…to all of you who came to listen/support my talk at LIDS this weekend. It was much appreciated.
Alan

I will be on the BSoUP stand at LIDS for much of Saturday, so do drop by and say hello if you’re going. 

I’m also giving a talk at the ‘Visions in the Sea’ event that is running at LIDS (in North Gallery 10).  I will be talking about the benefits of going on underwater photography workshops.  It’s at 3.15pm in the slot currently occupied by Mark Webster, whom I was going to introduce (because I’ve been on several of his workshops); but he can’t make it – so I’ve been asked to extend my ten minutes to thirty..! 

All the talks are on Saturday and Sunday - so please come along and provide some enthusiastic and raucous applause :-). 

Alan

Time to brush off the SCUBA kit for a new season.  Calling all dry-suited UK divers.  I have 6 places left on this weekend.  The boat is the gloriously spacious Tango, which has a hydraulic lift.  Weymouth has a wide variety of wrecks and reefs.  Accommodation is arranged at the Alverstoke Guesthouse.

Last call for any divers wishing to start off the season in wonderful Pembrokeshire.  Diving on offer between 2-5 April – number of days optional.  For hardly dry-suited UK divers only – only because of the water temperature.  The diving won’t be advanced as it’s early season.  The marine reserve is a memorable dive.

Hi GLUGgers,

Fear not, we are still holding the Social Event from 1pm tomorrow – but due to the probability of rain, we feel that at BBQ may not be appropriate!  Please feel free to come along and socialise, but when bringing food and drink to share, can you make sure that it does not need to be heated or cooked!  For details, please refer to the Trips page.

Hope to see you there!

Doug

Hello All,

Just a reminder!

Try Dive  – Saturday 20th March 1.00pm- £27.50

http://www.glug.co.uk/trydive

We are continuing the very successful try dive days, if you are unsure about scuba, come along and have your mind changed! ;)

Please come along and support the new divers! If you can already dive, come along and try out new kit, or have a swim! ;)

Thanks

Ian.

This post is aimed at covering a couple of points surrounding the new trips system.

For those who remember how the old Events system worked, there’s been something of a change in the way trips are linked with posts. Previously we had a chicken and egg scenario… which comes first, the post about the trip or the trip and then how to tie the two together when one doesn’t exist at the time you create the other!

The other difficulty… which of the 3 or 4 posts about a trip gets linked to the trip?

Well, no more. From now on, the trip comes first. If you are organising a trip please add your trip to the system first. Once this has been done, your trip will list in a new control on the edit post screen called ‘Trips Linker’. This allows you to insert a link to your trip anywhere within your post.

When you select your trip from the list, the control appends the link to the end of the post but you can copy and paste this anywhere within your post, more than once if you so desire.

The links become full hyperlinks when your post is viewed so don’t worry that they look a bit odd (something like ‘[GLUGTripnn]‘) while you are editing.

These links will alter their behaviour automatically as your trip is updated over time so they sort themselves out. The realy party piece is however the fact that the trip can automatically find all the posts relating to it without any additional work. This means that if you post several times about your trip in the months leading up to it, its easy to find all of them – especially helpful if key details change and people need to find the latest post.

This new feature also puts an end to trip organisers having to add links to their posts in the trip descriptions – the trip will do that for you!

Would you like to see it in action? Oh, go on then… here’s the link to the Madeira trip: Online Trip Booking: Madeira

As always, if you have any questions or queries just drop me a line.

Regards

Mark
(Webmaster)

As no doubt many of you will be aware, we have moved to a new trips system. As with any change, it takes time for everyone to adjust and for everything to settle down and this is especially true where such fundamental change is involved.

To ensure everything runs smoothly I would ask that everyone who has booked on a trip (by whatever means) checks that they are correctly listed as being booked on the trips page. Please also ensure that you receive a booking confirmation from the system each time you book.

Please alert the trip organiser or myself in the event that there’s a problem with your booking status as shown online.

Trip organisers are requested to ensure that their trips are kept up to date with bookings made by post or via travel agents to ensure the site accurately reflects the available number of spaces, not doing so could lead to tricky situations such as over subscription with inevitable disappointment.

Mark
(Webmaster)

Hello all,

Welcome to the GLUG training bulletin for March 2010

Just wanted to update you all with what’s going on and help keep divers diving, get new divers into the water, further your education and make you all better divers!! I am planning to run a series of courses designed to improve your diving over the next few months.

Some upcoming hilights!

Try Dive  – Saturday 20th March - £27.50

http://www.glug.co.uk/trydive

We are continuing the very successful try dive days, if you are unsure about scuba, come along and have your mind changed! ;)

Open Water Course Part One (April 2010 £249 – £399 parts 1 & 2)

Get your PADI scuba certification. If you’ve always wanted to learn how to scuba dive, this is where it starts. The PADI Open Water Diver course is the world’s most popular scuba course, and has introduced millions of people to the adventurous diving lifestyle.

This is the first part, the referral, it covers the theory and pool sessions, you can then go on to finish your course abroad or here in the UK. This course is filling up, so please be quick. I am scheduling others though, so get in touch!

Open Water Course Part Two (May 2010 £169)

This is the second part of the PADI Open Water course, we’re hoping to put a trip together (ideas include Malta, Tenerife, or Egypt) to finish off all those Open Water courses. Please get in touch if you are waiting to finish, or even just want to come along!

Nitrox (EANx) Diver (May 2010 £99)

The Enriched Air Nitrox course improves your diving in one enormous way! It allows you to spend longer under the water. This course is conducted entirely in the classroom and doesn’t require any diving. This course is almost full, get in touch ASAP

Scuba Review/Refresher Course (April 2010 £69)

Has it been a while since you’ve been scuba diving? Do you feel like your scuba skills and knowledge are a bit rusty? If you plan to dive this year and haven’t updated your log book in over 12 months, your dive centre will request that you take a refresher. Don’t cut into your dive time, do it in advance and pay less! The Scuba Review Tune-up is just the refresher you need. It reacquaints you with diving so that you’re back to feeling comfortable in the underwater world and log book ready in less than a day.

Advanced Open Water (£249)

The course helps you increase your confidence and build your scuba skills so you can become more comfortable in the water. This is a great way to get more dives under your belt while continuing to learn under the supervision of your instructor.  This course builds on what you’ve learned and develops new capabilities by introducing you to new activities and new ways to have fun scuba diving.

Rescue Diver (£299/£399 with First Aid Training)

This is the minimum level of training all divers should be at! “Challenging” and “rewarding” best describe the Rescue
Diver course. Building upon what you’ve already learned, this course expands on what you already know about how to prevent problems, and how to manage them if they occur.  You will learn: self rescue, recognizing and managing stress in other divers; Emergency management and equipment, rescuing panicked divers; and rescuing unresponsive divers.

Dry Suit Diver (£169)

Stay warm and cozy on your dives. Learn how to dive with a Dry Suit. A must if you plan to dive in the UK, I even take my dry suit abroad because I love diving in it! The buoyancy is so much better…

Deep Diver (£179)

Explore the wonders of the deep. This speciality course serves as an introduction to deep diving where you will learn the necessary skills, knowledge and techniques to safely participate in deep diving activities. Many wrecks and other popular dive sites are located at or just beyond 30m, the Advanced Open Water depth limit. This means you would have to dive beyond or very close to your limit and experience. This course is ideal for divers who want to extend their depth limit to the maximum recreational limit of 40m.

Wreck Diver (£229)

Wrecks open fascinating windows to the past. Most divers find wrecked ships, airplanes and even automobiles nearly irresistible because they’re intriguing to explore, exciting avenues of discovery, and usually teeming with aquatic life. The course teaches you the ins and outs of rewarding, responsible wreck diving.

————————————————————————————————————————————————-

If you or anyone you know is interested in any training from absolute beginner to instructor, or interested in technical diving including rebreathers, we can get you trained and diving!!!

All courses can be arranged, if you are unable to make a date, or I haven’t mentioned a course, then please get in touch and we can arrange one. Training can be arranged in the UK or abroad.

http://www.glug.co.uk/training/padi

Don’t forget club night, 1st Tuesday of every month at the Phoenix Club on Charing Cross Road.

Please contact me on: 

or

Thanks very much,

Ian

GLUG Training Coordinator

www.pathfinderdiving.co.uk

Hello fellow divers! I couldn’t resist sharing this with you! I’ve just had a fabulous night down our local pub with …. MONTY ! He’s such a great story teller and has such a stage presence. He’s so funny and is very good at speaking with different accents: Scottish, South African, Irish, French …I think I’m in LOVE ….again! lol
He was telling us about his work for the BBC, such as the Great Escape and he’s off to Ireland soon for his next project. We should have him on one of the GLUG liveaboards!

Hi All,

Hope you all well and will be able to help.

I’m looking for a good international Diving insurance for the coming year.

Thank you

Manu

it looks like we picked a nice day for it.  see you there andy

call me on 07960 944 766

also anyone else

Mandarin Fish on Dauin reef

The plan now is an Island-hopping trip, staying at three different resorts within the Visayas – the central group of islands. All transfers between the resorts are carried out by Dive boat, which means that dives are available even on transfer days, so we should get a full 12 days diving. The package will also work out at least £300 cheaper than the previous one, since the resorts are cheaper (but still very comfortable!).

The trip costs £1200 for 2 weeks, including a minimum of 30 boat dives, unlimited shore diving, Accommodation in deluxe rooms (all aircon) on a B&B basis, transfers to/from Cebu or other local airports, all transfers between the resorts, and all Marine Sanctuary fees. Not included are lunch, dinner, and drinks (allow £15-20/day to cover these), and flights.
Provided that you’re prepared to share a room, then there is guaranteed to be no single supplement – even if there is an odd number of people on the trip. (Of course, any Diva’s demanding their own room, will have to pay a supplement!)
Flights with Cathay Pacific should be around the £550 mark, so you’re looking at a little over £2000 in total for the two-week trip. (The previous package would have cost at least £300 more).
Non-diving partners are also welcome, and get a £600 discount on the price.

Payment schedule is £200 deposit, then 50% of the balance by September 1st, and the final balance by January 1st 2010.

For more details of the trip, please take a look at the Trip brochure – I’ll also be bringing a few copies to the club meeting tonight.

I currently have six confirmed divers, with two more people interested, but I’ve reserved space on the trip for 10 people, so I’m hoping to get at least another couple. The resorts themselves have at least 8 aircon rooms each, so there’s plenty of room on this trip for everyone! Even if I get more than 16 people, there are options available for staying at nearby resorts, or in fan-only rooms at reduced rates.

If you’d like to book onto the trip, you can pay the Deposit by clicking on this button: