I'm Diving a Whole Lot

The weather in Scotland is going from bad to worse.  Every year the summers are getting progressively colder and wetter.  I am all set to give up on trying to grow anything in the garden or even to mow the lawn!  It's been too wet to cut the grass for weeks.  I was talking about this to my dear neighbours and it was said that our standards have been so lowered that we think ourselves lucky if we get three dry days together.

Coast near Lady Bay, Stranraer

So, what can you do instead?  Go diving!  I started the year with 96 dives under my belt.  I have been diving each and every month this year.  I'm up to 148 dives now. I hit the century dive in the first week of February.  I was just looking at the dive log and the water temperature was 6 degrees!  Yuck.  I also note that my current log book is almost full.  I have two pages left!

It must be said that the freezing February dive was in a fresh water quarry and we were doing some training.  I don't like diving in water as cold as that.  When I first joined the Dumfries Sub Aqua Club, I was firm about no very cold water dives.  This has relaxed and I'll dive in pretty much all temperatures.  However, I do draw the line if there is actual ice on the surface of the water.  It's no fun then.

In the spring the weather was lovely for a bit and the visibility in the sea was really quite good.  This encouraging bit of weather soon settled back into a pattern of almost constant rain.  It was particularly frustrating for members of the dive club with boats.  They haven't had the boats out much.

The dive club went on a trip to Malta in April.  That was fun!  I'll write about that week away later on this month.

The job situation picked up for me in April when I was hired by a new company.   This was all the excuse we needed to book a two week family holiday to Egypt.  We love diving in the Red Sea!  I managed to squeeze in 23 dives in the two weeks we had there.  I was often the first in the water and last to get out.  I wanted to squeeze every last drop of dive time in that clear, warm water that I could.

It is now November, days are getting very short.  I have my memories of warm dives in sunny locations to sustain me through the long winter ahead.