboid’ tree, but Ro looked at me a bit odd when I asked if she had seen ‘Tremors’.

We hauled ourselves out of the water at the training entry point where a bloke was telling people that they would have to pull waterfowl around the lakes. Then Ro pointed out that he didn’t say ‘avian tow’ but ‘AV and tow’. I was commmenting that I had water in my ears, but like a teenager, that didn’t wash.

A dekit and a 30 min wait for a soss sarnie later [it was sat ready for 20 min] we headed back to civilisation.

Dive data:

18m

51 min

RMV = 13.4