First Dive in 2010: Oddicombe Beach, Torquay. Passed my Underwater Navigation. 50min in 8°C !

Well done Dany, but 8 Deg is hardly cold now is it!

I’ve not dived yet this year but my last trip to Vobster recorded 3 Deg at 30m and that was in October!

My next spec to be completed is underwater nav. I have the manual and have sort of read it, but not completed the reviews yet. I’ll maybe get it done this month as I have a couple of dive days planned during Feb and provided my instructor can make the dates, I should be OK.

But again, well done on completing it.

Hi Ian

Thats way too cold for me.

How is the Navigation going have you managed to get in the water?

Shaun

Hi Shaun,

Yes, I managed to get my first 2010 dives in last Monday. I went with 3 other dive pals to a very cold Vobster for the day. Min water temp recorded was just over 3 Deg C but the max was only 5 Deg C!

I managed to get in 2 dives but for 2 of the guys, it was just too cold. They both really suffered with extreme cold hands, despite wearing gloves. I was only wearing 3mm Typhoon (I did have a dry pair for the 2nd dive) but my hands were fine on both dives.

Apart from the cold temp. it was an ideal day in that apart from the 4 of us, there was only one other dive pair present.

We had planned to go to Stoney today, but on seeing the forecast on Friday that indicated a high probability of snow for today and with a very cold Sunday night forecast, we decided to put if off until the water temp increases a bit.

As for the Navigation, nearly finished reading the manual and will complete the knowledge reviews just as soon as I can. All I need to do then is tie up with my instructor to cover the practical, which I hope to get done before the end of March. But we’ll see how we go.

Hi All,

There doesn’t seem to be many Fish4Divers crew diving much at the moment. Or is it just that nobody is saying anything about there dives?

Anyway, on Wednesday, I went for my second trip this year to Vobster with 3 pals.

Not a bad day, but drizly, as I usually find it is at Vobster. Not that it matters with nice covered seating areas which are out of the rain. The water temp hadn’t warmed up though since my last dives there in Feb. At 25 m it was still only 3 Deg C.

Not much fun for one of the group when her Dry Suit flooded. But full credit to her, she kept going for the 30 min dive and did not abort earlier.

The rest of us managed two dives but we limited the second dive to a max depth of 14 m or so as the other two guys hands were suffering from the cold. Whimps! One even had a pair of 7mm gloves on over a pair a 3mm. For some reason, just with a pair of 3mm, my hands didn’t feel really cold on either dive. But limiting the depth to 14 m didn’t make much of a difference as the water temp still dropped to 4 Deg C.

The only sign we saw of the 5,000 new fish recently introduced, was about half a dozen or so small dead Roach. None of us saw any sign whatsoever of a live fish. But they must be in there somewhere.

Hi Ian

Its just too cold for me and wetsuit at the moment.

3 deg hope the polar bears were friendly

Maybe the fish have emigrated to warmer waters

Do you dive at Vobster often ?

Shaun

Hi Shaun,

I have dived at Vobster about 4 or 5 times, so far, but am going there again on Wednesday. Its a great place for inland diving.

I have dived Stoney a number of times, but for me, Vobster is better.

It’s the little things (as well as some of the big ones) that make it better.

It doesn’t get anywhere near as busy as Stoney, which is a big advantage, and usually means that there is no problem parking. They also operate a membership scheme (£30 per year from memory) which enables you to be able to book a space in the main car park at weekends, plus, saves you money on the dive fee for the day, plus saves you 10% on everything else you buy there, from a coffee to an air or nitrox fill, to a dry suit from their shop.

They have plenty of picnic type benches set out, all of which are under large gazebo type covering, so even if it is raining, there is plenty of place to sit and relax under cover. The food and drink outlet is close by the tables and is very convenient, as is the fact that you don’t need to pay for anything until before you leave at the end of the day, as they operate a numbered tag system to which everything is charged whilst you are on site.

They have plenty of kit up benches around and even a bucket of water on a stand convenient for mask rinsing, so you don’t need to bend down with your kit on to rinse your mask before getting into the water.

It would be nice if the water was a degree or two warmer at times, but to me at least, that’s not too much of a big deal when dry suit diving in any case.

Vis is usually pretty good and there is plenty to see on the bottom, both in terms of general bottom features of an old quarry, including a stone tunnel, plus lots of added attractions, such as aircraft and cars etc. There is also a very good range of depths going down to 35+ meters.

Maybe we should arrange a Fish4Divers event at Vobster sometime?

Ian

Hi Ian

Thanks for the great review

A Fish4divers outing to Vobster sounds like a very good idea. Will have to get Divefest out of the way then see what can be arranged I’m sure there will be a lot of people interested.

Shaun

I did a night dive at Babbacombe beach last Thursday for 88 minutes in a water at 10°C! Couldn’t feel my left middle finger at the end of the dive for about 1h. Had I been diving any deeper than 8m, I would have thought that was a DCI lol

Hi all

Anyone been diving over the bank holiday?

Shaun

Hi All
I’ve just got back from the Red Sea. had a great time on blue horizon doing St Jonhs and Daedalus lots of sharks to see. 18 fantastic dives with just under 20 hours in the water. I did however get out bloody quick when 2 silky sharks started eating around me (it takes a long time to come up 5 meters when you need to). will put up pictures soon
Caz

Hi Caz

Love the pics you put on the site looks and sounds like you had a great time. Was the boat as good as the diving and would you recommend it?

Did your hubby not offer to play with the sharks while you got to the surface

Shaun

Hi shaun

I don’t dive with the hubby his air usage not good and we squabble under water.
blueOtwo are fantastic the guys on the boat cant do enough for you. The food is good but not to my liking, plenty of it though. Diving is great up to 4 dives a day if you can hack the pace (rob can’t). We got 18 dives in the week which was all of them, as you cant do night dives at Daedalus but you can get 20/21 in a week normally . Vis was poor for the Red Sea but you get what you get. So Yes I would recommend it and my only regret is I have to wait till 2012 for my next one.

Caz

Hi Caz

BlueOtwo do seem to have a very good reputation as other members have also said what a great time they had with them. I hope time goes quickly for you till your next liveaboard will it be in the Red Sea as well?

I’m sure the fish would love to watch you and hubby squabbling does he need a twinset

Did the boat start and finish at Hurghada?

Shaun

Hi All
Just got back from 3 days diving in Oban. We had a great time despite Puffin dive centres. Don’t get me wrong the diving was great, but that had nothing to do with puffin.

However ... they appear to take far too much care of ensuring the right number of kit-kats were on board the dive boat, than other, more important matters ... such as ensuring that the cylinders were full and with A-clamp fittings removable before leaving the jetty. I personally had a tank with only 120 bar, and my group of 5 had 2 tanks with non-removable A-clamp fittings
In addition, surface intervals were only 1 hour, when the trip duration is given (on Puffin’s own website) as 4.5 hours for a morning departure, and the time for travelling out and back from the dive sites, it always means that you are chasing the clock. Not very conducive to calm and collected diving.

Anyone else used Puffin recently ? What were your experiences of them ?

I personally would not use them again, and would not recommend them to my dive clubs.

Caz