night life in Dover

[DAFFY]

As i still had 150bar left in the cylinder following last Sunday's St Margarets bay expedition we decided to pay the western wall a visit for a night dive. When we got to the car park it was 19:30 and already getting dark (autumn is on it's way folks), The car park had a number of people of asian descent who had been shore fishing and had ended up with a number of big black sacks full of mackerel, so fingers crossed as I have never actually seen a mackerel that was not on the end of a hook. It has been two years since I dived the wall and had forgotten the pleasure of the walk from the car park to the shore line over the shingle, but still that's part of the fun. On the beach itself a number of fisherman where setting up camp for the night so had a chat and arranged to avoid each other having previously been tangled up in fishing line.

Adam tied a rope with a light at the end to help in getting out at the end of the dive. Whilst kitting up we heard a fisherman shout something and was pointing out to sea. we all took a look and Jamie came out with the all time classic line "oh look its a dog swiming out in the sea" We had to point out to jamie that the dog was actually a large seal We where now kitted up and ready to go in, a number of fisherman had wondered over for a chat. The fisherman hoped that the seal would bu**er off, whilst we where keeping our fingers crossed for a possible seal encounter.

By now light was fading and the tide was fast coming in, so in we went (into quite a surge) The viz was great at least 5mtrs+ (at the end of the dive I was down in 6mtrs but could see Adam and Jamie on the surface even though by now it was 10:00pm, infact it reminded me of the opening shots from the film "jaws")

All the usual Dover wall suspects where there, loads of tompots, wrasse, bib, flatties, several varities of crabs, squat lobsters and your regular lobbies including a really large specimen that tried having a go at my torch, but alas no seal or mackerel

So max depth 9.1mtrs and an hour of fun diving including turning off our torches to create phosphorus patterns in the water. On the surface it was great having lesly doing shore cover and helping us with our fins and Adam's rope which made clambering up the beach far more easier. Lesly was surprised that we did not see the seal, as the last time she saw it before it got to dark ,the seal was roughly in the same area as us. Still never mind, maybe next time

[ANDY 64]

was that you that rang Dover Cg this morning about diving the wall,, someone told you to hold , while shouting at me across the op's room ?

did you get told , it could be a little bit surfy ?

[Rob Kipling]

Never dived there... we'll have to arrange one i think!`