Puffin Island Oct 2011

Wendy Northway

With a force 8 whipping most of the North Wales coastline a cunning plan evolved where we planned to dive Puffin Island, launching from Beaumaris. For those who had selected ‘other’ as a dive destination in Fantasy Dive, it meant bonus points – especially as we were off by 10am – it’s looking good so far! Primary reason for this outing was to test the performance of the engines. We’d swapped the engines from the new boat to the old boat and needed to assess operation fully laden with 10 souls/8 sets of dive kit. The weather was splendid - bright blue skies with the sun coming out. There was a slight chill in the air, but for October we couldn’t complain. It was breezy but diveable. The boat set out with DaveW at the helm and the 10 souls set out Puffin bound.

I was lucky enough to be paired with JohnA – I cannot remember the last time we dived together so relished the prospect to dive with Neptune himself. We dropped into 12m to small boulders bedecked with life. Spiral hydroids tumbled over the edges, boring sponges dotted the tops and gobies flitted everywhere! Each crevice seemed to house a lobster and those that didn’t where home to catshark! Ballan wrasse and pollack loomed just sufficiently in view allowing us to believe we were in our own private aquarium! Lobster pot lines criss-crossed and we had to be vigilant so as not to get entangled. My suit was leaking big time and I was so cold (getting scary as it’s only October – still plenty of dates left in the season!) but I was determined to give John an hour, however the cold got the better of both of us and we surfaced after 56 minutes – still respectable!

Meantime Ernie and Dave Humphries opted for depth and ended up on brittle star beds – ask me guys and I’d have told you that. I’m happy to tell you a little more about these sites and there’s no shame in asking a girlie diver! Ariel and AndyS were also out in the gravel (which can be very interesting, I hasten to add) carrying on with Ocean Diver drills. They also had a great dive – Ariel spying prawns pointed them out for Andy who put his hand down to take a closer look whence the conger emerge and took great interest in his hand! On surfacing, Ariel acted as casualty and enjoyed a tow back to the boat, which honest guys, Dave was not moving the RIB further away! The wind had picked up whilst we had been down and I doubted if we would get out again this afternoon. Never mind I had enjoyed a very pretty dive, but I was cold and soaked through.

Back at base hot chocolate called and I managed to drape my suit over the car. A combination of wind and sun dried it off sufficiently to allow for a second dive – should the weather allow. The wind did settle allowing for magnificent views down the channel and we were out again. We had a couple of dropouts – Dave Humphries had snapped his mask strap, Mark was cold thus I couldn’t let the side down; they needed me to make up numbers!

This afternoon I was buddied with Dave G. I was getting all the big guns today – no complaints from this corner! Once again we dropped into 12m to boulders very similar to this morning. Indian feather hydroids, elephant sponges and nemetesia antennea decorated the tops. The catshark and lobster that were so abundant this morning however were nowhere to be seen! It’s amazing how 2 dives in the same spot can be markedly different! I managed to get a bit of gravel groping in as rocks gave way to coarse sand. Tree-like sand mason worms, tiny shrimps and dragonets played their parts in the full richness that formed this spectacular dive. Just as I was getting too cold – the water that was gushing in my suit was now rolling down to my nether regions, we spied an anchor. Dave grappled with his lifting bag, very impressive as we were now at the apex of the island and being drawn into a runaway drift. Mission accomplished and we were outa there!

As we packed our kit away, Ariel and Andy surface with a second DSMB. ‘There’s an anchor attached to that one’ they enthused! Another drill successfully finished for Andy and they were back on the boat. All we had to do was wait for Ernie and Steve – another anchor and it would make a hat trick! Sadly it was not to be – that would been an anchor too far! 6 happy but wet divers headed back to shore. All of us seemed to have drysuit malfunctions and needed to get our puncture repair kits out. I certainly needed to release the shoal of pollack out of mine! Wind had definitely picked up now as we headed back. The boat out of the water and we were headed back home for pizza and PG. The engines seemed to pass their test and we discovered another launching place. Thanks to all who made this a success.