Christine Grosart 26/11/2023 Christine Grosart 26/11/2023

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!

Well…that’s what we used to say way back when I worked in horse racing!

But this time, I’m super happy that my image of a diver cutting away a Ghost net in Scapa Flow won an award.

Diver in Scapa Flow. Image: Christine Grosart

I headed down to Brixham with Paul Duckworth to promote Ghost Fishing UK and run a stand at the Brixham Marine Conservation day. We met some great people and I gave a talk on the project which went down really well. I was over the moon that my image of Colin Stratton and the Ghost net won the Underwater Conservation Photograph contest.

I came away with a Manfrotto camera bag and no less than four DSLR photography books.

Christine Grosart 08/11/2023 Christine Grosart 08/11/2023

Autumn Atlantis

Autumn saw my final trip of 2019 on the Atlantis. The divers were working a little shallower and I had a reasonably quiet trip. We were treated to some stunning sunsets and the views from my cabin were pretty cool too.

View from my cabin in the south north sea.

I was very happy to be invited to talk at the Birmingham dive show yet again. I'm lucky to have such a wide range of topics to talk on.

Last year I talked about my cave diving exploration project but this year I was able to talk on Ghost Fishing.

This was doubly exciting as Ghost Fishing UK had a stand at the dive show for the first time and it was definitely the best thing we had ever done in terms of outreach.

We raised a huge amount of cash for the charity and all the volunteers on the stand, working for free all weekend, were flat out from the second the doors opened.

My talks on the Diver stage were packed, especially Sunday which was several layers deep in standing room only.

There is clearly an appetite for divers to help the aquatic environment and we are very happy to provide them with a pathway to making a real difference.

Christine Grosart 08/11/2023 Christine Grosart 08/11/2023

Perdreau set-up day

I decided that embarking on Garrel today would be a silly move. Still with remains of a chest infection, the caving trip, though moderate, is quite long and I am still quite weak, so we decided that the Perdreau-Fourmi was a more pleasant option.

True to form, Jean Tarrit rallied a few friends from his club and they arrived to help us carry our gear in two journeys up the riverbed.

I headed through the entrance squeeze and into the cave to start rigging the 45 degree slope and 15m pitch to the sump pool.

I decided to bring walkie talkies this time and was quite surprised that I was able to communicate from the sump pool to the surface!

Job done in a few hours, I headed over to the Source de Bueges, which sadly cannot be dived. Some pretty dragon flies were in residence.

We had some nice cold pressions at the local watering hole in St Jean-de-Bueges and headed back to the campsite to sort out cameras and have dinner.

Gear stash at the bottom of the pitch in Perdreau Fourmi.

Christine Grosart 08/11/2023 Christine Grosart 08/11/2023

Into the Blue

New cave passage in the Event de Perdreau Fourmi, discovered 2012, Screen grab: Christine grosart

Today was an excellent day - but not without a few teething troubles to get around first.

I picked up a missed call from one of my work colleagues, who was asking where I was. France, was the reply. It seems the great shift screw up had raised its ugly head again, but I doubt I have much to worry about as I am certain I booked this leave. In fact, I booked it in January. So, I tried to forget about it and concentrate on the cave diving.

We headed up to the cave and Jean had brought more friends along to help us. They were practising their SRT in the cave which seemed as good a reason as any to come along.

Jean and Claudie helping in the dry cave

Rich and I dropped the pitch and started to get our gear together. Next problem, Rich finds the team spare mask has shattered into hundreds of tiny pieces. It had been in a pocket on one of the harnesses and not protected by a French Pot and had somehow got broken. Never mind. We can live without it and we have another anyway.

The sump is blue and inviting. I get the camera ready and Jean and friends watch us set off into sump 1, before heading out to the sunshine to await our arrival. We tell them we will be 2 hours at most.

Surfacing in the airbell shortly after passing sump 1, Rich and I can't really get our act together and we soon notice a little panting going on. Carbon dioxide. Great.

Chris at the top of the ladder beyond sump 1

We take things slowly and rig the ladder, before hauling the 12 litre bottles up and getting everything into sump 2.

Kitting up in sump 2 was fairly easy this time around and I get ready with the camera. We have a plan to shoot some video of the sump, especially our discoveries from 2011 and 2012. We don't hope for much as it is a small, fiddly sump covered in powder-like silt. But we gave it a go.

We get shooting and with plenty of time and gas, get to photograph and film everything we want to.

Then, we had one last job to do.

There was one bit of a chamber left to explore. I had always had a feeling there was more to it than just a boulder pile. So, I dispatch Rich off to take a quick look and a minute later he returned to say it was "Going".

Woo hoo!

Line reel tied in and I sieze the (rare!) opportunity to film exploration in progress.

Rich swam along with his reel and made some nice tie offs and the cave started to head downslope in a fractured, friable passage. It was sculptured and pretty and the water ahead was azure blue.

Behind Rich it was patchy, rust red and bits and pieces rained down from the roof as the first bubbles ever disturbed the rock.

As the visibility went to zero, I paused at 24m and heard Rich scratching around. I figured he wouldn't be long and steadily, hand over hand on the line, fumbled my way back to the tie off with Rich just behind me.

Happy, we thumbed the dive and had a pleasant swim home in patchy visibility. I stopped to photograph a worm, the type I had not seen before in a sump.

Surfacing back at the airbell, we de-kitted, pleased with the days work.

Not surprisingly, after a recent chest infection and a cold, I had some trouble descending back into sump 2 to get home. Fortunately my bottle of trusty Otravine got me to depth but wasn't keen on getting my sinuses back up again.

It's a divers worst nightmare (well, one of them anyway) and despite hanging around on the way up trying to get my sinuses to let go, it was obvious I was going to get a reverse block.

I did and it hurt a lot, making my eyes water and temporarily blind. Rich took my bottles off and I eventually heard the relieving squeak, followed by some blood and the pain subsided. Not pleasant.

Jean was at the top of the pitch waiting for us as we surfaced. He was worried as we were half an hour overdue. This was probably due to our taking our time in the CO2 ridden airbell. We apologised for worrying him but he didn't mind and we showed him our photos to cheer him up.

Chris holds the empty line reel in sump 2, Perdreau Fourmi

A gang of cavers had showed up to help carry all the gear back in one run, including a very small child who was lugging 2 tackle bags and going better up the hill than I was!

A cold beer in St Jean de Bueges followed by pizza in Laroque seemed a fitting end to a very pleasant day, all things considered. Finally things are going our way.

Christine Grosart 08/11/2023 Christine Grosart 08/11/2023

Sunny Swanage

Tompot Blennie under Swanage Pier. Image: Christine Grosart

I woke early, still thrilled about the night dive the evening before.

The sea at Swanage was sparkling and there was loads of space to park up on the pier. People kept their social distance and I was able to kit up in peace, checking my camera over and over and hoping for a good hour or so to learn more about photographing critters.

I wasn’t disappointed!

Images: Christine Grosart. Canon EOS 100D, Ikelite housing and DS160/161 strobes, Macro lens.

At barely 2 metres depth it was like being in an aquarium!

Swanage pier was my first proper scuba dive in the ocean 18 years ago and now I was back, taking photos I could only ever have dreamed of.

Tompot blennies posed for photos, a corkwing wrasse obliged as well and was very friendly.

Tompot Blennie. Image: Christine Grosart

I’d forgotten just how enjoyable it is to throw on a single cylinder and jump into the sea right from the shore. Of course, you have to get lucky with the weather and the visibility but this time both were in my favour.

After 90 minutes it was time to get out and check out the images.

I’m learning to love my Citreon Spacetourer which affords me privacy to get changed and somewhere cosy to sit and look through my images and write my blog - just as I am now!

Cuttelfish: Image Copyright Christine Grosart

Christine Grosart 06/11/2023 Christine Grosart 06/11/2023

Macro with Mustard

2020 has been rubbish for everyone. Well, to be clear, everything from terror, bereavement to annoyance and fury and my favourite one, disappointment.

This year I lost one of my closest friends when she took her own life. She was one of the strongest, toughest women I knew. So there but for the grace of god go any of us.

I was joining in with a British Society of Underwater Photographers (BSOUP) online meeting where we oggle the winners of the latest monthly competition.

That is where I heard about an underwater photography workshop being run in the UK by Alex Mustard.

Alex has a long standing reputation for being one of the best underwater photographers in the world and for once, I was not only available on the dates but had the cash (just about!)

I ummed and ahhed about it, thinking that I was nowhere near ready to be attempting a course for seasoned photographers to hone their skills.

I was barely starting out and really had no clue what I was doing. Rich pointed out that I'd had a pretty underwhelming year and this was my chance to do something fun, for myself.

So, I contacted the agent at Scubatravel who were absolutely superb, especially with the ever present threat of 'cancellation due to covid)' and I signed up.

The cool thing about this photography workshop is that it really was remote.

8 hours after I had set off from the Dales following some caving and diving, I was still driving in the dark, howling wind and sideways rain along a single track road with thankfully plentiful passing places and DEER!!!

I slammed on the brakes and screeched to a halt.

There, in my headlights, staring right at me was a big, beautiful stag.

Nobody else was about and through the driving rain I could see him, staring right at me. He stood for a while until nonchalantly wandering off into the undergrowth and the dark.

Thereby followed a hairy drive in the dark and weather, dodging deer a plenty.

Obviously, I had all the wrong lenses for photographing Scottish wildlife above water!

It seemed to take forever to get to Kinlochbervie and then 10 minutes of complete darkness later, the bungalow where we were staying for the week.

We exchanged greetings in a covid fashion and fed ourselves, before Alex set out a plan for the week. We met Chris and Cathy from Kinlochbervie Dive Centre (formerly Northeast Dive) who were our hosts for the week. Cathy is no shabby photographer either! They looked after us well and we were never short of gas, hot drinks and biscuits.

The weather was not going to be favourable and the chances of getting outside the loch to photograph wide angle vistas, slim. But I was on such a steep learning curve I was secretly pleased to just be able to work on my macro.

Sealoch anemone, Kinlochbervie. Image: Christine Grosart

I'm no marine biologist and have a LOT to learn about marine critters. This is kind of cool for me because I get a lot pf enjoyment out of learning about their behaviour, making friends with them underwater and slowing down to a halt to watch their little worlds unfold.

I watched for ages as a hermit crab tried to climb a vertical 'wall' of encrusting pink algae...only to fall off as he approached the top and had to start all over again. He looked miffed.

I watched another hermit crab trying out a new shell for size and a very angsty pair of squat lobsters joining up to defend themselves against me while I tried to get a decent shot.

Then I spent a while photographing two queen scallops when the long arm of a large starfish came into view. My shot was being photobombed by a starfish! I knew as soon as the arm touched the queenie they would be off and, sure enough, the starfish prodded the scallops and they were gone, stropping off into the silt.

Alex has quite a hands off approach to workshops and you learn things without even realising it!

He ran a lecture most nights, expanding our horizons with ideas many of us hadn't thought of. I was in good company with well established and award winning photographers such as Kirsty Andrews, so we were able to learn from each other too.

Details such as giving as much consideration to your background as your subject, really improved my images. The workshop gave us 'permission' to try things out, make mistakes, get better and the real value was that everybody on the boat was aiming for the same thing and we all had the same agenda.

Thinking about the background. Image: Christine Grosart

In the evenings we'd have a talk from Alex and a show and tell of some of our best images of the day.

The logistics meant we could do two dives of at least an hour each day with a decent surface interval back at Kinlochbervie, whilst being back at the bungalow nice and early evening to have the time to go through our images and fettle them.

This was probably the biggest benefit of the workshops. Mostly on diving trips, I can be up until 1am still sorting images from the day, especially on Ghost Fishing missions where the media needs to be out and with the press the next day or even the same day.

My set up is relatively cheap and all but the camera is second hand. I use a cheap, small and lightweight Canon 100D which is use mainly for cave photography.

It is limited with things like ISO but I enjoy wringing out the camera's capabilities which still exceed my own.

I bought the housing from a forum for a steal and then spent the same again on strobes, arms, clamps and lenses.

For this trip I used a Canon EFS 60mm f/2.8Macro USM lens. I have a Tokina fisheye but as we were unable to leave the sea loch to to weather, never got to use it on this course.

It didn't matter though as I had a tonne of fun with all sorts of creatures, getting closer...then closer still and looking for that all important background.

My photography definitely progressed in only four days and I am so grateful for the opportunity to learn with a true master of underwater photography. I am enjoying so much and cannot wait to get back into the water to get snapping again.

King scallops. Images: Christine Grosart

Hermit crab, dressed for Vegas…Image: Christine Grosart

Dahlia anemone. Image: Christine Grosart

Squat lobsters. Images: Christine Grosart

Sea Loch Anemone. Image: Christine Grosart

Christine Grosart 06/11/2023 Christine Grosart 06/11/2023

Not bad for a sh*thole!

Ever since my early twenties I’ve had a ‘target list’ for the year. I’ve never let a year pass me by without aiming to achieve several very cool things.

One such mission has been on my ‘target list’ for over 15 years, rolling over to the next year each time.

Keld Head is an iconic cave dive, which yielded the longest cave diving traverse in the world in 1979, conducted by Geoff Yeadon and Oliver 'Bear' Statham - a notorious duo who were also responsible for discovering several of my favourite cave diving haunts, such as Wookey Hole chamber 24 and Boreham Cave.

Geoff Crossley and Christine at Keld Head

Owing to a myriad of excuses - and I admit to have almost given up on the weather - I had never dived there. Yorkshire is a long way from my home, access to Keld had been difficult and it needed to stop raining for weeks on end. I simply found other things to do, but it never went away.

The world record traverse was eventually superseded by a dive in Florida, USA between Sullivan to Cheryl Sink, which forms part of the Wakulla Springs system.

The two systems are polar opposites in terms of atmosphere, geology and the style needed to tackle them.

I've been fortunate enough to stick my beak into both caves now. I adored Keld Head and it felt homely and familiar.

Wakulla scared the living daylights out of me - it's just a big, black hurricane and I was more than happy to mooch about in the head pool photographing manatees than go much of a distance in.

Horses for courses I guess. Olivier Isler, a record breaking cave diver himself, once said of UK caves:

"I know in England the caves are very small, the water is very cold, and you cannot see anything. Those are very difficult & dangerous conditions.”

To achieve a world record in a British cave is not to be sniffed at.

'The Underground Eiger' documenting the worlds longest cave diving traverse in 1979.

Access to Keld was fraught for many years, including those when I began cave diving and I never thought that things would change during my cave diving lifetime.

They did, a little, and members of the Cave Diving Group began to have tentative access again.

Chris, Martin and Geoff Crossley kit up while Geoff Yeadon watches on.

But that wasn’t the only problem. For most caves in the peat-ridden Yorkshire Dales to be diveable, it needs to stop raining. That’s a hoot in itself, but it doesn’t stop there.

It needs to stop raining for at least 3 weeks. Cave explorer Geoff Yeadon, responsible for both the discoveries and the record breaking first traverses from Kingsdale Master Cave and King Pot through to Keld Head, told me dryly that it was more like 3 months bone dry weather before conditions were tip top.

Given the warmer, wetter weather us humans have caused by global warming, my generation can probably shelve ‘tip top conditions’ for a while.

The longest dive, following Geoff Yeadon and Geoff Crossley as they connected King Pot to Keld Head.

Given the fast changing nature of pretty much everything thanks to Covid-19, I decided to pack my life into my Spacetourer and drive to Scotland to work on the DSV Boka Atlantis. I also threw in my sidemount cave diving kit…just in case!

It would be a shame to drive home past Yorkshire just as Keld Head was in condition - sans diving gear!

I disembarked the vessel and stopped off at my friend and fellow dive medic Danny’s house.

We jumped into St Abbs for a cheeky shore dive before it occurred to me to drop a message to Geoff Crossley, asking if on the off chance, Keld was diveable.

It was - and furthermore, he adjusted his weekend and his family at super short notice to accommodate me and join me in the cave. I’m so lucky to have just the best friends!

Geoff Crossley joined Geoff Yeadon in 1991 to complete the first traverse of King Pot to Keld Head.

As I drove the few hours down to the Dales, I was super excited to learn that Geoff Yeadon himself, now president of the CDG, was going to come along as well to supervise!

We were also joined by Martin Holroyd and after kitting up in the most idyllic setting, the perfect resurgence in the yawning, remote Kingsdale valley, we set off.

The water was typical for Yorkshire, with a yellow tinge from the peat staining. I followed Geoff who navigated the slightly complex entrance series and then headed off up some larger passages, straight into the hillside.

On some occasions I could only see one wall and not the other and before long, I couldn’t see the roof either. It was certainly spacious although the visibility prevented a good view of the whole passage.

After about 35 minutes of swimming, in 7 degrees water temperature, despite not being close to thirds my bladder pressure forced a return. In my haste to pack the car, I had forgotten my She-P. It was time to go home.

We had got about 750 metres back into the cave which is a decent day out for a British cave dive, when we turned for home.

I took a Paralenz on a tray with very bright video lights with me and managed to capture some nice footage of my first trip into Keld.

In my typical style, I’d stashed a mini bottle of prosecco in the head pool for afterwards.

Despite some covid restrictions being lifted, finding a pub that would feed us all was problematic. I was tipped off that my CDG trainee Mark Burkey was in town with his wife Jess, so after some creative phone calls we managed to find a pub that would feed us outside.

Settling down to a beer and fish and chips, surrounded by some of the best people on the planet, I began to realise just how lucky I was and after some of the darkest days of covid, began to see light again.

I pulled out the video footage of our dive for everyone to look at. Describing the dive to Mark, I commented: “And then we got to this junction where Geoff led me up some sh*thole…….”

The table fell silent.

“Some sh*thole?!!” Crossley said, outraged; “That was the main passage!!”

The table fell about laughing and muttered in there somewhere were comments of desperation from the original explorers about not being able to please some people!

Definitely something I will never live down!

Geoff Yeadon, Christine Grosart, Geoff Crossley

Christine Grosart 06/11/2023 Christine Grosart 06/11/2023

National Caving Conference & Thai Cave Rescue

While we were safely out of mobile phone signal with no internet in Fuzine, Croatia, a situation was unfolding in Thailand that was unparalleled in history. In June, a young male soccer team and their coach had ventured into a cave called Tham Luang in Thailand. It was a common thing to do. The boys left their push bikes by the entrance and headed off inside the cave for an adventure.

Then it rained. It rained a lot and the rain was early.

The water levels in the cave rose and the boys found themselves trapped by rapidly rising flood water and had to retreat even further into the cave to find higher ground.

There, they waited. The eyes of the world was on Tham Luang while the authorities tried to work out what to do.

I wasn’t surprised to hear that key members of the Cave Diving Group, some of whom had experience of underwater evacuations, had been called in.

The rest of the story is well known, so I won’t need to repeat it here.

It was great to see the guys back among their peers at Hidden Earth, the national caving conference and they had a very long, standing ovation from the main theatre which was overflowing.

Thai cave rescue divers from the Cave Diving Group at Hidden Earth 2018

With some help from some friends, we ran a try dive session in the pool and also won the ‘Best stand’ award of the conference for the Cave Diving Group.

Several months later I was quite surprised to receive an invitation to Westminster for one of many events celebrating the successful rescue of the 12 boys and their coach.

Confused, as despite being the CDG foreign officer, I’d been out of phone contact at the time and can safely say I’d had absolutely nothing to do with the whole affair – I replied thank you but I think the email has been sent to me in error.

I received a reply that the invitation was intended for the ‘great and good’ of the Cave Diving Group and was our opportunity to honour the guys that had rescued the children. An event for their peers, if you like.

It sounded like it would be a nice event and not something that happens every day.

I jumped on a train to London and we had all been put up in a swanky hotel before taking over the whole of Prezzos for a cracking evening and a great opportunity to catch up with friends, some of us who hadn’t seen each other for years.

The poor couple in the corner trying to have a romantic dinner for two must have wondered what was going on and how they ended up in the middle of this riff raff. I often wonder if they ever worked out who the guys were that stood together to have their photos taken.

The next day we had an invitation to drink the speakers chamber dry and eat all their food. Mr Speaker, Rt. Hon. John Bercow gave a good speech and we were given a tour of the houses of parliament before making our ways home.

Several months later, I was contacted by a member of Coventry BSAC who asked for Rick Stanton’s details as they wanted to make him an honorary member.

Rick had been unofficially “borrowing” their pool for years and now it looked like he was set up for life!

Rick graciously accepted and went to the dive club’s AGM dinner.

At one point in the evening, the compere asked what was the most unusual thing anyone had ever found underwater.

Rick put his hand up immediately and said “12 boys and a football coach!”

Emme Heron, Rick Stanton, Christine Grosart, Clive Westlake, Jim Lister.

Christine Grosart 06/11/2023 Christine Grosart 06/11/2023

Beautiful Babbacombe

Shameful, I know...but I had never dived Babbacombe!

Either the wind was going the wrong way, the visibility too poor, too much rain, waves breaking over the wall into the car park, too many people...

The list of excuses is endless.

But finally. I had some time at home, in the UK and in SUMMER!

This never happens AND the divers from the Facebook group South Coast Divers had been putting up some cracking images of critters down at 'Babbers' as it's fondly known.

I was fortunate to be welcomed by three people I had never met before nor dived with but we all had something in common - squidge!

Squidge is a diver's slang for marine animals. As opposed to spidge, which is wreckage.

Someone once pointed out that with regard to UK wreck diving, you can get the same effect walking around your local scrapyard at night, in the fog with a rubbish torch, in the rain!

There have seldom been times when I could argue with that. Triple expansion engines don't interest me and why is everyone so obsessed about boilers?

No, despite trying to fit in with the crowd, I'm afraid I have to admit to being a 'squidge' person.

This was evident when I spent an entire dive in Scapa Flow photographing starfish on the seabed and making scallops swim - they are so funny!

That evening in the pub, someone asked me where I had dived. "Markgraf" I replied.

"Oh" he said "See any nice scallops?"

I digress.

Jewel anemones and nudibranchs. Images: Christine Grosart

Anyway, off I went down to Babbers and needed to find somewhere to doss overnight. Covid makes things tricky but I did find a prime spot where overnight parking is allowed and the morning view is to die for.

I woke to the most glorious sunrise and the waves gently lapping only yards form Agnetha.

I made myself a strong coffee and had light chit chat with passing dog walkers.

It was time to pack up and head round to Babbers to meet Tamsyn, who had volunteered to show me around. Lisa and Richard Frew from Dive South had also come along for their first time at Babbers.

I'd had some fun building a single cylinder set up as I rarely dive anything other than my twins, sidemounts or CCR. But as we were only going to about 6 metres all that seemed rather overkill.

The super-hard-to-spot Snakelock anemone shrimp. Image: Christine Grosart

The sea was sparkling, the coffee shack was open and although it was busy with families and anglers, the atmosphere was friendly and folk kept their respectful distances. For just a couple of hours, we could drop beneath the waves and leave covid behind.

After an excellent location brief by Tamsyn, we walked to the end of the jetty and were accosted by a grey seal who was obviously hanging around the anglers hoping for some fish.

He'd got too brave for his own good and was sporting a hook in his mouth. He was close enough as we put our fins on that we could smell his fishy breath.

We got in and he soon vanished.

The visibility was about 8 metres and it was great to be diving with likeminded people. I was on a mission to take some nice macro shots and so were they. I was also keen to do some Seasearch recording. I love the way that just a simple, shallow dive can contribute to citizen science and even go some way towards creating MCZs.

Pregnant variable Blenny. Image: Christine Grosart

The snotty water and kelp soon gave way to a shallow reef and this was teeming with life. The usual Tompot blennies made an appearance but apparently I photographed one special little critter without even realising it!

The Variable Blenny has apparently been absent from our waters for several years. At least, there had been no positive ID of one since around 2007.

The South Coast Divers group, many of whom were keen Seasearchers, had been doing plentiful shore diving during these covid times and Variable Blennies were seemingly back in town.

And they rather liked Babbacombe!

For those not in the know, Seasearch changed my life. Well, that may seem an exaggeration but for a cave diver who gets easily bored in the sea and disappointed on almost every dive by 'only' seeing just kelp or weed or rocks with 'stuff' on them then well yes, you can see why I got a bit disillusioned with diving in the sea.

It offered me very little challenge and I found wrecks creepy and a bit boring.

Double spiral worms. Image: Christine Grosart

Then I did a Seasearch Observer course and my whole world changed.

National Seasearch coordinator Charlotte Bolton once said to me:

"Call me sad - but I love ALL my dives".

Rubbish, I thought. You must have at least one or two crap dives.

"Nope" she said "I love all of them."

How was this even possible?

The Seasearch course opens your eyes. It makes you look, Then look again, Then look closer again and before you know it you are analysing seaweed 'feet' and arguing over the markings on a corkwing wrasse.

An octopus could be dressed in a grass skirt and playing the maracas right in front of you but you'd probably miss it because you were trying to decide what length of 'animal turf' to put on your form.

In fact, no, you wouldn't miss it. You would simply enter it as 'rare' and gloat about it on your cephalopod reports - complete with photo.

Oh, it changed my life alright and it definitely changed my diving. It gave me a new lease of life and I spent every day offshore dreaming about not only taking macro photos of cool stuff but sifting through marine critter ID books and filling out Seasearch forms in latin.

I don't know what has happened to me but I like it. Diving for a purpose rocks!

Velvet swimming crab in a snakelog anemone wig. Image: Christine Grosart

I still can't tell the difference between a crab and a wrasse but I do love pretending I can and it is quite satisfying when someone tells you that you've photographed something quite rare when a) You couldn't take a photo of a fish at all last week and b) you had no idea what you were looking at and thought they were just everywhere!

Tamsyn very kindly pointed out a pipefish to me once I'd packed my camera away. She felt bad so pointed out another one on our second dive post coffee and sandwich.

He obliged beautifully. Their snouts are so long they are a pain to get in the frame and in focus, hiding in all that weed.

We headed for Mushroom Rock which is, no surprises, a large mushroom shaped rock right in the middle of the bay. Underneath, it is adorned with jewel anemones. These are my new favourite things to photograph. All colours, pinks, greens, purples, yellows...just stunning.

I inspected every damn snakelock anemone searching for the fashionable 'anemone shrimp'. This elusive shrimp likes to hang out in snakelocks and has kept macro photographers sane throughout covid.

I hunted religiously through every patch of snakelocks, going over and over in my head that it takes determination and hard work to get that photo you want and nothing comes easy on a plate and OH HELLO!

There he was.

I managed a few quick shots and signalled frantically to the others, at which point he turned his bum on them and hid in the most awkward place, almost impossible to photograph. I think Lisa got a few but he really was a bit camera shy.

Velvet Swimming Crabs like to wear snakelock anemones as wigs and they made for some amusing photographs.

I had a fantastic day with such lovely people and definitely got my photography and Seasearch fix.

I'm chuffed to bits with several recent purchases. My Ikelite housing was bought to accommodate my Canon 100D DSLR camera and I bought some second hand Ikelite strobes, DS160 and DS161.

I was debating for a while about a Cinebag Grouper, which seemed like a nice idea but quite pricey for what I thought was just a cooler bag with a badge.

I took a punt and bought one.

How wrong I was. The bag is sturdy, well padded and well thought out, with waterproof inner zip pockets and it is heavy duty. I keep an old sofnolime can full of fresh water in my car and you can use the Cinebag as a rinse bucket.

It takes up little space in my car and protects my equipment on the boats. I love it.

Christine Grosart 06/11/2023 Christine Grosart 06/11/2023

Pretty Persier

The lock down hokey cokey was starting to take its toll this summer, I’m sure, for all of us.

I had booked some blue shark snorkelling with Indeep as a ‘salvage the summer’ attempt but the weather ruined it and we couldn’t go.

So, with Rich around for a couple of days we made a last-minute booking on a couple of days diving down in Plymouth.

I decided to take my KISS rebreather because I hadn’t taken it in the sea much and, well, I should really. It was only ever bought for caves, but I decided to expand my horizons.

To make life even more awkward for myself I threw the DSLR in as well and we decided to camp using my new van awning.

Of course, it rained. Non-stop. The BBQ coals that we picked up were damp and after 2 hours of trying to make fire (all the pubs were full, before you ask…) Rich finally managed a decent meal. It was cold and wet and pretty miserable. I was enormously grateful for my Fourth Element poncho which made putting up a tent in the rain significantly more bearable.

We rocked up at Indeep who provided the usual excellent service in gas and boats. We headed out to a wreck I’d never been to before - le Poulmic. Very small but teeming with life. The weather topside was what we call ‘lumpy’ and we were grateful to be beneath the waves rather than on the boat.

In the afternoon it was a classic bailout to the James Egan Layne. Each time I dive this wreck (mostly pulling ghost gear off it, to be fair) it looks different. Rich had a great time with his camera while I struggled with not-very-good macro.

After a damp night in the van, the weather had improved greatly, and we headed out to the wreck of the Persier. I was excited as I’d never dived it before, and the visibility looked promising.

I gave myself a break and took the Paralenz dive camera. I always find shooting video way easier than images!

The wreck was stunning. We could hardly see it for fish. Great for critter nerds like me but not so great for wreck photographers like Rich, who spent much of his time shooing them away!

The wreck is adorned with pink sea fans and made for great wide-angle shots with Rich’s canon DSLR and new Easydive housing.

In the afternoon, we dived the remains of the Glen Strathallen.

In typical style, Rich and I got distracted by a lost creel that was still catching. He set about freeing the resident spider crab while I filmed. We just can’t help ourselves!

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