Derek’s Dive Domain

OK, so it is the day after Halloween, but its a halloween dive anyway, and its a night dive at Stoney Cove with David Morris.  I arrive after work, and get kitted up and we are into the water by ten to seven.  The plan for this dive is to head down the road to 27 metres, where we got to the previous night dive, and then if all is well, to gradually head down towards the hydrobox, checking to see how I am doing as we go.  I have never dived down to the box before, and this will be increasing my UK depth as well, in addition to it being another night dive.  Its a good way to up my experience, anyway!

We get in and head down the road to 27 metres as planned.  Everything is OK, so we progress downwards to 29, then 30 metres.  After another check, David heads over towards where the hydrobox is, and although I am meant to be staying just above him, I go with him as I want to keep his fins in view, thanks :)  33 metres comes and goes, and then I see the box loom into view.  We head down to the base area of the box at 35 metres, and have a look around.  I see the gnomes on the tray underneath the box, which I didn’t even know where there.  I can feel the narks at this point, which I don’t think I have experienced before, probably caused by the increased anxiety of the dive, compared to deeper dives abroad etc, I can feel my thinking being a little fuzzy.  I am just about to signal that I want to ascend a little, when David motions to do exactly that, and begin the ascent back up.  I follow David up the line between the two hydroboxes, back to 27 metres, and then from there we head up the pipe/air shaft which breaks off at about 11 metres.  From there is it a case of a regular ascent onto the ledge and carrying out the safety stop before exiting at the bus stop.

I really enjoyed this dive, and gained some valuable experience which I can use in the future.  One thing I have found in recent dives that I really want to work on is ascending in the horizontal position rather than vertical.  When I come up vertically, all the air works it way up and then starts venting from the shoulder dump, making me negatively buoyant again, and then I have to work between finning and adding more air as I go to remain buoyant and continue ascending.  This means that I keep sort of stopping as I ascend, which isn’t really good for ascent rates, offgassing etc.  I knew this was going on, but David pointed out exactly what I am doing after this dive, so it is something else to work on soon.  This is the sort of thing that I want to learn on the Stoney dives though, so its good reason to keep doing them.

After a surface interval and a coffee, we drop back into the water for a short dive on the six metre ledge to use up the remaining air in our cylinders (might as well get full money’s worth!).  We have a good look around the nautilus and the blockhouse, and attach some plastic skeletons in various places around the ledge.  It is a halloween dive after all…  Then it is out and to the pub, before heading home to sort out the kit etc.

Dive 1 (112)  Max Depth 35.4 metres, total dive time 30 minutes

Dive 2 (113)  Max Depth 7.5 metres, total dive time 19 minutes.