'Not Bardsey Island!!!' 10th & 11th June 2006
Kate and I set off on a beautiful Friday evening
to travel to North Wales for our Bardsey Island
trip. Her car looks small but it takes a lot of
stuff.
We took the scenic route, and very picturesque
it was too, across hills and valleys, and
visited lots of places Kate used to holiday in.
With pleasant chat and great scenery, before
long we arrived at the digs. The blurb said “not
unlike a portacabin” and so we didn’t know what
to expect. The place was unusual to say the
least but it had everything you needed and
plenty of signs to read to keep you busy, plus
the most curious array of door-closing
mechanisms using weights, pullies and bungee.
All rather Heath Robinson but everything seemed
to work and it was well set up for divers with
drying room for suits and a compressor.
A couple of beers in the camping area (where the
Hepworths were camping), a few rounds of musical
chairs and then we were ready for bed.
Saturday morning was glorious, the sun shone
through the window around half past four
causing third degree burns to my retinas. I
stuck my head under the pillow and went back to
sleep until Kate got up at a more sensible time
and made me tea in bed.
It was still beautifully sunny when Ray came to
tell us that the hard boat we had booked to take
us to Bardsey Island had cancelled due to the
weather. Que? But it was beautiful hot and
still? Apparently at the south coast it was
blowing 5-6 southerlies so Bardsey was off. We
did have a plan B though, a local RHIB operator,
Paul, was offering to take us out in shifts from
Porth Ysgaden on the North coast of the
peninsula, using his boat “Waterline”. So we
agreed and got ready and set off.
I buddied up with Jill (her first RHIB Dive) and
we were in the first group with Steve and Diane,
Kate and Mark. We sat in the sun launched the
Rib and bounced along the waves shouting Wooo
Hoooo! Everything went to plan and we dropped in
together for a scenic dive amongst rocks and
shingle in 22m. There was a current so Jill put
her blob up after ten minutes as the skipper had
requested.
We very quickly spotted a dog fish, and then
another, by the end of the dive we had seen
about 20, all sizes from “small” to “jeez that’s
a shark”.
At one stage Jill got very excited and tugged my
fin to show me a little octopus in a hole, it
swam off when we asked it pose for photos. This
was Jill’s first ever
UK
octopus so that’s two firsts in one dive. Before
long our time was up and we ascended grinning.
When we got back on the boat everyone else had
also had a Dogfish fest.
We returned to the beach to swap with group two.
It was now really sunny and warm and we ate our
lunch listening to the first half of the England
Match on the radio.
Dive two, Jill and I dropped in and found the
bottom at 22m. Less current this time but it
made it easier to take photos. We came across a
whole gang of dogfish just lazing about together
on the sand. What a lovely sight, there must
have been 15 of them. We also saw lots of large
spider crabs who were up for a fight.
A few minutes after the “chilled out” dogfish
group we came across another group but with the
exact opposite temperament; a full on feeding
frenzy just like you see on national geographic
only in miniature for people who are scared of
sharks. I appreciated this when one little one
tried to have a go at me. It was only small but
very feisty and threatened to drown us both
because we were laughing so hysterically. We
drained our masks and then I indicated to Jill
that I was getting low on bottom time just as my
computer awarded me 6 minutes deco obligation.
So we launched an SMB and made our way up, did
the stop and hit the surface only a couple of
minutes late.
Another lovely dive.
That evening we went to the pub for dinner. You
got chips and Rice with your curry, and it was
delicious. Chris had the biggest rack of Ribs I
have ever seen and managed to eat it all. I
discovered that I was the fourth youngest, never
realised what a bunch of old fogeys we have in
our club.
Sunday dawned and this time I didn’t get woken
up by sunshine at 4 am, or any time at all. It
was grey and over cast and trying to rain. Ray
came to tell us that Bardsey was off the menu
and did we want to RHIB or shore dive. The
consensus was shore dive so we went back to
Porth Ysgaden, the beach we had been to
yesterday.
At this point there some degree of “shilly
shallying”, a lot of looking at the clouds and
down into the sea and tutting. It’s fair to say
that the viz was nothing like as good as day one
but it still looked ok for a shore dive. A few
less valiant people departed; leaving myself,
Ray and Chris who decided to go in as a three.
Ray volunteered Chris to drag the SMB as he is
the youngest, only fair really.
As we were about to go in Sid, Brenda and co
turned up intending to dive too, thus doubling
the turnout of divers.
We waded in and descended next to the rocks. The
viz was bitty. The first thing I noticed was the
sheer variety of colour of the sea weed. It was
really pretty. We did an “out and back again”
kind of dive but there was lots to see; a fair
few wrasse, lots of huge spider crabs feasting
on a multitude of little sand eels, many
gurnards, and I even spotted a yellow pipefish.
No deco obligations today, max depth was 5.9m.
This would make a great dive for a beginner, no
real depth but lots to see.
The sun came out just as we completed the dive,
and we packed up and went back to the digs for a
shower and lunch before making our way home via
a different scenic route.
A lovely weekend, not the one that was planned
but still some good diving and great company as
always. This does mean, however, that we should
go back and actually do Bardsey island sometime
soon. |
