Galicia

With fine weather forecast and neap tides, the plan was for the first wave to dive the Bretagne. However (!) there was a southeasterly breeze and a moderate easterly swell that made the going fairly heavy. With 4 miles to go to the Bretagne it was decided that the conditions were against it. Further out it would have been rough, it might have been difficult to retrieve the divers, not to mention uncomfortable for the boathandler.

Clint took over from Anne who'd boathandled thus far and we headed across to the Galicia. Seaquest was on the wreck and in the process of picking up divers. Paul L and Kevin kitted up, then Geoff and myself. Clint and Anne were to dive when we'd come out.

Geoff (leading) and I pulled ourselves down the shot and though the murk to the bottom. Visibility was terrible, but off we went. Before doing so I switched to and back again from the pony Debbie (bottle) and Paul L (reg/gauge) lent me; and got the torch out. The pony mounted on my tank was fine, it didn't seem to affect my position or feel odd in the water; and during the dive I easily switched back and forth a few times for practise.

It was a really nice swim, taking in lots of bits of the wreck that I hadn't seen before, including the windlass (very big), mast pieces, tubing/shaft of some kind, hatches with triangular ends to the combing, big coils of 1" wire, bales of wire(?), more cylinders of concrete.

Bib, pollack, wrasse, a nice tompot blenny. Edible crab, velvet fiddler crab, white and orange centred anenomes, pink sea fans (had a close look to see the feeding parts).

Not having dived for three weeks perhaps, we made the most of it - 57 minutes. I took more pictures than I might have, and had a good poke about. I savoured this dive!

Eventually down to 100 bar we found a spot to send up the blob. At the surface (I don't know what I expected) the Sun was out, which was nice, but ahead I could see blue waves rolling toward me in and wondered if I'd be able to see the boat. I turned about a bit more and it was right there. Alongside, and starting to de-kit I realised something was slightly amiss. Kevin was seasick (properly) and only Clint was completely unaffected by the motion of the boat for the last hour.

Unfortunately it was too rough for more diving, and the trainees hoping for their first sea-dive were unlucky today.