Past Trips - Farnes 2003

The Farnes 15 May 2003

For some reason I seem to have ended up writing this report, I'm not sure why? As usual I've left it until I've almost forgotten about the weekend, so I'll have to rely on the photos that I took, and my dive log off course.

A select little band of divers headed up to the Farnes on the Friday night, Steve Garbet & I were the last to arrive, As we drove through Banburgh we saw Lucky Dip safely tethered opposite the pub, so we knew Nigel & Gill had arrived safely. We found the campsite road…. quite easily, but it was far more difficult finding the tents, even Skinny Dip seemed to be hidden. Nigel had said, " over the far side of the camp site, well there are a lot of far sides if you don't know which far side it is. Luckily we spotted all the others sat in the pub! ~ I know surprising isn't, the night before a dive, luckily they were all drinking shandies or straight lemonade.

Saturday Steve, Richard, Mike and & were relegated to Skinny Dip, (a bit like the boat handling course). The usuallly diving followed. Good clear vis, lots of fish, flat calm sea AND seals. Well, it's surprising what a seal can do mean…. low…. with a delayed SMD, but it seemed to have a good time. Mike had forgotten to take his camera in. ~ Oh well.

Both boats went very well and everyone had a good time driving them. Skinny Dip didn't like the waves in the morning but went better in the afternoon.

Saturday night was BBQ night up at the campsite; the smoke certainly helped to keep the midges away.

Sunday, Bob had seen how well Skinny went on the Saturday afternoon and decided that he should pressure….. give the boat a try out! So off he went Sunday morning on a flat calm sea. With 4 divers in and a flat sea Skinny performed very well, Bob's navigation seemed a bit strange though as at one point he was headed away from the dive site at full speed grinning from ear to ear.

Diving on the Sunday was the same as usual, Lots of sunshine, excellent, lots of fish, and seals to play with.

Thanks to Nigel for organising such a good weekend, the sunshine, the flat calm sea, the good visibility, lots of fish to see, plenty of seals to play with, but what happened to the herd of dolphins that I thought you said outward….slow ones'….. envious…. up…. one…. were due to turn up?

Fran