JK'ing Around in Europe: Chepstowe Diving Centre and Annual Dinner

We had another great weekend free from work and school at the end of April, when we joined 35 of our other SCUBA club members down to the National Diving and Activity Centre in Chepstow (immediately north of the Severn Bridge on the West side).

The weekend involved a communal dinner in a pub on Friday night, two dives on Saturday, and a formal dinner Saturday night.

The highlight for me was the diving (go figure). It was the first time that I was able to dive without an instructor of any kind. It was just Luke (the same diver I checked out for my Ocean Diver at Stoney Cove with), and I.

The National Dive and Activity Centre. About 70 m deep at the near end, all the <20 m is at the far end by the docks.

Kristin was doing her depth progression for her Sports Diver (she reached 30m and 35m on subsequent dives), so her dives were completely different from mine.

They have really laid out the quarry at the dive centre well. There are multiple depth levels, and must be near 40 different things they have sunk at different levels to see. Being constrained to 20 m, we had two main areas we could dive to.

Not a proper buddy check.

Or this

Because I had the additional experience in Malta, and (for reasons we won't explain) Luke hadn't slept, I offered to lead the dive. We followed a route around the north end of the quarry, and were able to see a Land Rover, swim through a training platform, explore an airplane, an amphibious vehicle, a troop carrier and a self propelled gun. Somewhere along the way, I also found my first actual underwater geocache! At this point, we'd reached the end of fun stuff to see along the quarry wall, so I had to make a dead-reckon guess as to which direction, into the blue and at a mid-water depth (the bottom dropped to 30 m) we needed to swim to get back to the start. We set off, found a new wreck they just sunk and hadn't marked on the maps yet, and managed to arrive back at the exact spot we started from.

It was a picture perfect dive plan and execution. I was super happy with how it all turned out. (humble pie coming don't worry, the second dive was not nearly as smooth)

My dive partner, Luke, did take some videos of the dives, but I haven't been able to get them from him yet. I'll upload them and post in another blog when they are around to be seen.

Our second dive, we added on three other divers to our group who had just checked out for their Ocean Diver in the morning. We explored the other area available to us, which included a deep sea diving bell, a couple of swim throughs (basically 1-m culverts sunken and chained down), and a bus we were able to swim through.

Unfortunately my perfect record (1 dive and counting) of dive leading was tarnished, as I realized there were a number of signals we didn't cover, and we had a less-than textbook ascent to the surface, without safety stops, or really much controlled buoyancy. Luckily no one was hurt, and everyone still had a really good dive. It was a harsh lesson for me of the exponential growth of minor mistakes. A great lesson to learn, and I'm both lucky and happy that they were small enough that no one was harmed.

Finishing the dive, we headed back to the hotel for our formal Annual Dinner.

Not everyone in the club, but everyone who could make it. We were about 35 in all.

This is the exec. Our fearless leaders. What a good lookin' bunch they are.

Alice was our master of ceremonies.

For mixing up a giant box containing hundreds of different (previously sorted) rubber O-rings, Dan was given the O-ring award.

Kristin and I both got our certificate.

And Ryan, Kris' dive partner.

Our most promising sports diver, Leah

And most promising ocean diver, Claire. Great job both of you.

When we say formal, all of the guys are required (not requested) to wear a bow-tie which was self-tied. Anyone who was caught using a pre-tied bowtie was brought up to the front and ostracized in-front of everyone.

These guys!

There were also other awards and penalties doled out over the course of the night, including ball gags given to anyone who was not prompt enough answering emails regarding the Annual Dinner.

I think mine was BS. I responded just as soon as I was sent an email. This was discrimination because I don't have Facebook!

At least James found something constructive to do with his.

And for once peeing just a bit into his drysuit Kieran was awarded the golden diaper.

The rest of the photos are mostly just shenanigans throughout the night. It was a fun time, and everyone in the club is a pretty good riot to hang out with.

I mentioned Alice was the Master of Ceremonies. It's a secret until the dinner who the MOC is, but Pav and Matt figured out before hand, and started telling everyone else, so they were given jester clothes to wear for the rest of the night.