In September 2008, my Ashford Dive Club buddy, Rick Stewart and I dived Porthdafarch in Treaddur Bay near Holyhead on the Isle of Anglesey, my dive 1582.

Circumstances dictated our dive time which coincided with an incoming tide. The visibility looked poor but we suspected that even if we could have waited to slack, it would not have been very good.

Rick and I finned out on the surface along the south-west side of the small cove at Porthdafarch and dropped down just 3.7 metres onto the seabed. The visibility was a disappointing metre. So we finned across to the south-east side where the visibility improved to around 2.5 metres. Rick was about to write “no life” in the sand when we caught sight of some juvenile wrasse. They were the only fish we saw and after only 30 minutes we aborted the dive and headed off to Llanberis to dive Vivian Slate Quarry instead.