In the Depths of the Fairest Cape
Posted By Sara-Lise Haith on 5 January 2007
The water however was a complete shock to my system, as it was 10degC, which is the coldest water I have ever dived in and after years of being a tropical cocktail diver I never felt so alert, awake, and alive, under water. The cold water touched my face like a ice-cube being rubbed on me as a joke. It almost burned. My wetsuit remained faithfully warm, but after 10 minutes, I realised that my gloves were way too thin. I battled to hold the camera and even press the button. After 20 minutes of bottom time we commenced our ascent, on my part extra slow due to the coldness of the water and also the depth of the dive. When we reached the surface I was unable to use my hands. The rib approached us telling us to remove our weight belts quickly and get our gear off as quickly as possible, and get in the boat. I was totally useless. I had no feeling in my hands and could not even move fast. My body had slowed down completely which are signs of first stages of hypothermia.
Fortunately another diver, Duncan and his dive partner Elsa assisted me to remove my gear. They were kitted up in dry suits and I’ll tell you all what, next time I dive in Cape Town I will certainly invest in one! I giggled nervously as I knew I was “wasting time” on the surface, couldn’t get my gear off and probably looked like a novice myself. The boat captain said not to worry, as it takes at least 20 minutes of messing on the surface before the sharks become interested.
Partridges
The second dive was at a site called Partridges, and this time, I borrowed some 5mm gloves in which I wore over my regular gloves, and in spite of the holes in them, it helped a little. Partridges is a huge rock formation surrounded by kelp, sponges, seals, birds, and has beautiful swim throughs. The only problem was that we were 11 divers for the second dive and it turned out to be a small nightmare, especially when a large swell that came up and the visibility suddenly changed to about 2 metres in the last minute. One diver shot to the surface but I was not going to risk saving him as I had my buddy to look after who was having buoyancy problems with the swell, and the diver who’s buddy shot to the surface simply watched him go. The instructor did not seem to notice, and then with the decreasing vis, I could not get his attention. It was then my decision to look after self first and also my dear Swedish dive buddy, Anna.
However, during the dive I saw about 20 different species of nudibranch, and at least six different variations of sponges. The colours are exhilarating! I also found a live shark’s egg (mermaid’s purse) which had become detached from where the mother had left it and it was rolling around in the sand with the swell. Once the vis clouded over we lost sight of the group, but without fear just followed the reef and then found some divers who could not understand our hand signals. I believe one of them was the instructor (couldn’t see!) and when he asked me how much air I had I told him, he couldn’t understand and seeing my pressure gauge in PSI confused him even more. He released his SMB and ascended. The other divers, somewhat bewildered, ascended with Anna and I. We waited about 10 minutes on the surface to get picked up, as divers had popped up everywhere, and those words of the 20 minute surface margin before a shark appears was forever in my mind. Anyway, Anna and I kept smiling and just held on to each other in the swell, waiting our precious turn.
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