Babbacombe Bay - 5-6th August 2000

(Advanced Open Water sports for all !!!...............)

It had to be Babbacombe....... after being talked into it seconds after the end of the Open Water course, Darren, Mark and I ventured back to that sheltered little bay 15 miles south of the M5. After a couple of visits to Stoney Cove (one instructional, one not) we were ready to embark on the last couple of dives to complete the Advanced Water certification..... apart from Mark who is the luckiest sod who is holding his back to do it in the crystal-clear waters of Cyprus 8 days from this page being published !! ...... lucky old scrote !!!..... anyway, for us poor sods, here is British diving........

Mark gets cramp in his right thigh and falls over ! (Yeah Reeeet!)

Roy is momentarily distracted by Pat Delaney's troops of buxom OW students as they walk by !

Darryl - someone who can bare his backside in public without being accused of staring !

Rachael teaches Roy, once again, how to do a Bow-line knot for the Search & Recovery dive !

Lou, after an attack by Roy the seagulls !

Gratuitous setting up the kit shot !

Lou and Emma

Charlotte watches as Darryl tries to screw open her valve

Dive #17

The AOW Search and Recovery dive. Emma and I buddied for this one and after all practicing Bow-line knots on the surface, Emma succeeded in tying one in seconds in 7m of water. The only drawback was the 30 minute wait at the bottom of the descent line for the others to finish where we froze (and also beaten at Rock, Paper, Scissors by Emma !!)

Dive #18

This was the AOW peak-performance bouyancy dive. The first 10 minutes was because I was too heavy and had to scrabble to shore to lose some shot ! Darryl, Darren and me were instructed by Steve on a very interesting dive where one deep breath in meant an ascent !

Dive #19

The AOW night-dive ! X-Files or what !! With nice kinky lights on our tanks, Darren and I set out afer Steve trying to spot all those weird and wonderful night creatures. We *did* spot a few crabs who were doing it sideways but not a lot else. Lovely dive though as after it...............

AOW DIVERS !!!!!!!!

After the night-dive, Darren and Andy are given an AOW-crowning celebratory beer (cheers Roy and Rachael!)

Straight to the B&B for Darren - Karate practice time !

The nightlife (minus camera) started after the night-dive (around 11pm !!!!). Darren and I tried to catch up with Roy, Rachael, Steve and Dean. We found them in the bar just above that horrible drop down to the beach car-park (Hullabaloo's ??) Anyway, it was full of wedding-party and 70's music so we caught a couple of taxis to Torquay.

Ending up (after a 1 mile walk) at the Rainbow Hotel, we found that everything shut at 01:00 !!!!! After three pints, we were back in a taxi to Babbacombe and trying to cadge bottles of beer from a neighboring hotel. Roy and Dean managed to blag £33 worth of assorted bottles where it was back to our B&B to chat, veg. and play some infuriating game that Dean had brought along........ nuff said.....we'll try it on you one day dear reader !!!

The following morning I got asked whether we were the ones who were playing around with the 'Songs of Praise' Karaoke equipment of using the recorders to play 'London's Burning'. Okay, Darren and I paid the bill and were off before further enquiries could be made !

Morning Buddy !

10 Minutes after wake-up, Darren is on the phone !

Dive #20

A rather naughty dive for Mark who deserves to pay severe beer-penalties for going in without the BWRAF. The profile is a bit haphazard here as we surfaced due to loss of direction and also because we got seperated due to various reasons. It was also the end of my diving for the weekend due to a horrendous reverse-squeeze due to, I guess, a cold that I thought had gone !