Sunfish Diary 2009
September
Due to a lack of response, the idea of moving Sunfish to QAB in Plymouth has been scrapped. Bookings are flying in, October is nearly full (but please ring me on 07968-262421 for last minute enquiries). As the weather has been so bad this summer, I hope we will get a good winter. So remember Sunfish doesn't stop throughout the winter, and it's always warmer IN the water.
The first weekend gave us great viz of nearly 10m on the wreck of the Galecia and finding a new very shallow unidentified wreck (7m) near Berry Head on the Saturday just topped off a great day. Sunday gave us better weather, but generally the viz had dropped to 5m. We dived Mudstone Ledges followed by Shoalstone. There was plenty of life; crabs, bass, pollack, wrasse plus lots of marco life.
This great start to September was then followed by 10 days of NE winds, closing Torbay!
The next charter was from QAB in Plymouth with the winds tailing off and a nice weekend forecast. The charter was from a Northants PADI club who wanted to stay out for the whole day on Sat and Sun. Our first dive was on the wreck of the Persier. Here they had to push the huge shoals of pout and Pollack out of the way to see the wreck which was in 28m and in 15m viz : Most of the guys described this dive as "awesome" and "best of the year". We had lunch in the sunshine anchored at the back of the Mew Stone.
Second dive of the day saw us speeding off to dive the wreck of HMS Scylla. The viz here was around 7m and with the sun shinning they all reported having had another cracking dive. We had planned to dive the Rose Hill on Sunday, but as a couple of them were feeling a bit delicate (too much of a good night the night before?), we dived the James Egan Layne instead. They all had yet another great dive in oily flat seas, but with no sunshine. Their final dive was on the outside of the breakwater in excess of 15m viz!! They had a great diving weekend.
The last weekend in September was another charter from Thetford BSAC, the first club to ever charter Sunfish, five years ago! We started by diving the Bretagne. They had a great dive in nice flat seas and 5m viz. We followed this by a trip to the Ore Stone, where they all had a really good drift dive.
Sunday's first dive was on the Eastern Blackstone. Slack was spot on and they had 10m viz! They followed this with a good dive on Thatcher Rock before heading back to Thetford (one guy took over 7 hrs!!). The thing that made it though was the pod of dolphins we had around us for 45mins or so when we arrived back in Torbay.
The weather was still holding for a Tuesday evening and we dived the Dutch Tugboat wreck just outside of Dartmouth. We were interrupted by the same pod of dolphins on the way there or should I say entertained so a good start. They had a great dive in this little wreck in 17m and on the way back into Torbay, just as the sun was setting, we were surrounded by the same dolphins again.
Due to the sale of Nautique in Paignton Harbour, air/nitrox is no longer available there. Please bring enough FULL cylinders for each days diving and contact Venture Sports on 01803 523023 for apres dive fills.
As of 1st October the scallop season re-opens. PLEASE ONLY TAKE WHAT YOU CAN EAT. If you take them all, there won't be any left!