Well I just managed to catch up on my mail, thought I'd post a few memories
of the CAIVNedFest.
Firstly, I have to thank Crusty for organising it all, he did a splendid
job asI'm sure all will agree, well played that man !!
Thanks also Bob for sending the T-Shirt , sorry I couldn't make the
Hotlanta gathering but we had already planned to be in Orlando. The T-Shirt
was very appropriate.
The whole trip was perfect.....except for that bugger of a geezer at
Hotlanta who nicked TA's bottle of SoCo 'cos it had been opened!
The only thing that could have made the trip better would have been for
some of the rest of the NedFesters such as Strike, Bob, Jeff, Lee, Chuck
etc. to have been there, never mind, we raised our glasses and toasted you
all, 'Absent friends...sod 'em!'. Still, we (me, Mrs Tart & her parents
John & Yvonne) did get a chance to meet Lee & Jayna again for a couple of
days which was great. Besides doing one or two wild rides (Kraken & The
Hulk) we mangaed to sink a beer or two (for those that have never met us,
this could possibly be a slight understatement) .
Then the outlaws went home & me and me Tart were on our way to Gnd Cayman :
-)
Alfred discovered us at ATL 'cos of the superb T-Shirts we were wearing,
then as we were boarding, John & Brooxie spied us - the NedFest was
starting.
After arriving at the port we dumped the gear on the tub & decided to get a
taxi & go & see if we could find the rest of the gang at the hotel some of
them had stayed at the previous night. We got there & they were sitting
outside the restaurant next door - DRINKING ! I wasn't prepared for this
but not wanting to be the odd one out I decided I really ought to imbibe of
just one or two.
After a beer or three we all made our way to the tub & started sorting our
gear out. The rest of the gang arrived, all the gear was sorted, we had
found the beer tap on the top deck, I had found that I didn't have my cert
card (what a plonker !), all ready to go........except we were missing one
person - BRAD!
Well Brad arrived a little later and proceeded to get his gear sorted, I
offered to get him a beer. Now we had all been given a plastic mug to drink
out of for the duration and all had our names on them, so I kindly put
Brad's name on his for him 'The late Brad Stambough', it was to transpire
that this was very fitting !!!!
The diving was simply fantastic for the whole week, I won't go into any
details / profiles etc. For me, the week was all about meeting a fantastic
crowd, a lot of which I had dived with before or met before, and some I had
never met before.
Some things that stick out in my mind:
Brad was late for eveything ! But was good fun & took it all very well
considering we constantly ribbed him about it the whole week.
On one dive quite a few (they know who they are) decided it was too much
like hard work to swim back to the boat so called for the RIB to come and
pick them up, personally I think they were just lost (I must confess I did
have doubts about where the boat was myself, but perseverence paid off).
The most important thing I learnt all week was how to change the beer
barrel !
The second most important thing I leant was that those horrible little
'blood worm' things that follow your torch on a night dive are the most
fascinating things to watch exploding as they get eaten by coral !!!
I tried Huw's Farce FIns out on one dive and recon they would be superb for
wreck penetration. It is absolutely true what they say, you do not feel any
resistance when finning, the main reason being that you don't go anywhere
!!! Not for me I'm afraid, I'd rather use a pair of old carpet slippers;
they also
happen to look better.
I finally received my Halcyon BackPlate/Wings/Harness set-up just before we
came away so this was my first trip with it - I absolutely love it (despite
the fact that one of the plastic cam clips cracked & eventually fell to
pieces when I disassembled it - Halcyon were very good about it and have
sent me two replacements). Using the SS BP I needed no weight, even when
wearing both my dive skin and 3mm shortie, no more playing around and
shifting my weight belt up around my chest to get good trim :-)
One one dive Kuty, Huw & I hired scooters - what a scream - definitely for
children aged 21 & over. It's unvelievable fun 'flying' around attacking
other divers whilst humming 'the flight of the Valkyries' through your reg.
All they needed was some kind of underwater paint-ball gun attachment !
They go pretty fast as well (while the battery is fully charged - mine ran
down fairly quickly), so fast I had to hold onto my official BS-AC Tropical
Diving Bonnet!
I asked Mrs Tart what her lasting memory of the week was, she said it was
definitely John Nitrox coming up the stairs to the top deck one evening in
his pyjamas looking for Brooxie !!
One thing that was obvious in hindsight, was that there were no screw-ups
all week, without doubt a reflection on the level of expertise of all
present.
A great time, sadly over, but the memories will linger forever - long live
the NEDs !!!
So, where to next ? There was talk about Layang Layang on the boat, or
anywhere in 'that neck of the woods'. I'm up for anything really (even
though I'm broke, we are just about to move to a UK£575k house & haven't
sold the old one yet, I am about to buy another car for UK£15k, the beer in
my local has just gone up.I'm so depressed I need another holiday - anyone
fancy El Gouna in Sept / Oct ?
p.s. Which lady was diving with a TAG watch & showed it to my wife ???? She
only bloody well wants one now doesn't she!!!!
Andy Johnson
Senior Product Support Specialist
UK HSC DASD
Basingstoke AL1C
Tel: 01256 34 1490 (Hunting Group)
Tel: 01256 34 1264 (Direct)
Mobile:07703 59 8282 Mobex:277 321
e-mail [log in to unmask]
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