Care in the Community Visits the Cove
By Mark Davies on 20 November 2005
As a dedicated UK sea diver I wouldn’t normally consider a trip to an inland dive site really merited any kind of exposure. However, now that Tim has moved to Leicestershire he’s miles from the sea and on the doorstep of Stoney Cove, so this last few months we’ve found ourselves there more often than we have done in the past 5 years! Our visit there this weekend was so typical of the British winter diving experience I thought I’d write a few words to give those visiting our shores a bit of a flavour.
Splash-in
There actually was a reason for going in the first place (I think you really must have a reason to visit these places!). Diver magazine was hosting a splash-in photo competition. Of course, Tim’s camera (which you may remember let him down in Egypt) was still away getting repaired, so the photo end of it was up to me. But it was still worth going to hook up with some other diving photographers that we knew from Tim’s own website and who would also be there for the competition.
The rules for the competition are simple. You show up and register, prove you’ve got no photos in your camera and then off you go for the day and take as many shots as you like. The winner is the person judged to have taken the best shot on the day.
The cold, early start
Typical of these trips there was an early start – well, for me at least. While Stoney Cove is on Tim’s doorstep it’s two hours away for me! So at 6.30 am (yes, it does happen twice in a day!) I was in my car and off. It was freezing! As a precaution I packed two hoods and two pairs of gloves, just in case the first set froze solid between dives. I joke not – I’ve had it happen.
I do love cold and crisp mornings. The drive was a delight. I watched the sun rising through the mist and into a clear sky over the rolling and frosted hills of Staffordshire. The view along the M6 has never looked so beautiful. But as I headed further south the external temperature sensor on the car was steadily falling. As I turned off the M6 and onto the A5 I plunged into fog and the temperature dropped sharply to -4c! We must be mad!
I got to the queue at the entrance (yes, people actually queue up to dive in a freezing cold lake in the depths of winter!) for 8.30 and with perfect timing Tim pulled up just behind me. I paid the entrance fee (oh yes, they even pay for the privilege!) and we were directed to the top car park – a huge great hike with kit away from the lake. We parked up and decided to take a walk down to the lake (just to check it was still there!) and get some breakfast.
The Dive School Conveyor
There was fog clinging to the surface of the water and the sub-zero air temperature just sucked the heat out of you, yet the place was packed. Most were not there for the photo competition; this was the machine of diving instruction in action. As usual dozens of clubs and dive schools had brought their students down for their open water dives. For many this freezing cold day would be their first experience of diving. We winced as we saw some in semi-dry wetsuits. We did not envy them at all! I wouldn’t be surprised if those individuals chose to make this experience their last! But that said, I also did my first open water dives in a semi-dry at Stoney Cove one October. I remember it being cold, but it couldn’t have been as bad as this. I’m still diving, after all!
We got a coffee and bacon butties and bumped into a few people we knew for a quick chat and a catch-up. It often seems like half the UK’s diving community descends on this place at the weekend, so it’s rare to make a visit without seeing someone I know. But we couldn’t put it off any longer so made our way back up to the cars to get changed. Brrrr!
Tell me again. Why are we doing this?
So, in the freezing cold we got kitted up. In his usual fashion Tim had forgotten to bring his cloves. Just as well I’d brought a spare pair, then! We’d arrived relatively late (people are usually queuing before 6.00am for a parking space next to the water) so we were quite literally as far away from the lake as it was possible to get and still be on the site. It wasn’t so bad for me but Tim had decided to bring his twinset for a bit of refamiliarisation – he’d not dived with it for some time. He didn’t enjoy the walk!
Now this is where the facilities at Stoney let you down. I’ve never understood why they don’t get a little golf cart with a trailer doing shuttle runs to and from the top car parks and the lake, carrying your kit for you. It would make life so much easier for everyone and getting there early for a good parking space would be less critical so their customers wouldn’t have to get up a stupid o’clock. Take note Stoney management if you are reading – get a golf cart!
But, in the absence of any mechanical assistance we made the long trudge down. At least Tim could do two dives with his tanks – I’d have to make the walk again to get my second tank for a second dive. That is, unless I just breathed half as much air on the first dive then I could use the same tank again! Seemed like a good plan.
So we made our way to the jetty along with the rest of the Care In The Community program! This many mad idiots willing to dive on such a day could only be as a result of emptying out the nations psychiatric institutions! We braced ourselves and jumped in.
Of course, with air temperatures at -4c it was actually warmer in the water than out of it!
You don’t see one for hours, then suddenly . . .
Other than taking photographs we had a mission. The lake is filled with all kinds of junk to keep your attention. Most famously there is the Stanegarth which, when it was sunk, was the largest vessel to be scuttled as an attraction at an inland dive centre. There are others, amongst which was rumoured to be a bus. I say rumoured because the last time we had been here we had been completely unable to find it. A bus! How can you miss it? Well, viz had been poor, but my navigation is pretty good and we’d found absolutely everything else we’d aimed for, so I thought someone must have moved it. We were not going to miss it again.
We’d been told that the best way to find it was from the Stanegarth. This is what we’d done last time and it hadn’t done us much good then! But visibility was better so we were hopeful. We dropped down and hit the Stanegarth with no trouble at all. I had a quick look inside and then we headed off in the direction where the bus was supposed to be.
Within just a few moments we ran straight into it. How we had managed to miss it before I will never know. We must have passed within feet of it and not seen it!
Bas%@rd Fish!
We left the bus and headed up what had been the old access ramp for the quarry before it had been flooded. We were aiming for shallower depths and better light. Without a strobe flash for my camera I was never going to get any decent shots at depth.
At the top of the ramp there is an aircraft cockpit with a shoal of perch and tench milling about. I dumped air from my suit and settled on the bottom trying to get that perfect shot – but the sods just won’t stay still! Added to that a bunch of students turned up and started kicking the hell out of me! Can’t really complain – we all had to learn sometime and this is really their environment after all. But it didn’t help in my photographic efforts. I gave up.
We headed for the surface. My plan of breathing half as much had worked! We’d done 40 minutes but I still had 115 bar left in my 15 tank. Our second dive was to be in no more than 5m looking for that perfect photo, and that amount of air would be ample for that. I’d saved myself that second walk up the hill!
Cold here, innit?
We got out and immediately we were hit by the icy air. The fog was still clinging to the surface of the water and those poor sods in the semi-drys were looking very uncomfortable. We just dropped our tanks and stayed by the water. A short surface interval would do us so we kept our gloves on and waited out half an hour.
We were amazed to hear the characteristic accents from a group of about half a dozen South African divers. Why on earth would they come from such a paradise to dive here? Beats me! Hope they enjoyed it.
We soon kitted up again and returned to the water. As planned we stayed in about 5m of water, concentrating on the area under the pub where there is an artificial submarine, a block house and plenty of those elusive fish. I got Tim to pose in some beautiful rays of light streaming into the blockhouse but didn’t quite manage the shot that I was after. The pictures I got around the submarine were a bit dull. But then I came across two battling crayfish in a crack. It was awkward getting in position for a decent shot but I managed a couple. With my air running low we surfaced after 30 minutes or so.
Battling the north face
We then had the long trudge back to the cars (where are those golf carts when you need them). It wasn’t fun but we got there in the end. Packing the kit away I took a look at my photographic efforts and decided there wasn’t anything worth entering into the competition. I’m still learning, after all. We made our way back to the pub for something to eat and a chat with the other camera nuts. Their efforts had been much better than mine – but then they’ve been at it longer.
After some lunch we headed off to a nearby pub to watch the rugby before heading home. Returning up the M6 I had the pleasure of seeing the most beautiful purple sunset over those same Staffordshire hills.
It may have just been a dive in a muddy puddle but I’d had the chance to catch up with some friends, had learned a bit more about using my camera and generally had an enjoyable day. I’m still very much a sea diver and will still need an excuse to go to an inland site but perhaps all those people who do get up a stupid o’clock to queue up to pay to dive in a freezing cold lake are not quite as insane as I once thought. I should hope not – I seem to be becoming one of them!
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Author: Mark Davies
Email: info@travel-dive.com
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