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 Preparing for a gentle recreational dive |
Day 4
Alex (BSAC Diver!) Poole
Peered out of the porthole to a flat calm sea and glorious sunshine. Then I woke up....
Still we didn't come to Orkney for the weather, and apparently not to dive the German High Seas Fleet either (as Jason was keen to point out when he discovered we were diving the James Barrie again). Still everyone else enjoyed it and was keen to do it again. Having scouted out the layout of the wreck yesterday, I spent most of today's dive inside the wreck exploring the engine room, bridge, and hold - all in fantastic visibility, and with the streaming currents a total absence of silt. Almost more entertaining than the dive though was the ascent. Following my attempt at a disappearing act (or was it an attempt to escape...) yesterday, everyone was ordered up the shot. Most chose to deploy lift bags on the way up. Deco started to resemble a maypole dance, though Jason won the star prize managing to send his delayed up between the hoses of our German Inspiration diver, Petra...
For our second dive, we were back to diving military wrecks, this time the F2; a German escort vessel from World War 2. Although heavily salvaged the bow section and forward gun turret were still intact. The wreck of the salvage barge YC21 also lies nearby, though our attempt to reel off and find it failed miserably. Still by this time everyone else had moved on leaving the bow section to me and Steve C. Poking round with the gun Steve found that part of the aiming mechanism actually still worked!!! Though the stern of this wreck is mostly a tangled mass, the bows still provides plenty of interest, and by laying a line it was possible to explore down two levels. (At this point I have to mention Alasdair, who it seems is getting disappointed at not getting a mention - but surprisingly he doesn't seem to have done anything stupid today.)
So another excellent days diving. Most people rounded it off with a pleasant evening in the pub. I decided to contemplate my "chakras" having visited the local chippy whilst studying the IANTD Technical diving encyclopedia. Ommmm.
PS. Having just seen Alasdair's dive plans for tomorrow I take back the comment about not doing anything stupid.