On 25th July 2006, Graeme “Spotty” Hastings, Chris Baker and I enjoyed another “Boys Day Out” in Dorset.

After first diving Lulworth Cove we drove to Swanage for an afternoon shore dive. As we made our way along under the old pier I paused to photograph a fish. Spotty, who had found a rope, suddenly sneaked up behind me and tied my feet together while Chris turned my air off. Mercifully quickly, Chris turned my air back on but then dragged me, still tied up, to a post where I was left upside down. I pretended to be dead but I don’t think this convinced Chris. At least he didn’t seem too concerned because he then finned off.

Chris had set Spotty the challenge of finning to the end of the old Swanage Pier and then navigating from the end of it to the tip of the new Swanage Pier. Freeing me, Spotty led us from the old Swanage Pier on what he believed was the correct bearing for the tip of the new pier. He was wrong but insisted on continuing on his bearing which eventually would have brought us to some cliffs approximately three-quarters of a mile away! Whilst finning along, Spotty found a pair of old pants and in the spirit of the day, tried to push them into my face. He failed but Chris picked them up and succeeded in attaching them to the back of my tank without me noticing. Eventually Chris tired of Spotty’s erroneous navigation and insisted that Spotty went to the surface so that he could get his bearings. It was at this point that Spotty finally realised just how far we were from the new Swanage pier and set a new bearing almost 180ْ  from the one that we had just been taking! Having finally reached the new pier we slowly finned along back to our entry point with me taking my time to photograph tompot blennies and pipefish.