Easter Shandy Gig 2007 - Dover :)

[Mark Chase]

Wellllllll I was only on the Friday coz its easter and i have kids, but it was still great fun.

Andyp decided to bed down at my place the night before so we were both in plenty of time for the gig. At a mear 80mph its the slowest Andyp has ever driven the last 30miles to a dive in his life ever AND the earliest he has ever been

The look of shock at the sight of Andyp pulling into the car park with a whole hour before departure time was quite a sight ill tell you

On the boat and were told viz will be poo and were doing the champaign wreck. My heart sank as i wanted it to be a great dive for Andyp to get him back into this diving lark. Ho hum we will just have to make the best of it.

Once over the wreck I look at the available viz and my heart sinks even further. We jump in and hit the bottom and I cant see a damed thing. I tie in the reel and I am thinking of binning the dive but i decide instead to try away from the shot. 5m away and viz is up to a massive 1.5m and all i can see is silt and gravel. I am also very pleased to see that Andyps buddy glue is working well despite the long lay off.

I am deciding whether or not to risk sticking my arm in the silt for a bottle of champaign when I see a puff of silt from a large scallop. Fan bloody tastic thinks I. and we are off. Soon scallops a plenty are gracing the bottom of my goody bag. Even Andyp who is the worst catcher of food on the plaint (He struggles ordering a big mac without it escaping) managed to bag loads. Viz was fine in front of us but pretty crap behind and the bag was soon so full we were being highly selective as to which scallop took out fancy.

In the end the bag was so heavy i couldn't move it and we called it a day. I connected the lift bag and sent it up and we headed for home. I thought Andrew would be totally pissed off at spending an entire dive scalloping but he had had a fantastic time as well.

Dave had grabbed half a dozen bottles of champaign so i nicked one to add to the feast. The haul of scallops was epic and i couldn't wait to see Lings face when i got them home.

Dive Two:

A fantastic lunch in the local pub was followed by a quick jaunt out to the Varne wreck. Andyp had had to go home so i was doing the second dive with Colinicky. Waiting over the wreck for slack the viz again looked pretty depressing .

Down the shot we go, and it is indeed pretty grim. The Varn is a flat wooden wreck with many tones of china on board. It was well worth a rummage despite the crap viz. Sadly i made a hash of tieing in the guide reel. I didn't have the line going through the line guide so it kept spooling off the side of the reel.

We found some china bowls which i decided to bag up. Colin didn't know my rule that if your reeling then the other diver holds the goody bag so I was now faced with laying line with a somewhat impaired reel and carrying a goody bag. I soldered on for a while and then thought sod this as more line spooled off the side of the reel, and I insisted Colin took the bag. After some initial confusion he got the message and I decided to reel back to the tie in and sort it out before continuing on.

As it was we got back to the shot and the tie in and I was thinking it was all a bit to crappy to spend more time on. Colin agreed and we binned the dive there and then and went home with a total of no deco.

We were first in except for crew so I was surprised to see we were second to last back?? every one else obviously had the same idea. I was surprised as had it not been for the reel problem id have staid for another 20mins or so no problem.

So not the best of dives but I did get 6 rice bowls to go with the scallops and champaign. All i needed was a wreck with knives and forks on and we would have been totally sorted

ATB

Mark Chase

[Miss Roxy Chablis]

Thanks to Juz and Blanaid for organising
My leaky suit didn't even make it through the first dive - but it was a very pleasant few hours on a nice boat in lovely weather with great company - so not entirely wasted - see you all soon

[Juz]

Originally Posted by Howard Payne

Thanks to Juz and Blanaid for organising
My leaky suit didn't even make it through the first dive - but it was a very pleasant few hours on a nice boat in lovely weather with great company - so not entirely wasted - see you all soon

Howard, you are welcome on any Kinky Divers gig! You are quite clearly the acceptable face of DIR .

Juz

[divegyrl]

Originally Posted by Howard Payne

Thanks to Juz and Blanaid for organising
My leaky suit didn't even make it through the first dive - but it was a very pleasant few hours on a nice boat in lovely weather with great company - so not entirely wasted - see you all soon

So sorry you did not make it down with your suit, the scallops were better than the champagne is my guess!

Originally Posted by Juz

Howard, you are welcome on any Kinky Divers gig! You are quite clearly the acceptable face of DIR .

As Juz said, it was very good to meet up with you; I hope to meet up with you again on a boat soon!

[Ian@1904]

[divegyrl]

Originally Posted by Ian@1904

there was a mention of floating it off the boat, but 'they' didn't want to upset the marina/coastguard!

[keith_henson]

Originally Posted by Ian@1904

barstewards

[Madfish]

Aaahhhhhhh is that Junior's home-made blow-up of Digger? Sweet - looks just like him!

Dianne

[warmwaterdiver]

My thanks go to Blan & Juz for organising this, and to everyone that made it, it was another fantastic YD trip

Mark Chase, for being Mark Chase, although he looked a little greyer than last year
AndyP, for turning up earlier, and getting "bloody hell your early Andy" off everyone
Illy, for trying but failing to bring as much chocolate as me (& Avril for the bbq)
Simon, for bailing after one day!
Nigel, for agreeing that Buddy make excellent smbs
Howard Payne, for the three minute dive, HES DIVED WITH A STROKE EVERYONE
Nevil, for being sacrificial
Paul Oliver, for filling my space on the Sat PM, having the best dive of the weekend for brass
Keith, for the suitcase drama, and the inflatable suit drama, and for gutting that fish
Ben, for the "childish" jokes
Jay, for being "half" a proper policeman, see you on a train sometime soon!
Ian, for making it for the day despite the buddy situation
the mad people on semi-drys
everyone I've missed
and of course The Dud(e) just for being himself
and the fact that he did try to eat his bodyweight in chocolate

5 days Dover diving work tomorrow

[Andy Phillips]

Hi,

Had a cracking time. S'funny, the easter dive has always been a bit of a highlight. The vis is always pants, spent a few dives swimming in circles looking for the wreck, but it has always been fun.

This was no exception, I admit, I was really looking forward to a dive with vis, all I have heard for the last month was " you should have been there, the vis was xxx".

As I was muttering, I have come to the conclusion that the search for the perfect wreck is no substitute for good company. I have found it increasingly hard to motivate myself to get out of bed at 5.00 am to sit on a boat in silence for two or three hours, swim round a wreck and return in silence. I have no real interest in lifting spidge unless it is really worth it.

Friday was a real tonic, it was a laugh from the moment we arrived, the vis on the dive was not exactly epic, but you could see and actually finding scollops (there were so many it was hard to miss them), picking them up an stuffing them into Marks already insanely full bag was just darned good fun. As I mentioned at least 100 times, it was just like the old days. Good company, a good swim and a bit of nosh to keep Ling happy. I have to say it was also nice to be back in the Water with Mark. We have always had a bizzare understanding underwater, this was no exception, we just kinda know where the other one is and what he will do next. It makes for a relaxing time.

Felt a bit knackered the next day which is a sure fired indication that I had way to much He in my system for my own good. Such is life.

Thanks to Blan and Juz for organising it. Putting dives together can be a painfull task, but it does feel great when they come off. You should feel very happy, it was good.

Take care,

Andrew