General: Cromhall Quarry has 9.5 acres of water and is only 1.5 miles from J14 of the M5. The slightly undulating rock bottom gives an ideal training depth of 17 metres. It slopes upwards to the former haul road entry, giving a shallow beach area allowing easy access and egress for entry-level dive trainees and rescue training. At the north end of the quarry is a pontoon floating in 15 metres of water that has been specifically designed for ease of use by divers. The former limestone quarry has filled naturally and the water quality meets EU bathing standards, with underwater visibility during January 2009 of up to 8 metres. Teas, coffees and snacks are available at the Dive Centre.

We arrived at 9am to find quite a busy quarry, there were a couple of large groups completing some very realistic rescue courses and more than one person had to check if this was indeed a practice! First dive was to 7m for about 20 mins, lots of silt and not a lot else. After a short interval break Stuart and Stephen had a second dive to 17m and worked their way back up to the shallow end. After 18 minutes of 7m silty non-action it was time to get out. At least we'd been in the water (which was at a balmy 16 degrees). However the basic lesson we'd learnt was not to dive from the shore as the silt would follow us, and not to do training exercises anywhere near the bottom as the silt would rise up to meet us. Stuart and myself therefore took a different approach for the second dive.

After fighting our way past the diver soup (I'm not kidding - there were about 20 of them doing some training) we then made the lengthy fin to the furthest marker I could see - with Stuart complaining intermittently about the distance. This was somewhat a leap of faith, as none of us had had the presence of mind to look at the map of the quarry. Therefore we had no idea what the marker indicated - or how deep it was. Fortunately as Stuart and I descended on the line a rather tired looking boat appeared at 15m. However, after about 10 seconds both of us decided that it was no longer of interest and proceeded to initiate the next part of our dive 'plan'.

Having cunningly taken some bearings on the surface Stuart and I had planned to navigate from the initial descent point across the quarry, and then do a 90 degree turn to progress up the quarry to the shallow end. However as soon as I started to navigate I suddenly had the horrendous thought that maybe I was on the reciprocal bearing (known as 'doing a Dave'). My sense of foreboding increased when the side of the quarry appeared awfully quickly. However - being a man, and hence unable to show weakness or indecision - I kept on the plan. If I was going to fail, it was going to be a massive fail.

To my great astonishment Stuart and I arrived exactly where I intended to, more through luck than judgement. We'd also, somehow, managed to avoid the majority of the silt, and find the 6m training platform. I'd also seen two dead-fish. The glamour of diving! There was also a shark and some barracuda. Helen was very disappointed not to see them. On getting out Pat and Paula turned up, both claiming they'd been diving down the other end of the quarry. They provided no evidence to support this outlandish claim, but we decided to give them the benefit of the doubt. Couldn't help noticing that neither of them had wet hair though (or in Pat's case - hair!). For the final dive it was time for Helen's triumphant return to the water. This time - rather than sitting on the bottom - it was time to use the diving platform. This made life somewhat easier for her and Stuart. It also allowed me to investigate how many times I could swim in and around a discarded container. Quite a few as it turned out. So to sum up - Stuart and I had remembered how to dry-suit dive and Helen now understood what 'suit-squeeze' is. Regarding Cromhall - good for a little bit of training, but not much cop for seeing stuff (fish, planes, boats, each other).

Pat, Alan and Tim visited Cromhall last Sunday on a very over cast and chilly morning. As usual there were very few divers about and as the quarry is of considerable size we were able to park up next to the air station and the entry platform. A quick cuppa while the cylinders were being filled and then we entered the water. For the first dive we dropped straight down from the platform and then Pat led us on our exploration heading west finding the trailer and then the mine but not much else. The visibility was down to about 2 meters and the water a cool 6 degrees at its coldest and a only a little warmer near the surface. Dive timed at 29 minutes but at least we were getting some time underwater after a long cold winter. The second dive was similar to the first - straight down from the platform heading south to the first cabin cruiser and then on to the second cabin cruiser. The plan had been to make it to the catamaran but as the cold was catching up with us we decided to make for the wall on the east side of the quarry drift upwards to about 8 metres and then fin slowly back to the platform in the relatively warm waters just under the surface. Dive was timed at 31 minutes and another one under the belt.