The five of us travelled down on Friday evening, hoping that Pete’s (the Skipper) description of the chances of diving on Saturday as “Iffy” was iffy itself, but unfortunately it wasn’t, and at 6:30 I received the news, although it did mean we could enjoy the night. So we hit Portsmouth after a couple in the hotel, and ended up enjoying a nice Italian meal before another taxi ride back to the hotel 

In the morning after a suitably greasy breakfast we decided to walk the ten miles into town, led by Nigel “Uncle Albert” Gee, who managed to include a photostop at Charles Dickens’s birthplace - Nige knew where the house was because he used to babysit the young Charlie when doing his naval service down there. Once into town we took the ferry across the Mersey to the Submarine museum which was interesting, and included a tour of a 1947 submarine by a wartime submariner. We headed back across into Portsmouth and soaked up the sun and a few drinks at Bar Ha Ha, listening to the Caribbean music and seeing a naked man climb a mast (ask Annette and Phil?? for the photos). We then decided to walk a further 3 miles to another pleasant restaurant overlooking the harbour, before (wisely) taking a taxi back to the hotel for an early night, ready for the next day’s diving.

 We found the marina area easily enough and after a breakfast of bacon and egg sandwiches washed down by some tea made by Pete waited for the other divers. First to arrive couple of scrap metal merchants, suitably armed with crowbar and hammer. The other three divers failed to make the 10am setting off time and we headed to the first wreck. On the way the other three divers rang saying they had arrived for the 11am start! Which meant that we had to go back to collect them rather than enjoying a leisurely lunch after our first dive.

 When kitting up Tony noticed that his weight belt was too small, after much faffing managed to get a bit more room inside but the tightness round his waist/gut meant that he couldn’t breathe and we called the dive after the weight check. Visibility was so bad, around 0 meters that the only divers to stay down longer than five minutes were the scrap chaps, although both Phil and Nigel needed their 15 litre cylinders refilled following their 2 minute dive. We then zoomed back to the marina to pick the other three divers, an old chap and two lads from a school’s diving club.

 Then onto dive two, which being on a shingle bank should deliver the 4meters of viz that Pete told us about, it didn’t and after 10 minutes we were all back on the boat heading home!

written by Mathew Nash