Buoyant Babe
02-05-2006, 15:11
The first and only time I have dived St Abbs was on the recent YD gig on 1 April. I only managed one dive as the viz was a metre or less. It was cold and the whole experience was not dissimilar to bumbling around in thick fog.
Monday, however, was a totally different experience.
My mate Jim from our club, Sunderland SAC, had organised two dives with Peter, Skipper of the Selkie. Ropes off were 11am and 3am, so Aaran (Eeyore) and I set off about 8.15am for a nice 90 minute drive up to St Abbs.
It was overcast and a bit drizzly when we got there, but hey – we were going to get wet anyhow so it didn’t matter!
On the boat there was a bit of a swell but nothing too bad. Peter dropped us in on The Skelly. I wear 11k of lead in a harness and still have a bit of a problem getting under on a free descent, but once down I’m finding that I’m perfectly weighted for the dive.
The Skelly was where I’d dived a few weeks before, but I might as well have been on another planet! The viz was grainy, but a good six metres, and we could see perfectly the wonders around us. The walls of the many of gullies were covered in orange and white dead men’s fingers, huge plumrose anemones, tiny nudibranchs, different coloured anemones the size of dinner plates, big red sunstars, and at 25 meters, a carpet of brittle stars. This was one of the prettiest dives I have ever done. The dive lasted 46 minutes, I used 110 bar of a 12 litre tank, max depth was 25.4m and the temperature was a cool 7.7 degrees.
I wore a combination of Fourth Element Xerotherm leggings, socks, and vest with a Xerotherm Arctic long-sleeved top under my 4mm compressed neoprene suit. My legs and feet were cold, leading me to question whether I was having a suit flood, but I’m happy to say I was bone dry when I got out.
Agreeing to surface, we had planned before hand that I would deploy the DSMB as I really do need practice with this. I had been fiddling with my shoulder auto dump before the dive and thought I had set it to vent freely, but on ascending it wasn’t venting at all and I had to do this manually. I have only just started using my suit alone for buoyancy, so all this is a bit of a learning curve for me.
We ascended really slowly. Unfortunately, once I got to 4.2m, I wasn’t quick enough to dump the air out of my suit while reeling in at the same time and checking my computer, so I bobbed straight up. Aaran had tried to grab me, but being a touch light himself had to let me go – no point both of us shooting up to the surface!
The boat was right next to me and Peter got me in straight away. I explained what had happened and he gave me oxygen as a precaution. My computer was showing everything was okay (it hadn’t locked me out) and was still allowing me to plan another dive, and because of the very slow ascent we’d had up to the point I got to 4m, I wasn’t overly worried but was extra vigilant for any untoward symptoms developing.
Aaran had had a big suit flood on this dive and was so cold he decided to sit the next one out. We had a good two and a half hour surface interval and got back on the boat to find the swell had picked up. Peter took us right round the corner to Petticoe Wick where we dropped in on The Peanut (I believe this was a boat carrying a cargo of peanuts when she went down). I went in with Jim and Geoff. We had arranged before hand to sort out my autodump so I spent a few minutes at 7m with Geoff pinning me down from behind and Jim grabbing me from the front while playing with my chest bits! Fully inflated, I managed to set the dump so that it was venting.
All sorted, we set off for the dive. This wasn’t as pretty as The Skelly, but we did manage to find the huge boiler of The Peanut standing upright on the sea bed, along with some scattered metal plates. This dive lasted 39 minutes, max depth 15.8m, the temperature had actually dropped to 7.4 degrees (although Geoff and I both felt warmer on this dive than on the first), and I used 80 bar of a 12 litre cylinder.
My autodump was working on the ascent, although it wasn’t dumping as freely as I would have liked (why the feck I fiddled with it in the first place I don’t know), and Geoff said my buoyancy was spot on when we did our safety stop, so I’m well chuffed about that.
The two dives only cost £20 and it’s really nice to be dropped off on shore in between, especially as we girlies don’t possess the ability to wee freely over the side on a dive.
I had a great day, honed some skills and learnt more about tides and winds. Despite my quick appearance at the surface I feel fine, although I’ll be extra vigilant for the next few days. Having done most of my UK dives so far from the shore, I’m fast becoming a convert to boat diving and am finding kitting up in small spaces much less of a kerfuffle than it used to be.
More information about St Abbs can be found here (http://www.dcordes.freeuk.com/welcome.htm):
I love diving, me!
Monday, however, was a totally different experience.
My mate Jim from our club, Sunderland SAC, had organised two dives with Peter, Skipper of the Selkie. Ropes off were 11am and 3am, so Aaran (Eeyore) and I set off about 8.15am for a nice 90 minute drive up to St Abbs.
It was overcast and a bit drizzly when we got there, but hey – we were going to get wet anyhow so it didn’t matter!
On the boat there was a bit of a swell but nothing too bad. Peter dropped us in on The Skelly. I wear 11k of lead in a harness and still have a bit of a problem getting under on a free descent, but once down I’m finding that I’m perfectly weighted for the dive.
The Skelly was where I’d dived a few weeks before, but I might as well have been on another planet! The viz was grainy, but a good six metres, and we could see perfectly the wonders around us. The walls of the many of gullies were covered in orange and white dead men’s fingers, huge plumrose anemones, tiny nudibranchs, different coloured anemones the size of dinner plates, big red sunstars, and at 25 meters, a carpet of brittle stars. This was one of the prettiest dives I have ever done. The dive lasted 46 minutes, I used 110 bar of a 12 litre tank, max depth was 25.4m and the temperature was a cool 7.7 degrees.
I wore a combination of Fourth Element Xerotherm leggings, socks, and vest with a Xerotherm Arctic long-sleeved top under my 4mm compressed neoprene suit. My legs and feet were cold, leading me to question whether I was having a suit flood, but I’m happy to say I was bone dry when I got out.
Agreeing to surface, we had planned before hand that I would deploy the DSMB as I really do need practice with this. I had been fiddling with my shoulder auto dump before the dive and thought I had set it to vent freely, but on ascending it wasn’t venting at all and I had to do this manually. I have only just started using my suit alone for buoyancy, so all this is a bit of a learning curve for me.
We ascended really slowly. Unfortunately, once I got to 4.2m, I wasn’t quick enough to dump the air out of my suit while reeling in at the same time and checking my computer, so I bobbed straight up. Aaran had tried to grab me, but being a touch light himself had to let me go – no point both of us shooting up to the surface!
The boat was right next to me and Peter got me in straight away. I explained what had happened and he gave me oxygen as a precaution. My computer was showing everything was okay (it hadn’t locked me out) and was still allowing me to plan another dive, and because of the very slow ascent we’d had up to the point I got to 4m, I wasn’t overly worried but was extra vigilant for any untoward symptoms developing.
Aaran had had a big suit flood on this dive and was so cold he decided to sit the next one out. We had a good two and a half hour surface interval and got back on the boat to find the swell had picked up. Peter took us right round the corner to Petticoe Wick where we dropped in on The Peanut (I believe this was a boat carrying a cargo of peanuts when she went down). I went in with Jim and Geoff. We had arranged before hand to sort out my autodump so I spent a few minutes at 7m with Geoff pinning me down from behind and Jim grabbing me from the front while playing with my chest bits! Fully inflated, I managed to set the dump so that it was venting.
All sorted, we set off for the dive. This wasn’t as pretty as The Skelly, but we did manage to find the huge boiler of The Peanut standing upright on the sea bed, along with some scattered metal plates. This dive lasted 39 minutes, max depth 15.8m, the temperature had actually dropped to 7.4 degrees (although Geoff and I both felt warmer on this dive than on the first), and I used 80 bar of a 12 litre cylinder.
My autodump was working on the ascent, although it wasn’t dumping as freely as I would have liked (why the feck I fiddled with it in the first place I don’t know), and Geoff said my buoyancy was spot on when we did our safety stop, so I’m well chuffed about that.
The two dives only cost £20 and it’s really nice to be dropped off on shore in between, especially as we girlies don’t possess the ability to wee freely over the side on a dive.
I had a great day, honed some skills and learnt more about tides and winds. Despite my quick appearance at the surface I feel fine, although I’ll be extra vigilant for the next few days. Having done most of my UK dives so far from the shore, I’m fast becoming a convert to boat diving and am finding kitting up in small spaces much less of a kerfuffle than it used to be.
More information about St Abbs can be found here (http://www.dcordes.freeuk.com/welcome.htm):
I love diving, me!