Kittens - 15/5/2009 - 16/5/2009

Over the weekend, Brian and I went to visit Amy and Bram in Auchtermuchty. They adopted kittens and we got to see them within their first few hours of exploring the cottage. Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum are sister and brother and are very different creatures. Photos and videos can be found here.

River Teith - 10/5/2009

Trip report coming soon

Alan waits out the faff.

Upstream view to the first bridge across the River Teith.

Squinty Brian

Ali complained that all kayaking photos of her are from the back.

Brian doesn't look completely unhappy

Alan avoiding mayflies

Assault of the mayflies

Lanzarote Above Water Adventures - 27/4/2009 - 3/5/2009

Blah blah blah coming soon

Eventually Ben figured out what the suitcase was all about and he wasn't happy.

Go karting with other Active adventurers

We were adopted by one of the Hotel Celeste's cats.

She wasn't pleased that we wouldn't let her inside.

Brian in one of his natural habitats, with a Spanish portion of brandy

Our walk just north of Costa Teguise had lots of interesting sites to explore. We wondered how often people came there for diving, with the clear water. My guess is not so often because of how exposed to the current, waves and surge the area was.

Dive 8: Temple Hall wreck - 2/5/2009

Our scheduled dive was a boat dive to explore some wrecks outside Puerto del Carmen. Because the numbers didn’t make sense to rent the boat, they changed to a shore dive. Instead we went to explore the Temple Hall wreck on the northern side of Arrecife, near the desalination plant. That boat didn’t survive a bad storm a few years ago, although if you look at it quickly while driving past, you may not notice that the back end is missing. The only thing that’s noticeable is how unusually close it is to the beach to not be parked at a dock.

Because the crazy French group had gone home, Simon went back to being retired and Laurence was our guide. After the usual gearing up faff, we swam out about 400m and then descended to about 6m. We swam along the sandy bottom and then worked our way along the sheltered side of the boat. As usual, Alan kicked up a lot of sand and Brian hovered about a metre higher than the rest of us, very wisely avoiding it.

As we reached the back of the surface half of the boat, there was a bit of a drop to the back end of the boat, which was completely underwater and slowly disintegrating. This dive was not going to be a proper wreck dive – we weren’t going in the boat anywhere – and I can’t say I minded. The underwater disintegrating parts looked quite fragile even though the surface parts looked in good condition.

We swam around the back of the boat and then along the top of it. My depth gauge had my maximum depth at 9m but Laurence’s was a bit closer to 10m. We saw more fish near the back end as they had more places to explore and hide. I touched a piece of the external boat hull as we swam over the last of the back end and felt grateful again to not be exploring boat innards. The metal was quite brittle and didn’t feel at all stable. Laurence looked into the dark inside of the front half to see if there was anything interesting, but not really. I guess all of the critters were having an afternoon nap.

We swam back along the front end of the boat and then in to the shore. On the swim back to the beach, I saw lots of funny logs that turned out to be sea cucumbers. I had a hard time keeping my back end down at less than 2m. Every so often, I would feel no resistance against a kick and that was my fin above the water surface.

Sadly, Brian and I missed a grumpy grouper hiding in the shadows near the bow of the boat. Both of us were disappointed in the dive, not because of the missed grouper but because it felt a bit boring. The wreck wasn’t a lot to see, especially compared to some of our other dives. Laurence had said the French group loved it because they could take lots of photos. Alan took a fair number of photos, as I suspect I would have, too, but that’s usually a sign of boredom on my part. Large collection of photos means I’m attempting to make my own fun.

Even more sadly, dive 8 for me was the end of diving for our trip. We were heading home the next evening. I am definitely looking forward to more diving, though I’m not sure yet when or where. Brian’s keen for UK diving, but he is on his own there. I found Lanzarote water a bit cold so, drysuit or not, I don’t see myself surviving cold, murky UK water.

Alan poses in front of the wreck at Temple Hall. Brian's photo composition looks as if the boat is about to drive into Alan's head.

Ahead of the dive, I wasn't warm enough and Brian was too warm.

The slowly disintegrating boat

Friendly urchin

Cuddly cuttlefish

Blurry flounder making its retreat

Dive 7: Mala / Charco del Palo (right) - 2/5/2009

This dive site has the added charm of having access at the resort town of Charco del Palo near Mala, which is a naturist resort. So, if the weather is nice, you have to mind your eyes to avoid the naked Germans wandering around. If the weather isn’t so nice, like the morning we arrived, you just have to not look so carefully. My eyes were the fortunate ones. Brian’s on the other hand looked toward the porches. Neither of us understands the appeal of naturism. I think 25C and 30kph winds is not nearly warm enough to be running around without any clothes. Brian thinks that it requires far too much additional sun cream with unpleasant consequences if forgotten.

The entry at Mala is challenging. Steps lead down to rocks where two ladders lead out of the water and a single handrail has been installed to aid with entry. Giant stride entry is the easiest way in and a rope provides a barrier hand hold while everyone gets in and organised. Both surge and surf are likely. As we walked down the stairs in full gear, I watched waves wash over the entry about once per minute. The challenge of the morning was going to getting gloved, masked and finned without getting pummelled. I let Alan and Brian go first.

Instructor Simon went both first and last. Geared up, he stood at the entry point making sure each of us got organised and into the water safely. Just before I heaved myself in, he reminded me to put lots of air in my BCD. I had none. Well timed. The giant stride entry was no problem and I clung to the rope barrier beside Brian, waiting for Simon to join us. Once everybody was in, we descended quickly to about 6 or 7m and swam away from the exit ladders. The surge kicked us side to side as we swam away, which kept my heart rate and breathing rate up for a while. I wondered if I would finish with less air than Brian, who tends to go through air quite quickly.

With some time to get used to it, I learned to slow down and hold my position in the surge/current and then use it to glide forward. We swam over the sandy bottom and many lava outflows. As we moved beyond the entry point and worked our way deeper, the surge pretty much disappeared. On this dive, there weren’t as many little fish to swim with as some of the other dives. I wondered if they preferred not to be kicked around by so much surge. The lava rocks were sea urchin resorts, which seemed to follow the same organisational scheme as the towns of Costa Teguise and Playa del Carmen. Obvious mental note followed to not step on or put a hand down on a rock without looking. We descended to about 20m gradually but kept a safe 2 or 3 metres from the bottom. Soon we saw the first of many stingrays . One laid so happily in the sand that I thought it was an angel shark, but the shark shaped footprint wasn’t so obvious. Until google showed us the difference, Brian thought they were manta rays. But no, they were stingrays, hover-swimming like martian spaceships of cartoon legend. We must have seen at least a dozen stingrays of various sizes. Alan got a few photos that I hoped would turn out. We worked our way back gradually toward the ladders swimming over more sea urchin resorts that seemed to be missing only the vend-a-loungers.

At a depth of about 6m, Simon led us into a small cave in one of the lava outflows that is good for seeing some of the more rare wildlife. We swam into the cave, Simon then me then Brian and finally Alan. As with the previous dive, Alan was still struggling with buoyancy and swimming level(ish) so he kicked up a hell of a (sand) houlie. Simon shined his light into the crevices and we saw a number of fish that I didn’t recognise. In the second crevice, a moray eel showed its face briefly and then mooned Alan as he tried to take a photo.

On the way out of the cave, we had the option of a swim through to the inside or a swim around. With the increase in surge again and my tank nearly empty, I didn’t feel confident in my buoyancy control enough for the 1m or so clearance at the start. I didn’t want to scrape along or kick/shove rocks on the way through, so I opted for around. Brian and Alan swam through.

It wasn’t long until we reached the exit ladders. As the usual least amount of air remaining, Brian got to go first. Alan let some air out of his BCD and was able to sink to the bottom easily. I got caught in the surge and pulled upward. Dumping the air out of my BCD didn’t help. Swimming down didn’t help. As Brian climbed upward, I threw myself at the ladder and clung to the bottom rung as the surge picked my back end up far too easily. I remember looking slightly enviously at Alan wishing I had stuck to 6kg instead of 5kg on my weight belt.

Once Brian was clear (enough), Simon sent me up the ladder. About halfway(?) up, I made the mistake of looking at the waves crashing against the rocks, which very easily tore the regulator from my mouth. Frothy saltwater waves don’t taste all that good. I reached the top of the ladder and Brian asked me if I was ok. I said no as I slithered onto the rock and made space for Alan. Brian scolded me, reminding me that ok and happy are not the same question. I apologised as I sat onto a nearby rock to wait for Alan and Simon to get out safely.

The long slog back to the car was uphill like all the rest. On the way back to the van, Simon pointed out another swim through that was possible in milder conditions. It had to be milder conditions because there was no exit route even though the swim through ended at the shore. Divers had to swim back out and around to exit. Another day, another dive. The conditions weren’t in any rush to improve for us.

The entry at Charco del Palo (Mala)

Swimming companions

Blurry half of a stingray in the sand

Blurry, sandy stingray

Dive 6: Puerto del Carmen – Top of the Altar - 1/5/2009

Our largest group dive of the week was another Puerto del Carmen dive. Most of the morning group from Brian’s deep dive was staying on for the afternoon dive. Brian was late coming back to the hotel for lunch and I had been wondering if they had any difficulties during their dive or just suffered from group faff. I was right on both accounts. Brian’s blue hole dive got changed because of group inexperience. One of the divers had problems with equalising and had to bail early. And the faff factor was enormous.

Not a lot changed between the morning and the afternoon. Our group consisted of Brian and me who had been diving all week and Alan, Richard and Leslie, all three with the advanced qualification but not an enormous amount of experience. Richard and Leslie were responsible for the lion’s share of extraneous faff beyond what is typical for diving. I waited until the last possible minute to get geared up and buddy checked with Brian. Then I asked Simon if I could go chuck myself in the water so I wasn’t standing around in lots of heavy gear. Brian and Alan went with me, though the rest of the group wasn’t far behind. A bunch of kids were jumping off the jetty in the same place where we wanted to enter, so it was an awkward and slippery walk past them. Brian went in the water first, followed by either Alan or me. Simon had caught up at that point so he got to wait on the jetty around all the screaming kids while Richard and Leslie got the rest of their gear on.

Once all of us were in the water, Leslie had trouble submerging, suggesting she needed another 2kg on her weight belt. Simon helped get her down to about 6 or 7m and then found a rock to use as a substitute extra weight. While we were waiting for them to get organised and underwater, Alan took some photos with his digital camera. It was a cheap digital camera with plastic housing that he found in Arrecife. I was jealous because my camera isn’t useful beyond 3m and its predecessor had a bad experience with Lanzarote. Alan and Brian each took a few photos. He had said it would work up to about 15m, which was the depth where the buttons would be under too much pressure to function properly.

Once everybody was underwater and reasonably settled, we began the dive by swimming out along the jetty. The more interesting creatures were found in the rocks rather than in the sand below. We saw lots of little fish whose names I forgot as quickly as I learned (underwater naturalist I am not). I learned very quickly to not stay too close to either Leslie or Alan. Probably because each was wearing a pretty massive weight belt (ca. 10kg), they moved through the water in a manner that looked more like kneeling than swimming. Lots of sand kicked up. Brian hovered away and up by at least two metres. Sensible.

The plan was to visit Charlie the grumpy grouper I saw two days previously, if he was in the neighbourhood, and see what else we could see. Simon said Charlie usually hangs out around 16-18m, which is where I saw him during my training dive. Sadly, we didn’t see Charlie, but we did see lots of little fish, a handful of starfish, sea urchins and two angel sharks. Simon pet the angel shark, which was passed out asleep in the sand. This time, he didn’t invite us to pet the shark. I wondered if the size of the group and possible chaos might disturb it, especially since the previous day’s feeding angel shark wasn’t too happy with us.

The reefs drop off significantly at the top of the altar. We descended to around 20m, which is the top of the drop-off. Swimming over the drop-off was a very slight heart in throat moment. I’m not fond of heights, but the sensation of essentially flying over the reef was the fondest of heights I have ever been. I am looking forward to doing deeper dives in the future.

I am not sure who hit the 100bar mark first. I have to guess Brian because of his claim, but maybe not. We headed back toward the jetty. I got a little too close to Leslie and she nearly knocked my regulator out of my mouth as she was adjusting her BCD for the ascent. I readjusted and moved away to give her more space. We slowly worked our way back up to about 9m and pile of rocks at the end of the jetty. At some point of swimming along during the swim back, we lost Leslie and Richard quite suddenly. In less than two minutes, probably less than a minute for Simon, gone. We waited while Simon swam back toward where we had been and then all of us looked up to see Leslie and Richard at the surface. Near the end of her tank, the weight belt that Leslie was wearing and the rock in her BCD pocket wasn’t enough to hold her underwater any longer. She and Richard swam back to the entry point on the surface. Alan, Brian, Simon and I swam back underwater. Simon’s warning to stay low seemed a bit pointless with the other two from our group bobbing along the surface, but it was good practice to play with buoyancy at the end of the dive.

Our return to the surface was greeted by the same screaming children who were there when we left. We missed the peace and quiet of underwater.

Simon, our fearless leader

Brian and me

Underwater Alan

These little black and blue fish were among my favourite swimming partners

Starfish

Underwater moose ears. Guess who?

Underwater Brian

Dive 5: Puerto del Carmen Old Harbour Wall - 30/4/2009

My first dive with the training wheels off was with Simon as guide and only Brian and me as clients. We headed back to Puerto del Carmen and the jetty entry to explore the old harbour wall. The idea was to swim along the wall, which should have all sorts of interesting marine life swimming or sitting about, and then swim back across the sand.

On the way out, we saw a 2 or 3 metre tubular colony of organisms that looked like a windsock waving underwater. Not sure what it was called but it had very little texture.

Peter's lecture to Brian about being a good buddy and mindful of me / my swimming pace in the water seemed a bit misdirected. I was a much faster swimmer and had to correct to Brian's pace.

On this dive, I learned a new hand signal from Simon. Hand vertical against forehead means shark. Just in front of us was an outline in the sand that looked like someone with a shark shaped foot had just stepped there. It was an angel shark hanging out and waiting for a meal to swim along. Simon gestured me over to it, beside him and showed me it was ok to pet it on one of its fins. It felt like very coarse sandpaper, even through my gloves. The shark eventually got fed up with us being there and distracting its food away. It swam away in a huff, biting at nonexistent things in its path. While it was no threat to any of us, I felt guilty for chasing its food away. We saw another shark in the sand soon after, but left it alone.

Brian and I both reached 100bar at about the same time, but I think we were well on our way back by that point. We continued along the sand for a while and then reached the pile of rocks near the jetty. The difference between the sand and the pile of rocks was huge in terms of the number and variety of fish we saw. Where we saw just the sharks and the occasional fish before, the rocks were teeming with life.

We followed the pile of rocks to about 6m when Simon told us to stick to the bottom. As we were approaching the jetty exit point, the possibility of boat traffic meant the bottom was the safest place to be. The minimum depth was about 3m and no propeller was that big. Simon looked around and up and signalled to ascend. I was too busy looking down and around that I missed it and saw just flippers when I turned back. I figured it out and joined them on the surface.

Simon preferred the jetty as an exit point and I could immediately see why. We had to climb up lots of steps but we were not covered in sand. Comparing end pressures, Brian was a little bit lower than me. I had hope that I would get used to breathing funny air with practice and not take over his title as air guzzler.

Dive 4: Playa Chica, Puerto del Carmen - 29/4/2009

In the last training dive, I fared much better with the 8kg weight belt. We swam in a different direction than the visit to Charlie, starting from the jetty again so I could practice a different type of entry. I had really just one set of skills left to practice, the tired diver tow, so until the end, it was really just like a normal dive.

We swam along the sand and reached the top of the reef as we neared 18m. As usual, the little fish wondered what we were. The catfish and the cuddlefish avoided us in their usual nonchalant way. Perhaps the morning’s cuddlefish warned his pals about me.

We followed the reef along and then headed back toward Playa Chica to finish the skills. I had to tow Peter some distance in the water. Him being considerably larger than me meant it would take some time. Unlike the pool sessions, I only had to do one type of tow.

With the end of training dive 4, I finished the PADI open water course and was officially a qualified diver. When we returned to the shop to put gear away and do the rest of the paperwork, Brian returned from his morning dive. Peter gave Brian a lecture about the importance of being a good diving buddy, which was probably about 50% seriousness and 50% entertainment on his part. They also had an odd bullshitty conversation about aikido, which was a bit beyond my attention span. Brian had the afternoon off, too, because they didn’t have enough people booked for the scheduled boat dive. They didn’t have anyone other than Brian so instead he and Simon did two dives in the morning.

Dive 3: Playa Chica, Puerto del Carmen - 29/4/2009

The plan for the day was to get the skills out of the way as soon as possible so that the rest of the dives would be more like pleasure dives. To make sure I could stay on the bottom for the skills, Peter had me use an 8kg weight belt. As far as skills on the list, I had to do a controlled emergency swimming ascent (CESA), some underwater and surface navigation, mask removal. To further reduce risk of built up nitrogen, the CESA was scheduled for early in the dive. We would submerge, do the mask removal and then the CESA.

I didn’t fare well with mask removal – water up the nose – and pushed that to later in the dive. The CESA was next. I had to swim up a rope with Peter’s hand under my jaw to make sure I was always breathing out. He said it was the first time he heard anyone humming, but whatever works. Next up was the surface navigation. I had to set my lubber line, swim with it as a guide for 20 kicks with a snorkel, swap snorkel for regulator, turn around and return 20 kicks along the return course. Sounds easy enough. As usual, I forgot to count less than half way into the exercise and Peter had to stop me with a tap on the shoulder. Everything else went fine and I arrived, regulator in mouth at the point where I started. I apologised for not warning him of my counting skills and we submerged to do the same exercise (sans snorkel/regulator swap) underwater. I was still slow to descend and I made the mistake of dumping all of my air when Peter motioned to me to dump some air. Descending slowly became descending like the lead weights around my waist and I landed with a thud on the bottom. A cuddlefish gave me a dirty look as it swam away.

The submerged navigation was just as entertaining as the surface navigation, except this time, Peter was prepared for me to forget to count. Entertainment aside, I did arrive back where I started.

Skills over, we headed deeper along the jetty to explore. At some point, I think I put a little too much air in my BCD for how deep I wasn’t, and I very quickly felt like someone tied a bundle of helium balloons around my waist and let me go. I was a big sack heading for the surface, trailing my legs and arms behind me. A quick dump of air after a panicky flail to find the button on the BCD and I was right again. Peter looked back but only after everything looked normal again.

We worked our way down to 18m and saw a big grumpy-looking grouper. He was dark blue and about a metre long. I found out afterwards that his name is Charlie. At the time, I struggled with buoyancy as I tried to stay out of his way. I had a hard time with the extra 2kg of weight. I felt like every movement was exaggerated, with the weight yanking me in whatever direction.

We headed back to the shelter of Playa Chica and I did the mask removal, slowly but well enough. It’s supposed to be simulating the mask being knocked off or similar, but oh well.

The trudge up hill was slow and hard work. Peter helped me carry my weight belt so I could move at a pace faster than a waddle. Peter asked me what was wrong, that I seemed "off". I explained the buoyancy comedy that he didn’t see and said I didn’t expect 2kg of weight to make so much difference.

Dive 2: Playa Chica, Puerto del Carmen - 28/4/2009

The debrief from dive 1 didn’t last very long. While the sun was out, it was reasonably warm, but that wasn’t during our surface interval. Training dive 2 had more skills than training dive 1, and a bit more depth, too. I swapped tanks, adjusted the position a bit down so I stopped whacking my head into the valve behind me, and Peter talked me through the list of skills that I needed to demonstrate that I would promptly forget. He went through the hand signals and motions for them so that I would understand when he reminded me underwater. He also borrowed a 1kg weight and put it in my pocket. With the extra weight, I could sit on the bottom when necessary and have some more practice using the BCD for buoyancy.

Skills included more mask flooding, hovers, cramp removal and some other similar things. Skills done, we wandered down to about 12m exploring more of the rock pile boundary of Playa Chica. In addition to the cuttlefish, I saw catfish, flounder (flounder swim funny – on their sides so they look a lot like a tiny version of a stingray), rock fish, seabreams, and more. My favourites for colouring were the black and blue ones. My favourites for their perpetual grumpy expressions were the cuttlefish and rockfish.

Training dive 2 ended much the same as training dive 1 with a long slog from the beach up to the van.

Dive 1: Playa Chica, Puerto del Carmen - 28/4/2009

The PADI book said that the first training dive should be just a dive. Peter had me do a couple of skills to balance with dive 2 a bit better. I was quite happy with that idea, figuring that I would rather have the last of the 4 training dives more like a dive than the first.

I needed some help remembering how the gear all pieced together, but most of it was pretty intuitive. Geared up, we walked to the beach of Playa Chica, which is, as the name suggests, a small beach protected by large piles of rocks on either side. Brian and I had the best snorkelling there during our last Lanzarote trip, but sadly, that was after my last camera had died.

We waddled into the water and then put fins on. Submerging the first time was a little awkward, just like in the pool, but it didn’t take too long to get used to everything. Peter had me hold his hand for the first few minutes of being underwater, until both of us were sure I was doing ok. He had me do the first few skills and realised that while my buoyancy was perfect for diving, it wasn’t great for staying parked at the bottom to do the skills. He had to hold me down by the shoulder. Skills done, we swam around the edge of the big pile of barrier rocks. I saw cuddlefish, seabreams and lots of fish whose names I forgot very quickly after examining the wall chart back at the dive shop . The maximum depth for the dive was 8m. We returned to the surface via Playa Chica as well, which meant ankles down were covered in sand.

The walk back to the van was much more of a slog than the walk to the water. It was this point where I realised that every dive was going to be like this. Unless I take up altitude diving, and even then, locally I don’t think even altitude diving will make a difference. I will always have an uphill walk on the way back from a dive. Water flows down hill. Tired diver trudges uphill with wet, heavy gear.