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The three wrecks of xlendi bay

DIVING TRIP TO GOZO
On the 12th of September , three of our members Andy , Debbie and myself set off for the 5 hour drive to Gatwick airport and the 7am flight to Malta,, kindly chauffeured by my husband Ian. 

At check-in I found my drop-weight DSMB and my extra pony regs put me over the very generous weight limit by 4kg, so I promptly asked Debbie to carry through the excessive weight for me, she lied suspiciously well when asked “if anyone had been asked her to carry anything through customs for her”!.
Andy was stripped search as he made the machine beep, this was found to be the money he had in his pocket, which he refused to take out and put through the machine, being a person of Scottish origin!.
We arrived at Malta ‘airport after a very pleasant flight over Europe, including seeing the peak of Mont Blanc, since I was sitting on the wing.  A very smooth and prompt
transfer by taxi to the ferry and we were soon enjoying a cold beer in The ferry terminal, whilst
awaiting our ship coming in!.  On Ferry we saw Glimpses of sea caves, domestos blue sea, a sea plane impressively taking off on a pin!, and lots of boats bobbing around.  Checked into our accommodation at Frankie’s and by 2pm we were conducting our shake down dive in a harbour calledMgarr ix-xini, excellent first dive to 10m, seeing octupi(yes plural), blue spotted Moray Eel, Fireworms(its all in the name, touch at your peril!!).  However there is no pleasing when we asked Andy what he had seen he said “some fish, did not look edible too me!”.
YOUR WRECKS WILL COME ANDY:)

Day two 14.9.07
DIVE ONE:THE KAWELA
Ok this is more like it.  Today we are visiting “The Karwela”, a passenger ferry sunk last year along with the comino-land, in order to attract more visitors!.  Swam down to the wreck, started at the communication mask at 26 m and worked our way down to the deck at 32m, lovely Volkswagen beetle on the deck, unfortunately all the big big lifting bags were in Stevies pocket in England, otherwise would have bought back for my bug mad friend.
Promenade deck penetration(steady!) carried out by Andy and myself and Andy, who always maintains that some things are more fun when carried out alone!) penetrated the engine space.

Nice slow decompression on the way back up a very pretty reef, socialising with Fire worms, Trigger fish and Sea urchins.

DIVE TWO: THE BLUE HOLE
A long hike down some pretty slippery rocks, believe me, you would refuse to do this if Porthpean looked like this!!, we had people without dive kit stopping for a breather on the way up!!.
With some relief we dropped into the nice gin-clear water and down to 15m, out through an arch to the azure coloured water and commenced swim on wall to 30m, we could still see the surface and the fish on the surface!.  Rather nice cold beer afterwards.  This turned out to be a favourite dive.

Day THREE-15.9.07

Dive one:The inland sea

100m swim through the small inland sea led through a midnight blue gash
To the open sea!.  We had to be very careful to keep over to one side, as tourist boats were constantly going over our heads!.  Swim through led to a lovely 26m wall, then a ledge leading to 50m, andy cheered up considerably!.
Walls of purple lichen, huge rocks and boulders, and shoals of fish.

Dive two:

After lunch on shore and very interesting talk by debbie on an ancient now land-based sea bed and attached fossils, and a photo call for the tourists, we dropped back into the blue hole, lots of brightly coloured fish at 31m, walls full of fire worms, starfish etc.  Everybody enjoyed the dive despite another trek down in full kit.
DAY FOUR-16.9.07
DIVE ONE:THE COMINO-LAND
Dive two-THE UNKNOWN BAY!
We are now combining two sports!, mountain climbed in full kit down,to nearby bay who’s name eludes me, magnificent wall bottoming out at 40m, lots of shoals, bright red starfish, stonefish, and an exit via a 1 storey high ladder with the sea smacking us in the face!!.  Debs managed this with aplomb.  Out in the evening to lovely pavement café for dinner, wine and lager, just small ones!.
DAY FIVE-17.9.07
Dive one-The Xlendi
Back to the wrecks, now the “Xlendi”, topped out at 26m , mid 38m, bow bottom at 42m.  Upside down, due to hitting reef whilst being sunk, Two props at bow and stern, sunken car and rowing boat beside her.  Very nice.  Debbie had lovely solo dive on reef , for one hour and saw moray, octopus etc.
Dive two: Xlendi bay
Xlendi bay.  Shallow reef dive at 11m for 50 mins, saw colourful octopus, flying gurnard, parrot fish, bream, orange squirrel fish.  Andy and I fed the evil spiny sea urchins to the fish.

DAY 6-TUESDAY 18TH SEPTEMBER 2007.

Well unknown to us and due to a flat tyre incident this would be our last day of diving.  I set off in the morning believing that the next day would be a whole day of diving an oil tanker out of Malta, and was therefore happy to dive the same wall twice in one day!.

Dive 1 “The Inland Sea”

All three of us were all kitted up and ready to go.  I turned my air on and it started gushing out of the turret, oh no!.  quickly turned air off, as you do!.  Meanwhile Debbie and Andy entered in the water,and Debbie prepared to wait for me, whilst I found a man with a toolbox. 

We had seen some German divers earlier on and thought they might be well prepared, well one of the German chaps had a toolbox to die for!.  He tightened up my first stage inlet post, well actually he took apart the whole first stage, checked my “O-ring and assembled the whole kit and caboodle again.

I thought I might get in the water and check everything worked, by which time my buddies assuming I had not had success had gone off for the dive.

I decided as I was in I would not miss out on a dive and I would face the fear and go through the 100m swim through alone, I knew Debbie would be on the wall around the corner and was much relieved to see Debbie, who gave me a clap and a hug!. 

Proceeded to have a wonderful dive, pottered around and went back as Debs and Andy were on the turnaround.  Andy mentioned that he had reached 48m on the wall and that at 42m he had a distinct thermo cline and brain freezing!

Dive 2

Back through the swim-through and across the wall, fed fish bread and eggs, which Andy saw them eat, we got bored waiting for them to start!.  Back across the wall found a lovely green grouper who seemed to want to be friends, and moved closer when I moved closer, I checked he had no sharp teeth!.  Shoals of fish and 50m drop-offs, absolutely fantastic.

Last Day—Wednesday 19th 2007.

Sight-seeing in Malta-bit of culture in the silent city. 

Thursday 20th 2007

Home, and despite epic journey all arrived at club on time!

I THOROUGHLY RECOMMEND GOZO, BEAUTIFUL AND AWE-INSPIRING, EXCELLENT FOOD, THE WRECKS WERE FANTASTIC, THE ACCOMODATION EXCELLENT AND THE VIEW OF ALL THE DIVERS IN THE ENTRANCE TO THE CAVE WITH THEIR BUBBLES FLOATING UP BELOW US NOT TO BE MISSED.

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