Expeditions

St Kilda: Chapter two September 2008

Tony Bridge feasts at Ee-Usk

This is the second chapter in the St Kilda expedition describing how the idea started and moving on to the first couple of days.

The beginning

Following a failed attempt in 2004 I managed to reach St Kilda in 2005. I fell in love with the place and wanted to visit again. But more than that I wanted to do it in style. I had seen the Norwegian Rescue vessels, Elizabeth G and Halmar Bjorge many times when the club visited Oban and it was clear that these were the premier dive boats in the UK. In fact, when looking to purchase a ship, these vessels warranted serious consideration.

I contacted Northern Light who were the booking agents for both of them at the time and enquired to their availability. Not good news, they were booked solid for 18 months. Undeterred I arranged the charter in this time-frame, received the paperwork and sent the deposit.

Next thing was to advertise the trip within the mighty Ribble Valley Sub Aqua Club (RVSAC). The notice went out and within two hours the trip was full! As it was so far in advance I thought to myself "could I do two weeks with a return to Oban in between?" Well, history shows that most St Kilda trips just don't happen due to the extremes of weather and though that two weeks with a return to Oban in between (to deposit the first group and collect the next) may give me a better chance of getting there. So, the answer to myself was YES and promptly booked the second week. I advertised in the club and to some of my diving chums and hey presto, I had the second week filled within minutes.

24 divers, one boat, one objective...

I had plenty of time to plan the expedition and in fact had written my BSAC First Class Diver (FCD) expedition plan about the place. I called Hannah from Northern Light Charters and Rob Barlow the skipper a few times on the lead up to the expedition once to be told that there was a fuel surcharge required; not totally unexpected!! The planning documentation (with private details removed) are available for download from this site.

I put a team together to organise the detail of the expedition in advance. My fellow Triton Oceanic team member Tony Bridge, designed the clothing; Jackie Dixon (RVSAC treasurer and fellow Tritone) sorted all the finance; Ed Howarth and Mike Holroyd helped with the final planning whilst I was diving caves in Sardinia (subject of another article) and ran the dive management during the trip and last but not least, Sandy Thomson who booked all the accommodation.

A few days before the trip I whacked out the final plan and looked at the weather forecast. Week one looked very bad with two lows coming in from the west...

Setting off (Friday)

O-ring and myself - followed by a very large Tony Bridge in a very little car- set off a little after lunch on the Friday for the six hour journey to Oban. Following an uneventful motorway bash we arrived at the Lancaster Hotel. It was so 60's it was almost cool again! You almost imagined Norman Bates (Psyco) to be behind the desk.

Rooms were comfortable and Andy and I roomed together for the first night; we both knew who the snorers were in advance. The room was clean albeit a bit austere but a little worrying as the heater control was hanging off the wall exposing live wires within one meter of the sink!!!

We all arranged to meet at the Ee-Usk, North Pier, Oban at 2000 for a welcome dinner. Enthusiastic, all of team 'alpha' arrived early to find the restaurant totally mad busy with waiters buzzing everywhere. We were told to come back in '20' so a quick pint in the Oban Inn was called for. As part of my weight loss program I waxed lyrical to Jim Donbavand on the way over about my stopping drinking - which I successfully managed for three weeks loosing a whopping 14lbs - but caved in immediately when a pint of Guinness was thrust into my eager hand. We all piled back over to the Ee-Usk and Tony treated me to an excellent seafood platter (it was his turn). After I picked him off the floor when he received the bill, we walked back to the Lancaster full of anticipation.

Day one: Loading & travelling day (Saturday)

A bit of detail on the team now.

The Elizabeth G department consisted of: Rob Barlow (Skipper), Helen Ricketts (Crew & hospitality), Isabel Little (Cook), Trish Blackely (Crew)

Team Alpha consisted of: Ed Howarth, Andy Proctor, Paul Saunders, Gordon MacSkimming, Sandy Thomson, Jim Donbavand, O-ring King, Teresa Darbyshire, Pete Church, Anne Church, Tony Bridge and myself.

Following my breakfast of porridge, I called Rob the skipper to arrange a time to meet up; we arranged 1200 with boat loading at 1430. I gave a briefing about the arrangements at 0930 and the team all spit off to chill before loading the boat. I decided to do a bit of shopping and bought some dried fruit from the whiskey shop (you wouldn't be catching me buying whiskey would you :-). O-ring, myself and Tony went for a coffee near the centre and wondered up to the Elizabeth G.

The skipper was preparing the ship for the expedition. It wasn't till later that I realised the amount of time required on this type of vessel. Rob was great and let us below to look at the cabins and layout. Elizabeth G is a great expedition ship with plenty of space. The first thing that hit me was that it didn't have that slightly 'bilgey' smell below. After drawing a quick diagram of the cabins to allocate personnel we left the crew busying themselves with final preparations.

Unfortunately there was a fishing vessel in Robs normal place on the Railway pier and the Halmar Bjorg was adjacent to the quay and so we had to cart all the kit around onto the ferry section of the quay. We started to load the boat 1400. The ferry was due in at 1500 so we piled the mountain of equipment in the middle of the concrete pier to avoid upsetting the feared harbour-master. The drivers went off to park the cars at the Atlantis leisure centre whilst Jim, myself, Gordon and Sandy started to load the boat. Unfortunately low water was at 1240 BST and combined with the spring tides the process of lowering the seeming endless stream of twin-sets and heavy kit made it a slow process. This did accelerate as the drivers returned to assist!! The deck was full of bags, boxes and cylinders and we then crated a human chain to move the kit around the boat. A soon as the kit was stowed, at 1630 following the safety briefing, Rob the skipper reversed the boat of from the ridiculously tight berth into Oban harbour.

Spirits were high and contrary to the forecast, the weather was looking good as we steamed out towards the Sound of Mull. Even rounding Ardamurchan point, the seas were still reasonably calm so we continued on to anchor in the Bay of Laig on the west coast at Eigg.

Food is an essential component to any successful expedition and on this one we were in for a right treat. On this first week we experienced the cuisine of Trish who had a lovely Northern Irish accent and was a highly experienced and accomplished cook.

Dinner was Duck and Port pate with red current and onion coulée; chicken wrapped in bacon with a creamy mushroom sauce, mange tout and baby sweet corn with baby boiled potatoes caressed in Irish butter. I was so impressed I forgot to note down the desert and excellent selection of cheese that appeared at the end of this and every meal aboard. Just to top off the first day we were treated to a partial eclipse of the moon over the lovely hills of Eig...

Go and get a cup of tea then go to chapter three...

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