I didn't manage to get in the water this weekend.  I should have been going up to Rosehearty on the Moray Firth on Saturday, but getting up at silly o'clock wasn't appealing after a Friday that started with a 6.30 am meeting and ended with a rehearsal that finished at 9.30 pm.  And on Sunday I had a tree to cut down. 

As I walked along the beach at Carnoustie on Sunday, the water was crystal clear.  You could see every frond of seaweed, every tiny shard of shell in  the coarse sand.  I don't know whether the vis at Catterline would have been as good - it's much more silty, and gets stirred up easily by the resident seals - but I did wish I were underwater.

In the end I nearly was: the dogs swam and then shook themselve all over me so I got nearly as wet as I used to before my drysuit was fixed.  And I had a lovely time beachcombing, which is the next best thing to diving.

It'll be a fortnight before I'm back in the water - I'll be in Gloucestershire next weekend, clearing up my late mother's flat.  I do hope the weather holds.  It's about time we had a decent summer, with good vis, no storms, no days blown out due to easterlies, no constant heavy rain...  If I'd started diving last year I might not have seen it through, conditions were so bad so often; it would be great to show last years' trainees what diving's really all about. 

Now that the clocks have gone forward we should be beginning our Wednesday evening dives soon.  I can't wait to get wet again!

Hazards of winter diving

This is a very frustrating time of year for divers living in northerly latitudes, who prefer diving in the sea rather than in quarries and other inland waterways.  You arrange a day's diving: check the tides, find an interesting-looking site, get your buddies signed up, book the boat, or make sure your own boat is seaworthy and the trailer is safe; maybe you even book accommodation.

Then the weather turns nasty and the day's blown out.  It's happened to me twice already this year (though I must admit other people did all that prep work both times).

I have a pool-tested drysuit, but I want to check it really is dry now and I can't do that in 3.6 metres of water.  I have all my kit clean, dry and lightly oiled (well, I've rubbed beeswax along my drysuit zip and siliconed the O-rings of my torch and camera housing, anyway).  I've packed the whole caboodle into the car twice and had to take it out again.

All I want to do is get wet - and not in chlorinated water.  A pool is no substitute for the real thing (the wildlife's not up to much, for a start, and what you do find in there doesn't bear thinking about).

Our main problem has been the wind, as it was for so much of last year.  Last weekend the forecast was for Force 4-6, with gusts of up to 45mph.  That's no fun, nor is it safe for wee rubber boats or divers.

In the event I was quite glad we didn't try diving last Saturday.  As I walked my dogs in the woods (to avoid the worst of the wind-chill) the sleet came on.  The very thought of being out in a small boat in the middle of the North Sea in sleet is seriously unappetising.  There's no protection from the elements in a RIB and a drysuit can only provide so much weather-proofing: rain's bad enough, but sleet is beyond horrid.

So I'll possess myself in what little patience I can muster and pray for a sunny, calm, dry spring and summer with brilliant viz, in total contrast to last year up here.  One out of four would be good, but I'm going for the set.  We're due a break....

To read more about GreatCopy go to http://greatcopy.info/.

The saga of the drysuit looks as though it may have come to an end.  Hoo-flipping-ray!! And about time too.

By the end of last season it was leaking really badly, and I had two miserably cold days at the end of October, completely soaked by the end of each morning dive.  Luckily there was no afternoon dive on the Saturday and on Sunday there were the harbour's hot showers and a complete change of clothing to look forward to before the long drive home.

That was IT.  Enough.  I thought I was going to have to get a new suit and even got in touch with a friend who makes them (though only for power-boating - he wasn't too sure about making one for diving...).  I took the suit to the dive shop for a last attempt at rendering it usable.  Given that the shop had pressure-tested it the previous year and found no problems, I wasn't sanguine, but it was worth one last shot.

They tested it again and found not one but THREE holes, the largest around the suit inflation valve.  As the valve doesn't swivel and that's where I was getting wettest, that wasn't a major surprise, but I hadn't realised there were also holes in one arm and on my back.  So they fixed the holes, re-taped the neck and wrist seals, and gave it back to me for a reasonable sum.

I'd hoped to test it for real on a club dive down at St Abb's a couple of weekends ago, but the weather wasn't up to much so I didn't go.  Yesterday evening I gave it the "beginner's test", in the local swimming pool down to 3.6 metres.  Not a drop.  Totally dry.  Hallelujah!!

I do hope it'll be the same when I move that decimal point to 36....

The show goes on!

Dive 2011, Birmingham UK.
My dream drysuit – I’ve seen my dream drysuit!  At last someone has realised that black is boring.  And not very safe either, if you’re trying to keep track of your buddy in murky vis.  (Don’t get me started on cammo drysuits.  The invisible buddy – how are you going to keep an eye on him  if you can’t see him?!?)  Fish aren’t all black, so why should we be?

Nah.  This drysuit, by Hammond Drysuits of Dartford in Kent, had a different colour for each section.  Probably not a regular production number...  One arm was lemon yellow, another turquoise, the front of a leg was red, the back green –if I haven’t got exactly the right colour in the right place at least you get the drift.  Bright.  Cheerful.  VISIBLE.  Maybe a bit too visible for some – not everyone does the jester look well – but un-losable.  Better still, it might even keep you dry – a sore point with me at the moment...).

What else was on show at Dive 2011?  My prize for gizmo of the year goes to the TriDri, a handy telescopic tube with a fan at one end and an outlet the other, for drying drysuits.  I could really have used one last weekend – better still two, one in each boot!.  It’s triangular, so it rests on one edge and doesn’t roll around.  It folds quite small, so it’ll fit in your bag.  And it blows air forward into the toe of the boot, normally the hardest bit to dry. What’s more, it was so silent that the demonstrators had fitted strips of plastic to the top end so you could see there really was air blowing through it. 

In tests with a rinsed-out suit, indoors the leg with the TriDri dried in 2-3 hours while the other leg took 9 days; in the garage the figures were 3.5 hours and 14 days respectively.  It’s not yet in production, so if you know anyone who could make such a thing for a reasonable price (I’d happily pay up to £40 for one), get in touch with Dr. Howard Fortescue at howard@howard-f-fortescue.co.uk.

All the usual suspects were showing – Asia-Pacific and the Caribbean had “villages” of their own, PADI and BSAC were there in force.  The Photo Zone provided a colourful interlude, chats with Maria Munn’s enthusiastic staff, and a chance to vote on this year’s underwater photos of the year.  The rebreather market was well represented and the technical pool was constantly busy with divers putting kit to the test.

Competitions were rampant as travel companies tried to tempt divers to book now, right now, while the mood was on them; business is clearly still very tough for many, meaning bargains and emptier seas for divers. 

Among the speakers Andrea Marshall and Mack S House stood out for opposite reasons.  Mack House was speaking on Underwater Crime Scene Investigation, which should have been a fascinating topic.  Sadly he didn’t come alive (ironic, really) until he was answering questions at the end, by which time I’d lost interest in him and his subject. 

Andrea Marshall, who should have been talking about Manta rays, threw her brief out the window and gave an impassioned speech about conservation and how divers have a huge but time-limited opportunity to make a difference to the health of the watery 71%.  She apologised for being depressing but gave such a rousing call to action that no-one will have come out of that room untouched.

A busy weekend but a fascinating one, filled with friendly faces, glorious kit (I got the torch I needed at half-price, a spare undersuit for only £25, several books at reduced prices...), and so many opportunities. 

But the real revelation of the show was a new low in catering (cheese-on-toast-flavoured coffee, anyone?).