Vobster weekend

SoB · January 28th, 2006, 11:08 PM

Well, I can confirm it was -1C when I got there at 0930 and 0C for most of the day - water was a balmy 6C by comparison.

That said - James and Co. went on a tour of Somerset and arrived around lunch time

so I picked on an unsuspecting group of three in a nice blue van with what looked like an Orange surf-board on top and invageled my way into the group.

Gledders, Daz and Al were looking at chocolate from what I could see!

Well the short version is that you could try to clean your mask in the buckets but you had to have an Ice-diving cert first, cut the surface with your chain-saw and have a full surface support team and rescue divers standing by.

First dive was uneventful apart from (1) not having dry-suit hose secured so it popped out - thanks to Buddy for puting back in, (2) buddy being slightly underweighted and having a tendency to head for the surface anytime I wasn't looking (3) having re-positioned the canister for the Salvo I couldn't reach the on-off switch (doh!) (4) other pair had worse problems as one of them simply couldn't descend (not enough weight) so the 2 teams got seperated (well of course - one pair [mine] were actually diving :p ) - well okay - we got a little lost and ended up on the other side of Vobby but who cares - 1st dive of the year!!!

Well okay - most of these are teething issues with first dives of the year, new kit, new positions, new buddies. All in all not a biggy.

HOWEVER - for me, the real reason there was to practice all the DIR-F stuff I learnt last year, S-drills, valve-shutdowns etc etc., but by the time I got in the water I was already frozen and my hands were blocks of ice very very quickly - blow the drills

.

Now you would have thought that an hour out of the water would help to warm us back up - but remember two things (1) water temp 6C (2) air temp 0C - who knows what the ground temp was but it was enough to suck the heat from you feet first - after that hour my legs were numb from the knee down.

Getting into the water again was an excercise in will-power - well it was for me! Once in you warmed up

bliss - but not enough to want to have to try and shut valves off/on - I could barely unclip/clip so once that light-sabre was off it was staying in my hand and scything through anything slow enough to be "torched".

..Oh one more think - Daz and Clare look very fetching in their matching team DUI outfits ...and my first "in-the-flesh" meeting with Clare ended up with me getting a good kicking within 2 minutes. Nice bunch, all of them.

Regards,
Simon

**Alastair** · January 29th, 2006, 12:42 AM

Had a good day out today. Nice to meet Simon and James from the board along with the usual suspects. We also had a surprise visit from DJL who dropped by to catch up. It was great to chat to him.

As the post from Simon mentions it was a bit nippy! The scootering tends to make you a bit colder so that added an extra challenge. That said David Martin still had his fingerless gloves on

The DIR-F course looked like it was going well. Managed to catch up with them in the surface interval. Looking forward to the write up.

Oh and Simon - Daz and Clare don't have matching drysuits :p

Cheers
Al

SoB · January 29th, 2006, 10:08 AM

Al,

Okay Okay

Having got you short arses mixed up out of the water - I mean FFS when you're sat down you all look the same to me :D .

So who was diving with Clare you or Daz sounds like I got mixed up write at the introductions bit and it was you and Clare.

Apologies for being dense - I can blame it, quite happily, on being frozen.

I think I need a Team Gledders picture with a left-to-right (or right2left or up2down, down2up ...whatever).

Cheers
Simon

**Alastair** · January 29th, 2006, 11:52 AM

Quote: (Originally Posted by SoB)

Al,

Okay Okay

Having got you short arses mixed up out of the water - I mean FFS when you're sat down you all look the same to me :D .

So who was diving with Clare you or Daz sounds like I got mixed up write at the introductions bit and it was you and Clare.

Apologies for being dense - I can blame it, quite happily, on being frozen.

I think I need a Team Gledders picture with a left-to-right (or right2left or up2down, down2up ...whatever).

Cheers
Simon

Don't worry Simon - we all look similiar in gear. Myself and Clare both have red TLS drysuits - it wasn't intentional but due to the nature of ebay

.

Oldish pic of the team is:

Left to right myself, Fraser and Clare

Daz wears a black drysuit so you should be able to spot him that way. He'll actually be mortified he was mistaken for a DIR diver! This is the last time he was captured on film with a DIR diver

Me on the left, Daz on right. I've got my new suit in this one as well.

Cheers
Al

Little Pete · January 29th, 2006, 11:54 AM

LMAO Al, love that pic of Daz :p

*Clare Gledhill* · January 29th, 2006, 03:49 PM

Friday morning found me at the station picking up Daniel (Galobeast) and driving to Vobster to meet Diane for a couple of dives.

Daniel, who is from Brazil, was very excited to see it begin to snow as we kitted up for the first dive. I can't say I shared his enthusiasm. We just pootled about, practiced a few gentle ascents so Di could get comfortable - very nice. Daniel thumbed the dive as he was cold - I found out later on the surface that he was diving in just a 200 gramme fleece

After much choccy on the surface and an achingly funny session where Di compared me to Eva Braun (ve ave vays of getting you into ze trim!) we headed back in for another dive. Di did an excellent shutdown and Daniel and I had a bit of fun throwing some stages about until our hands were so cold we couldn't feel the clips anymore.

Fun day.

Saturday morning I really didn't want to get out of bed. But I was expecting Janos at 6:45 am so struggled out and got the extra kit that I would need after the day before into the car. It was chuffing freezing! To say I was non too pleased when I found he was running late and I could have had an extra hour in bed would not be an exaggeration!

Getting to Vobster it was great to see DJL, as well as Al and all the boys on the DIR F course.

After a few weeks (well months if I'm honest) of ignoring skills a bit, Al and I were determined to get some done today. First dive though I was going to try to get more comfortable on the Gavin - which I've not been very happy with since I got it.

We scootered out round the quarry without stages. Al had added a bit of weight to mine and whilst it was easier to manage in the water it was clearly too heavy as it went negative below 10 meters and I stopped and gave it the last rites as it settled on the bottom :D Much more comfortable though - unlike my shutdown drill which frankly sucked. Far too slow and a real struggle to reach the left post in the new (but really warm) undersuit.

Second dive was three stages each and an attempt to start finding our way round the switching drill we need to get sorted. I have to say scootering out to the 12 meter platform I felt like an aircraft carrier with the gavin and the stages... Woe betide any OW diver I came across in the vis - I may take a while to stop

The valve drills went better this time, but the stage switching was horrid, and I was again unable to unclip my pressure gauge when the leash is in place. Talking to RichW on the surface my leash is too long and my hip D ring may need repositioning further back for multiple stages. All food for thought next time I suppose. Scootering back we saw SoB and his mates - even if he couldn't tell who was who!

It really was warmer in the water (5 degrees) than on the surface so we got back in again. Janos joined us on dive 3 so Al and I decided to swim the stages around. Shutdowns were a bit easier still so mustn't let the practice slip again - every dive until we are Mexico bound methinks.

All in all another good day. But all the nicer that this morning I got to stay in bed in the warm!

Little Pete · January 29th, 2006, 06:03 PM

Quote:

Second dive was three stages each and an attempt to start finding our way round the switching drill we need to get sorted. I have to say scootering out to the 12 meter platform I felt like an aircraft carrier with the gavin and the stages... Woe betide any OW diver I came across in the vis - I may take a while to stop

Abosolute gem :D I've got the mental picture of you now as the centre of a carrier group with a scooter and 10 stages. You could have Al and Frase either side as escorts and put Chasey and Janos out as your hidden RB attack sub equivalents :p

By the way Clare, what is the new undersuit you mention? I've seen you in a DUI 400, is it just a new one of those?

NickB · January 29th, 2006, 07:04 PM

Just got back ater the SatNav took me through Bristol FFS!

Tootricky and I were there to have a pootle around before his TDI Adv. Nitrox & Deco Procs next w/e (good luck mate).

Nice to meet Sterny, Howard, Marianne & Jason? and all the guys doing DIR-F this w/e (good luck to you too guys, let us know how it went)

Janos · January 29th, 2006, 07:20 PM

Yes, just to say that it was nice to get in the water. Bouyancy was a bit better, but trim was a bit worse

Hey ho. Bit more practice needed.

Janos

Divingniknaks · January 29th, 2006, 08:57 PM

Quote: (Originally Posted by Little Pete)

LMAO Al, love that pic of Daz :p

I didnt know Yasser Arafat was a diver :D

January 28th, 2006, 11:08 PM	#1 (permalink)
SoB(Offline) Be nice or the SMB gets it.... Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Caterham (province of Thailand) Posts: 48	Saturday Well, I can confirm it was -1C when I got there at 0930 and 0C for most of the day - water was a balmy 6C by comparison. That said - James and Co. went on a tour of Somerset and arrived around lunch time so I picked on an unsuspecting group of three in a nice blue van with what looked like an Orange surf-board on top and invageled my way into the group. Gledders, Daz and Al were looking at chocolate from what I could see! Well the short version is that you could try to clean your mask in the buckets but you had to have an Ice-diving cert first, cut the surface with your chain-saw and have a full surface support team and rescue divers standing by. First dive was uneventful apart from (1) not having dry-suit hose secured so it popped out - thanks to Buddy for puting back in, (2) buddy being slightly underweighted and having a tendency to head for the surface anytime I wasn't looking (3) having re-positioned the canister for the Salvo I couldn't reach the on-off switch (doh!) (4) other pair had worse problems as one of them simply couldn't descend (not enough weight) so the 2 teams got seperated (well of course - one pair [mine] were actually diving :p ) - well okay - we got a little lost and ended up on the other side of Vobby but who cares - 1st dive of the year!!! Well okay - most of these are teething issues with first dives of the year, new kit, new positions, new buddies. All in all not a biggy. HOWEVER - for me, the real reason there was to practice all the DIR-F stuff I learnt last year, S-drills, valve-shutdowns etc etc., but by the time I got in the water I was already frozen and my hands were blocks of ice very very quickly - blow the drills . Now you would have thought that an hour out of the water would help to warm us back up - but remember two things (1) water temp 6C (2) air temp 0C - who knows what the ground temp was but it was enough to suck the heat from you feet first - after that hour my legs were numb from the knee down. Getting into the water again was an excercise in will-power - well it was for me! Once in you warmed up bliss - but not enough to want to have to try and shut valves off/on - I could barely unclip/clip so once that light-sabre was off it was staying in my hand and scything through anything slow enough to be "torched". ..Oh one more think - Daz and Clare look very fetching in their matching team DUI outfits ...and my first "in-the-flesh" meeting with Clare ended up with me getting a good kicking within 2 minutes. Nice bunch, all of them. Regards, Simon

January 29th, 2006, 12:42 AM	#2 (permalink)
Alastair(Offline) DIRX Supporter Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: UK Posts: 693	Had a good day out today. Nice to meet Simon and James from the board along with the usual suspects. We also had a surprise visit from DJL who dropped by to catch up. It was great to chat to him. As the post from Simon mentions it was a bit nippy! The scootering tends to make you a bit colder so that added an extra challenge. That said David Martin still had his fingerless gloves on The DIR-F course looked like it was going well. Managed to catch up with them in the surface interval. Looking forward to the write up. Oh and Simon - Daz and Clare don't have matching drysuits :p Cheers Al __________________ Helium is our friend - GI3

January 29th, 2006, 10:08 AM	#3 (permalink)
SoB(Offline) Be nice or the SMB gets it.... Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Caterham (province of Thailand) Posts: 48	Spot the diver competition Al, Okay Okay Having got you short arses mixed up out of the water - I mean FFS when you're sat down you all look the same to me :D . So who was diving with Clare you or Daz sounds like I got mixed up write at the introductions bit and it was you and Clare. Apologies for being dense - I can blame it, quite happily, on being frozen. I think I need a Team Gledders picture with a left-to-right (or right2left or up2down, down2up ...whatever). Cheers Simon

January 29th, 2006, 11:52 AM	#4 (permalink)
Alastair(Offline) DIRX Supporter Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: UK Posts: 693	Quote: (Originally Posted by SoB) Al, Okay Okay Having got you short arses mixed up out of the water - I mean FFS when you're sat down you all look the same to me :D . So who was diving with Clare you or Daz sounds like I got mixed up write at the introductions bit and it was you and Clare. Apologies for being dense - I can blame it, quite happily, on being frozen. I think I need a Team Gledders picture with a left-to-right (or right2left or up2down, down2up ...whatever). Cheers Simon Don't worry Simon - we all look similiar in gear. Myself and Clare both have red TLS drysuits - it wasn't intentional but due to the nature of ebay . Oldish pic of the team is: Left to right myself, Fraser and Clare Daz wears a black drysuit so you should be able to spot him that way. He'll actually be mortified he was mistaken for a DIR diver! This is the last time he was captured on film with a DIR diver Me on the left, Daz on right. I've got my new suit in this one as well. Cheers Al __________________ Helium is our friend - GI3

January 29th, 2006, 03:49 PM	#6 (permalink)
Clare Gledhill(Offline) GUE Instructor Site Admin Pacman Champion! Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: UK Posts: 1,541	Friday morning found me at the station picking up Daniel (Galobeast) and driving to Vobster to meet Diane for a couple of dives. Daniel, who is from Brazil, was very excited to see it begin to snow as we kitted up for the first dive. I can't say I shared his enthusiasm. We just pootled about, practiced a few gentle ascents so Di could get comfortable - very nice. Daniel thumbed the dive as he was cold - I found out later on the surface that he was diving in just a 200 gramme fleece After much choccy on the surface and an achingly funny session where Di compared me to Eva Braun (ve ave vays of getting you into ze trim!) we headed back in for another dive. Di did an excellent shutdown and Daniel and I had a bit of fun throwing some stages about until our hands were so cold we couldn't feel the clips anymore. Fun day. Saturday morning I really didn't want to get out of bed. But I was expecting Janos at 6:45 am so struggled out and got the extra kit that I would need after the day before into the car. It was chuffing freezing! To say I was non too pleased when I found he was running late and I could have had an extra hour in bed would not be an exaggeration! Getting to Vobster it was great to see DJL, as well as Al and all the boys on the DIR F course. After a few weeks (well months if I'm honest) of ignoring skills a bit, Al and I were determined to get some done today. First dive though I was going to try to get more comfortable on the Gavin - which I've not been very happy with since I got it. We scootered out round the quarry without stages. Al had added a bit of weight to mine and whilst it was easier to manage in the water it was clearly too heavy as it went negative below 10 meters and I stopped and gave it the last rites as it settled on the bottom :D Much more comfortable though - unlike my shutdown drill which frankly sucked. Far too slow and a real struggle to reach the left post in the new (but really warm) undersuit. Second dive was three stages each and an attempt to start finding our way round the switching drill we need to get sorted. I have to say scootering out to the 12 meter platform I felt like an aircraft carrier with the gavin and the stages... Woe betide any OW diver I came across in the vis - I may take a while to stop The valve drills went better this time, but the stage switching was horrid, and I was again unable to unclip my pressure gauge when the leash is in place. Talking to RichW on the surface my leash is too long and my hip D ring may need repositioning further back for multiple stages. All food for thought next time I suppose. Scootering back we saw SoB and his mates - even if he couldn't tell who was who! It really was warmer in the water (5 degrees) than on the surface so we got back in again. Janos joined us on dive 3 so Al and I decided to swim the stages around. Shutdowns were a bit easier still so mustn't let the practice slip again - every dive until we are Mexico bound methinks. All in all another good day. But all the nicer that this morning I got to stay in bed in the warm! __________________ Clare . "Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions....Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you too can become great." Interested in DIR dive training? Always happy to chat/answer questions so get in touch via PM or visit www.dirdiver.co.uk

January 29th, 2006, 11:54 AM	#5 (permalink)
Little Pete(Offline) New Member Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: UK Posts: 509	LMAO Al, love that pic of Daz :p

January 29th, 2006, 06:03 PM	#7 (permalink)
Little Pete(Offline) New Member Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: UK Posts: 509	Quote: Second dive was three stages each and an attempt to start finding our way round the switching drill we need to get sorted. I have to say scootering out to the 12 meter platform I felt like an aircraft carrier with the gavin and the stages... Woe betide any OW diver I came across in the vis - I may take a while to stop Abosolute gem :D I've got the mental picture of you now as the centre of a carrier group with a scooter and 10 stages. You could have Al and Frase either side as escorts and put Chasey and Janos out as your hidden RB attack sub equivalents :p By the way Clare, what is the new undersuit you mention? I've seen you in a DUI 400, is it just a new one of those?

January 29th, 2006, 07:04 PM	#8 (permalink)
NickB(Offline) Always lowering the tone Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Cardiff, UK Posts: 341	Just got back ater the SatNav took me through Bristol FFS! Tootricky and I were there to have a pootle around before his TDI Adv. Nitrox & Deco Procs next w/e (good luck mate). Nice to meet Sterny, Howard, Marianne & Jason? and all the guys doing DIR-F this w/e (good luck to you too guys, let us know how it went) __________________ SnowHeads / BreastFriends / Free Money!

January 29th, 2006, 07:20 PM	#9 (permalink)
Janos(Offline) "Two Sheds" Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Surrey Posts: 400	Yes, just to say that it was nice to get in the water. Bouyancy was a bit better, but trim was a bit worse Hey ho. Bit more practice needed. Janos __________________ You can lead a horse to water but you can't climb a ladder with a large bell in both hands - Vic Reeves www.hellfins.com/shed

January 29th, 2006, 08:57 PM	#10 (permalink)
Divingniknaks(Offline) Resident purveyor of shiney kit.... Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Midlands UK Posts: 1,038	Quote: (Originally Posted by Little Pete) LMAO Al, love that pic of Daz :p I didnt know Yasser Arafat was a diver :D __________________ Phill ----------------------------- Salvo Lights, DirZone Gear , Frog Wings Dive ? http://www.divingniknaks.com