Friday – Dan
In Bristol, divers loaded into cars which took to the highway. The winds were still and the sun was high. Good viz was waiting, the ocean will not catch a break this week. 18 divers in total shine their flips ready for Skomer, imaging puffins, crabs and seals. You and I know that the boats won’t last to allow that… surely?
Max is missing, not found in Alex’s 10th spreadsheet, but we soon find him buying beer and ham, laughing in his usual German way: “JAJAJAJAJAJAJJAJA!”. Miles away, Will is drawn to Costco. Steph and Kai bookend our hero, spearheading in the noble rental van “cunt brains” which arrives down at the Grass Roots site hours in advance. They sigh, smile, and choose a choice camping spot where they relax and catch up on the groupchat.
Back at base it’s frenzy. Alex whips his concubines to stiff peaks, each calling a different car breaker. Alessandro looks to Sophie, who stares at Leather’s nice fishing hat. All searching for a replacement wheel for Luis’ Van, all in absolute vain. After what feels like hours, we nobly give up, as the RAC say it’s fine to tow on a spare. We grit our teeth and pretend we believe them.
That evening our brave Luis pulls into Grass Roots and peels his fingers from the wheel. We take in the beautiful site, Will’s circus tent and a generous horde of beers which he brought to share. Cards, campfire and caressing (between Luis and Will) mark the end of day one.
Saturday – Dan
Morning peeps through rainbow canvas in circus tents, and breakfasts spews forth. Duncan shows off his impressive collection of salt, typical for a mineral enjoyer. Dom makes a coffee so strong it actually heals Christina’s leg from PK, Phil’s Mustache falls off. We get a brief from scuba daddy and march toward Skomer, stopping only to get a few snackys at Tesco. We plan to launch from Martin’s Haven, where the ferry usually picks up the birders. The only thing standing in the way is a 500m trailer reverse -downhill- to get the boats to the beach. You blink and you miss Luis doing it in one shot, a king. Boats in and the bolts break, aha! I knew they would fail. But oh no, a bodge is just convincing enough to carry on.
Cunt brains, piloted by Stephi, mirrors the inch perfect reverse to bring our cylinders and etc down. We pull a gigantic piece of luggage out the van that Nanda claims, already semi-drysuited. He pull out only his mask. Ben Taylor claims the tiller, he was wearing those sort of skipper sunglasses you know? He and I bring the boats over to our first site, High point! It all went very well that morning.
I remember Taylor and Christina saying they saw every type of crab, alongside lobster, scallops, jewel anemone. It was a slightly snotty but enjoyable 6-8m viz. Enough to see scuba daddy’s twinset oooooohh. We do two waves of High point before pinging to North Cliffs across the Jack sound. This dive was very special. About six to eight catsharks, some breamy things, of course occasional Ballan Wrasse. The viz was even snottier, as the surface was closely guarded by hoards of Razorbill and Puffin.
In tandem, a few bimblers take a kelpy, bouldery look round Martin’s Haven. Jack’s £40 drysuit works, although his boot leaks a tad. We get back and pack up, getting back around 7pm to be greeted by a King size feast of BBQ courtesy of our two generous chefs Will and Luis, who have constructed their aprons and hats from a tablecloth. A stick full of Kofta help’s Alex’s briefing go down. He murmurs about the epic mega rave. THE EPIC MEGA RAVE?
Myself, Steph, Max, Christina, Luis and Will take to Milford Haven to unleash boogie bombs to educate and liberate the people of the southwest. Eventually the Kraken and cola mix starts to just taste like cola. The vibes flow, we throw middle fingers to the DJ and head to get a kebab. Myself, Max, Steph and Luis wind up singing Super Trooper and Will and Christina take an awfully long time on their trip to the car? We Taxi back and all dream of day two.
Sunday – Alex
On Sunday started the day by sorting out cylinder fills as we’d missed the cutoff the evening before. After all the cylinders were loaded back into the van, we headed back to Martin’s Haven to begin our day of diving. Arriving at the dive site, I was relieved to see that my knots had held and that they were still on the mooring we’d left them. After a long swim to get the boats, we loaded them and headed to our first dive site – Rye Rocks. This was our first dive site on Skomer Island itself, which involved venturing past the turbulent Jack Sound to make the crossing. Luckily, the weather was calm and the boats were playing nicely.
After dropping off the first wave of divers safely ashore, we collected a second wave to head out to do a dual-site dive with one boat dropping divers on Rye Rocks and the other dropping divers on The Lucy. Loaded with Nitrox, the divers on The Lucy ventured down to 35m to the completely intact shipwreck. After a whistle-stop tour of the wreck, the current had unfortunatley picked up a little, which made getting back to the shot quite a slog.
Unfortunately, the wind picked up in the afternoon and we decided to call off boat diving in the afternoon and anyone who wanted to took a chill shore dive out of Martin’s Haven while I put the boats to bed on their mooring.
Being a Sunday with most choices for dinner shut, we decided that this would be the best day for a Curry! After dropping off cylinders, we headed straight to Milford Curry House. Once refuelled, we headed to the campsite for a few beers before calling it a day.
Monday – Kai
Monday was the first day of the trip that seals were seen underwater, and as far as I’m concerned that’s the most important thing that could have happened.
Whilst swimming along at Rye Rocks, a seal was spotted out of the gloom. It gave a brief look over and then swam away. That alone would have been a treat, but 4 more seals decided to come over and say hello during the course of the dive. Primarily they would be seen in rocky covered sections and bobbing in and out of the kelp – where they often rest underwater.
That would have been a 10/10 day of diving just for that dive alone, but then on a second dive a large male was briefly seen swimming overhead in the shallows, just out left on a short boat trip from the beach.
You might be thinking “crikey how could the day get any better – don’t tell me you also had a BBQ the same night?”. And to that I’d say wow what a good guess – courtesy of Luis Nunes’ chef skills we all had a class dinner to finish off the day.
Tuesday – Dom
Tuesday started off with the usual visit to the fill station and a trip to Sains. Three waves of diving took place throughout the day. After Kai’s encounter with seals the previous day, everyone was eager to dive Rye Rocks in search of more. This meant splitting the boats between a few sports divers on the Lucy and everyone else on Rye Rocks, which were only a short distance apart. I drove for two waves and dove on one.
Though we only reached a max depth of 10m, Rye Rocks was one of my favourite dives of all time. After being dropped just off the rocks, we descended onto a kelp forest and swam around for a bit. Everyone was thrilled when a seal was spotted. It swam right up to us, nibbling on our fins and bumping its nose into us. We hovered just above the kelp, watching it play until our max dive time eventually brought it to an end.
That evening, after a Maccas dinner, we drove over to Stackpole Quay, a small harbour recommended by the divers who ran the fill station. We kitted up in the National Trust car park and walked down to the beach. The dive came with the promise of seeing 40 catsharks, and it definitely lived up to the hype. I don’t think there was a single moment when I didn’t have at least one in view – they were everywhere. We also came across lobsters and duelling crabs.
Wednesday – Alex
Having already decided that the wind would be too strong for boat diving on Thursday, this would be our last day of diving, so we decided to make a good go of it. To begin with, we ventured round the south side of Skomer to Deadeye Wreck. All that remains of this wreck is the skeleton of the hull and keel lying flat along the seabed nestled in a reef of purple flora. After this, due to popular demand, we revisited Rye Rocks, where more seals were spotted in the water. Finally, we spent the rest of the afternoon doing the boring job of recovering the boats before heading back to the campsite for dinner.
That evening, we once again headed out to Stackpole Quay for a night dive for everyone who didn’t get a night dive the day before. As yesterday, the catsharks and other wildlife did not disappoint. This time round, the divers decided to load their pockets with beer to cool down on their dive so they’d be perfect when they made it back ashore.
Thursday – Dom
In proper UBUC fashion, our final day was laid-back and relaxed. We woke at a more leisurely hour, packed up camp, and left the campsite around 1100. Alex was especially keen on brunch and found the perfect spot – a posh farm café nearby. We arrived just in time to sneak in under the breakfast cutoff, and the poor kitchen was suddenly hit with a dozen orders right before they started prepping for lunch. Still, they welcomed us warmly. Despite the chaos, it was well worth it – the food was brilliant. All that then remained to do was the trip back to Bristol.