On Thursday morning the weather was not so good with a very hazy start. We ate the usual breakfast and waited for the dive boat which was late. Meanwhile the skies became more and more cloudy. We eventually boarded the dive boat and motored off round the point to the dive site. The dive wasn’t bad, just a little boring. When we surfaced, the weather had deteriorated to the point of squalls and rain. We ate dinner and a group decision was made not to dive a second dive that day due to the worsening weather conditions,

By 3pm that afternoon we were sat in a sheltered bay chilling out and swapping stories and jokes. The afternoon however, had started to drag a little so we all sat at the main table at the rear of the deck with our drinks. Pete suggested that we play a game he had learned whilst in the army called “Bunnies”. I do not suppose the photos will do it justice, however, we were all in stitches for the next couple of hours. Tim and Adam joined in and at one stage Adam was John’s dancing partner! Dinner was brilliant and not long after, we all retired to bed knackered but happy. Most of us drunk, from the “Bunnies” penalties. Next morning we awoke to still more cloud and rain. Where was the sunshine? Although it was quite chilly that morning, the atmosphere had remained jovial from the previous night’s antics and John received a ribbing for dancing a Waltz with Dave. In his haste to get away from having to dance a jig with John the night before, Adam had tried to escape by climbing the rigging of the boat. There were no hangovers and everyone ate breakfast together as usual. Two planned dives for Friday to make up for the previous day. The first was to be in the Turkish Bath and the second would be just a bimble around DALYAN BAY. At the time of writing this, we had finished our first dive and were enjoying a really good lunch. The dive was brilliant, all went well and the weather had brightened up and got warmer. At 1.15pm, we actually saw the sun, but not for long. It disappeared very quickly. We did our second dive and all enjoyed it. Tim stayed on the boat and we all used SMBs. When we surfaced, the wind had got up so we quickly de-kitted and got off the dive boat, putting our diving gear onto the Mother ship. This was only done once we had had a group photograph taken with the crew of the dive boat. We quickly sorted out the best way to dry the kit and then sat down to tea, coffee and biscuits and the usual chat. Adam took the boat to a sheltered bay for the night and we got out the drinks and usual assortment of seeds and nuts. Once again dinner was excellent and the wine flowed. It began to get chilly and wet later on that evening so we went down into the lounge and chatted. Tim had tried to teach me Backgammon but I lost to him twice. He was then thrashed by Adam!

On the Saturday morning, we woke to the sounds of strong winds, the clattering of rigging, the bumping of the tender on the side of the boat and lots of rain. Prospects for the day did not look good. At 7.30am, having already packed, I thought I heard other people stirring in their cabins. I went up onto the deck and found that someone had left their dive bag out all night to get wet. The plan that Saturday was to have breakfast, move round to FETHIYE, dock and disembark. Our kit would be taken to the Hotel Kamel and we would have the chance to shop, chill out and perhaps have a sleep. We were meeting up with Tim and his “soon to be wife” Bridget, that evening for dinner. The trip back to harbour was uneventful except for the fact that Dave was being teased gently about having done his deepest dive ever. Tim produced a T-shirt with a picture of the Devil with his arm around a diver and the caption read “There is no such thing as too deep”. Dave voluntarily had his photograph taken wearing this.

 At the time of writing this (9.15pm), most had gone to bed to get what little rest they could before the minibus left for the airport in the early hours of the next morning. We were to catch a 4 hour flight to Stanstead, UK.  We arrived at the airport the next morning after a long journey but with very pretty scenery, snow-capped mountains which shone in the moonlight. We arrived at our check-in gate after passing through the X-ray machine, Pete and I had to go through more than once due to items in our pockets and jackets. We were the first people in the queue and were happily agreeing that we would take the front seats for legroom when we discovered that the flight had come half full from Cyprus. We were still fortunate enough to get seats together and proceeded to go through to duty free and to wait for our 7.45 flight at gate10.