I hate bureaucratic nonsense!

I know I used to live in Hong Kong, I know I have travelled extensively in South East Asia, but I don't understand how they can have such long convoluted and bureaucratic processes. Everything we need to do requires someone to produce a written pass - it is a letter that is given from one person in one office to another - probably next door. And even then it does not necessarily mean that it works. So here we sit, in Galle harbour, not able to leave the harbour because someone had to write "a letter". Have they not heard about emails or the telephone. Rant over. We are supposed to be leaving at 6 tomorrow morning, and the plan is to ropes away and go, but I can guarantee that we will get stopped by a patrol boat as we leave - because the driver didn't get a flipping letter.

Club Night

Next club night - 3 March at the Royal Beach Hotel. Let us know if you are coming.
Ta

Love going away, hate packing

It is great to get away and I can't complain because I am going to Sri Lanka to dive with Blue Whales, but ...... why is nothing easy? The list of issues seems to get longer:

• Hong Kong want a bond to release the camera kit .... of £100K. Are they kidding!
• The Exec Producer gets told that neither he nor the sound crew can have visas ..... 3 days before we are due to go.
• Sri Lanka give us a good deal on flights but then we need a second mortgage for excess baggage - I could buy a house for that

On the plus side, the new camera has arrived, I have worked out how to use it, there is enough space for my camera gear and all other problems seem to have been resolved. More news later.

The Blog is Back!

Is it really that long since we did anything with this. When we had the old Triton Scuba website we used this blog to post news and "stuff". The new website has blog style pages incorporated throughout the whole site with different topics being covered, however, lots of you have asked for a general mutterings and ramblings blog page like we used to have. So, we have listened to what you say and given the old one the kiss of life. All of the old posts are still there so feel free to have a browse.

A Busy Club Night

It was another busy club night last night. Around 70 turned up and we actually ran out of food and had to order some more - oops. And .... finally we managed to hold the unwanted Christmas Present raffle. As last year it was a good bit of fun. There were around 34 stunning prizes on offer, everything from bottles of booze to 2009 diaries. We also had the traditional Chinese wall calendars in Spanish (seem to remember they turned up last year) which this year was won by our only Spanish club member Jorge. Now what were the chances of that happening?

So, in spite of being a bit late it was still well supported and many many thanks to everyone who bothered to wrap and bring presents and to everyone who gave so generously to the occasion. The raffle raised £150 which we are going to donate to Sport Aid. Talking of Sport Aid, don't forget to visit our just giving page for that event, and if you do want to join us on 21 March for a mile jog/walk/stagger then please let us know.

IE Success and New Instructors

Many congratulations to our new PADI Instuctors. All candidates passed their 2 day exam after a packed IDC on Saturday. Congratulations as well to our new Staff Instructors, Chris and Noeleen who will be working for Emperor divers in Nuweiba. The guys have now embarked on their Speciality Instructor package. More details and photos to follow when I find a keyboard that doesn't stick.!

Instructors Meeting

We held the first of our instructor meetings during February. With so many changes going on it was important to get together and ensure that all the instructors and DMs were on the ball and up to date. The minutes of the meeting have been published and are available for those who would like a copy.

As always the meeting ended up as a bit of a social event and some of us went on afterwards to the Noble House to consume large amounts of Chinese food. This was followed by some extraordinary activities in a few other local establishments. As quite a few instructors and DMs were unable to attend then we will be running another one hopefully in April to pick up the rest.

Phil Short Presentation

Last nights presentation by Phil Short at the club night was a great success. In spite of around 10 people who had said they would come not turning up, there were still around 90 at the event so a good turn out. It was also nice to see divers from other clubs in the area including Cockleshell Divers and RNSAC. We hope that you enjoyed the evening and we look forward to welcoming you to events in the future.

January 2010 Newsletter

The first newsletter for 2010 is now out and published on the website. There is lots of good stuff in it .... news about charity events, courses for cold months, trip reports, new gear, dive boat schedule information, course dates and club weekends coming up. Click here to have a read.

Successful Advanced Powerboat Drivers

No diving this weekend, but we were running an Advanced Powerboat course through our RYA training organization Triton RIBs. Although it was a bit chilly, it was dry and great fun. The full moon and a clear sky made the night navigation phase easier than it might have been, however the strong currents tested the drivers ability in slow speed manouevres. Well done to Andy, Chris and Alex. In the future Andy is hoping to be more involved in the boat side of business so you may well see him on the dive boat this season, and Chris is going to be giving a helping hand too, so look out for him.

Supporting the Royal Navy

When a bunch of Royal Navy personnel asked us to help them get an adventurous training qualification at short notice we were only too happy to help. There were 14 lads and one girl who all work at RAF Halton on Harriers and they needed the training running during one week. Having plenty of full-time professional instructors, plenty of equipment and total flexibility in training they came to us. It was a pretty cold week as well, with snow falling at Vobster, but with a new batch of student drysuits in the centre the guys managed to stay reasonably warm during the open water phase of the training. Many of the group will now be off on further adventures diving and we wish them all the best and would like to thank them for being such fun to work with. Photos from the training are on our facebook fan page.

Phil Short Presentation Evening and Club Night - 2 February

We get 2010 off to a great start and start the year off with a great presentation evening. We have Phil Short coming in for the first club night of the New Year. Phil is a technical and cave diving expert of considerable experience. His expeditions have included diving to extreme depths and through some of the most amazing cave systems in the World including previously unexplored caves in Siberia. This is going to be a graphically rich and extremely interesting talk and we hope that you can all come along. The evening is free to club members and just £5 to guests to cover food. It is another charity event and we hope that some if not all of you will want to make a donation towards our current charity "Water Aid" at some stage during the event. The evening is open to everyone, BSAC, PADI, SAA or indeed anyone else who wants to come along for a cracking good night. It is ticket only so please contact us if you want to go. We look forward to seeing you soon.

Club Night 7 January

For the first time we can remember we have had to cancel the club night tonight. Road conditions are still pretty bad due to the ice and the BBC have forecast more snow this afternoon - even if it doesn't snow it is still going to be a bit tricky underfoot and while driving. So unfortunately the Cow Pie and mash,and the unwanted Christmas present raffle will have to wait until Tuesday 2 February. (Note it is on a TUESDAY). Please let us know if you are coming to that one - we will be having the raffle as well as the presentation by Phil Short and it promises to be a good night out so we hope to see you then.

December Newsletter

The last newsletter of the year is available on the website. Loads of stuff, including new drysuits, report from the Christmas Ball, online training info and lots more. Click here to get your copy. And have a Happy New Year!

Scuba Santas 2009

The guys are back from the Scuba Santas event and apparantly around 190 turned up in total so they managed to break the record. You are all completely barking. Well done to Martin and Amy at Vobster Quay for putting on the event and to everyone who took the time to dress up and jump in in aid of the RNLI.

Moose Milk - Christmas 2009

The Moose milk flowed and the sausage rolls and mince pies went down very well yesterday. A steady stream of friends, customers and club members popped in to share a Christmas drink with us and it was great to see so many of you. If you are wandering out and about today enjoying the December sunshine, there is plenty more food and drink available today so please feel free to drop by. If we don't see you, from everyone here at Triton Scuba we would like to wish you a very merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Congratulations to our new open water and drysuit divers

It was a bit nippy to say the least, but well done to everyone who passed courses with us over the weekend. We had two courses running, drysuit and open water, and in spite of the chilly Northerly wind that came through everyone had a really good time. Picture shows the open water course - to tag yourself go to the facebook fan page by clicking here.

Triton Scuba TV Appearance

Following on from the wreck sinking on the BBC Series "LIFE", we were on the telly again last night. CBBC "Inside LIFE" aired the programme that we worked on both in the UK and the Bahamas. The programme showed scenes in the Bahamas cleaning and sinking wrecks, as well as James learning to dive here at the centre, before finally going to dive the wreck that he helped to get ready for sinking. If you missed it then you can view LIFE by going here, and the CBBC Inside LIFE programme by clicking here. Enjoy.

Christmas Ball 2009

What a geat party. It was a full house at the Royal Beach with around 120 turning up for a fantastic night of eating drinking and generally having fun. The raffle on the night raised £520 for our chosen charity "Water Aid". Pictures have been posted onto the the Triton Scuba Facebook Gallery - its on the new fan page which you can get to by clicking here. Feel free once you are a fan to comment, tag people you know and upload your own pictures.

November Newsletter

The November newsletter has been published on the website. Go to the members area or alternatively click here. Plenty of information including holiday reports from Dahab, kit news from DEMA and the latest from PADI on training. In addition there is news about forthcoming social events. Loads going on so make sure you down load your copy.