On Saturday we held the second event for the Surf Coast Cup, the shore dive. Long range forecasts showed there would be a dip in the swell on the weekend with some nice northerlies preceding it which would make for a great days diving. Looking along the surf and shipwreck coasts it looked like we could get in at some other locations that we don’t dive that often and so we put the call out early with the hope of going out west.
During the week we kept scrutinising the updated reports and the westerly winds predicted on the Saturday is what ended up in us deciding to stay closer to home then to risk several hours driving for a potentially undivable comp. So good ‘ol Aireys was it.
Arriving Early the ocean was looking nice and flat but with the low light and overcast clouds it was hard to tell what the viz was going to be like. Once everyone had arrived we all suited up and commenced with the safety equipment check and dive debrief. With the swell predicted to pick up during the day and some 20kt westerly to WSW winds we called it a shorter comp starting at 8:30 and finishing at 1. We had a mixture of people, some competing in the comp and a few just there for the social dive, some veteran divers to beginners.
Most divers decided to walk around the cliffs to the east and try for the reefs in deeper waters. This is when we realised the viz wasn’t going to be great. Whilst Gerard persisted to find some cleaner water further out, most of us headed back towards shore to hunt the gutters in the shallows.
I took Ivan under my wing for the day and warned him that I wouldn’t be diving for long having had very little sleep the night before and forgetting my socks and gloves, I also thought I would be nice and get out early to get the BBQ fired up so the others had hot food waiting for them. So needless to say I was surprised when I made it back to the carpark to find everyone else already out and changed waiting for us and making it there to sign off with just 3 minutes to spare!
We all shared our diving stories for the day while checking out each others catch while the BBQ was cooking and eating it at the same time before commencing the weigh in. Despite the challenging conditions it was good to see that most people had their 5 fish to weigh in and whilst there were plenty of options to upgrade during the day there wasn’t any overkill. But seeing the scoresheet at the end of the weigh in my competitive nature finally kicked in and I regretted not getting a couple upgrades!
Scores for the day were:
Malcolm 100 points
Nam 78 points
Gerard 71 points
Hayden 70 points
Julian 56 points
