Hi everyone,

I’ve discovered that due to a problem with the configuration of the GLUG server, some people have not been receiving emails from the website, when new Posts are made.

I believe that I’ve now fixed this, so you should receive notifications of future posts, but you may want to go and check out the GLUG Website for any Posts you might have missed over the last few weeks.

The website displays the most recent 15 posts on the main page - to go back further, scroll down to the bottom and click on the “Previous entries” link.

You can also display all of the Posts for a specific Month, by selecting the month you want in the “Archives” list in the left hand column.

Apologies if you haven’t been receiving the Posts you’ve subscribed to, but this should now be fixed.

(BTW, If you want to change the Categories of Posts you’re subscribed to, log into the members area of the website, and click on the link in the Dashboard, or the “Profile” link in the top right corner. Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and you can tick or untick the Categories you’re interested in.)

Neil.

Martin J has been kind enough to send in a trip report from last season’s fantastic Plymouth trip - great diving and even better Venn Farm breakfasts, by the sounds of things.
If anyone has any pictures from this weekend, please email them to me and I’ll add them to the report.
And, as always, if you’ve been on a trip recently, either with GLUG or by yourself, and you feel like adding a report to the site, then get typing…

I received an email from a new dive & spa resort called UTOPIA VILLAGE, on Utila, The Bay Islands, ?Honduras.

They are presently planning a Gay & ?Lesbian Week with special prices.

Check out the website for more information and contact details.

One of our newer members, David, has been kind enough to contribute a trip report for the most recent Weymouth trip. It sounds like it was a great weekend, scuppered karaoke plans notwithstanding.
If anyone has any pictures (taken either above or below the water) from this weekend, then please email them over to me and I’ll add them to the report.
Similarly, now that diving season is finally underway, don’t hold back with trip reports of your own…

NCRD (Northern California Rainbow Divers) have asked me to pass on to GLUG members, information about a liveaboard trip they’re running to the Galapagos in September 2009.

Currently the trip is half-full, with 7 of the available 14 spaces reserved. Approximate cost is £1850, excluding airfares and marine park fees.

For more information, see the NCRD Website.

Anyone interested should send an email to the trip organiser at galapagos [at-symbol] rainbowdivers [dot] org.

(BTW, Rainbow Divers joined GLUG on a trip to Honduras a couple of years back - they’re a great bunch of people!)

Neil.

GLUG members, and others who subscribe to our mailing list will have noticed that recent emails don’t contain the body of the post - just the title.

I’m aware of the problem (as well as a “404 error” that sometimes occurs when Editing posts), and I’m working to find the cause.  In the meantime, clicking on the Post title in the email will take you to the website to read the whole Post.

Apologies for the inconvenience.

Neil.

17th September 2008

ONE WEEKS LIVEABOARD ON BLUE SEAS
SAFARI: THE BROTHERS, DAEDALUS AND ELPHINESTONE
TO INCLUDE: RETURN FLIGHTS, TRANSFERS, FULLY CATERED, 6 DAYS WITH 4 DIVES A DAY.
£1025.00
(PLEASE CLICK ON LINK FOR FURTHER DETAILS incl additional costs such as beer, nitrox and marine park fees)
http://www.oonasdivers.com/dive-tours-red-sea-liveaboards-blue-planet-liveaboards.shtml

Hi Everyone.

Following on from GLUG’s last two fabulous Southern Red Sea trips on the magnificent Blue Seas, I have booked her once again and, this time, we will be doing The Brothers, Daedalus and Elphinestone. These are mostly drop off dives with wonderful coral covered walls on one shoulder and, on the other, the blue with great chances of seeing Hammerheads, Grey Reefers, White Tips, Blue Fin Tuna, Baracuda and, the killer turtle on Daedalus!! You will need to have at least 50 dives under your belt for this trip.
Feel free to read the trip reports on previous trips to these reefs to get a feel for a day on board Blue Seas. Also, for those of you who went on last year’s trip (2006) Berga and Tobias ( 2 burgers and a beer) are back on Blue Seas and we are keeping our fingers crossed that they will be our dive guides for next year!

To book please call Oonasdivers on 01323 648924 with a deposit of £200 (only refundable by replacing your canceled place with someone new) and then please email me so as I can keep my paperwork up to date. This a first come first served trip with booking only accepted once you have paid your deposit. Presently there are 18 places left. Thanks.

Finally, just to sound bite this idea-if anyone is interested in me organising what I can only describe as a ‘pretty’ trip, doing The Fury Shoals/St Johns including Dolphin House safari liveaboard, with less challenging diving, but equally very beautiful, especially for photographers, let me know and I can then price it up and arrange. For now, it would be on Blue Waves which holds 15 people and I would be looking at a May trip for around £895. Looking forward to hearing from anyone interested and then, I will ‘event’ it.

Best wishes to everyone and please feel free to get back to me with any questions.
Charlie Stewart

Hi
If anybody is interested My Local Dive Center has a number of places it needs to fill for a Northern Red Sea Safari, in August.
The live aboard is with Blue 02 aboard Blue Horizon, one of their newer boats. All cabins are en-suite, A/C etc.
If you are intersted the cost is £950 pp and includes flights from Gatwick.
The package includes: London Gatwick flights Egyptian entry visa and internal transfers from/to airport,
7 nights full board onboard vessel, marine park fees, all soft drinks, tea & coffee, single 12ltr (DIN/INT) cylinder and lead weights.
NITROX AVAILIABLE but is chargeable
If you are interested please email scott.roberts AT virgin.net (just change the AT for the @ )

Charlie Stewart has been kind enough to write-up a report from his most recent trip to the Red Sea. Covering the Brothers, Daedalus and Elphinstone, with threshers, hammerheads and cross-dressing Germans thrown in for good measure, it’s enough to make any diver green with envy. You can read it for yourself here.

And, now that diving season has begun in earnest, if anyone else feels similarly inspired to contribute pictures or trip reports then please email them to me so I can add them to the site. Your fifteen minutes of fame starts now…

For when planning your dive trips abroad I found this site to be excellent to save trawling through all the web sites for the cheapest airfares- it’s Martin Lewis’s (he of Radio 2’s money saving expert fame) search engine which will trawl through them all for you.
He has a regular email newsletter which gives good savings on everything from travel to freebies as well!

http://flightchecker.moneysavingexpert.com/

Teletext.co.uk has some fabulous deals as well especially to good dive destinations! They too have a regular newsletter worth subscribing to.

Good hunting! Hope it saves you guys and gals some money to spend on dive gear this year!

Thanks for sending us an email. We’ll be in touch shortly.

It seems a configuration file got screwed up during the recent website outage, which meant that the links in the emails which are sent out didn’t work.

Hopefully this should now be working again. I’ve also added a note to the email which points out that even if the link within the email doesn’t work, you can always go directly to the GLUG homepage to read the post. (looks like that didn’t work!)

Neil.

If you tried to access the GLUG website on Friday or Saturday, and found that you couldn’t, the reason was that the Server had died. Our Web Hosting provider has had problems replacing the server, and currently they are running with a lower-specification machine, which is quite badly overloaded.

The other problem is that since the server was replaced, many of the scripts which generate the GLUG webpages aren’t working properly. I’ve raised this with them, and modified the script for the home page to work around the problem, but there are around 40 script files which have the same problem, so you’ll find that many of the pages don’t currently work.

If they haven’t cured the problem within 24 hours, I’ll start modifying all the others, but it’s a mammoth task, so please bear with me.

The “Contact Us” page still works correctly, so if there’s something you need to know, please fill in the form, and we’ll respond as soon as possible.

Neil.

UPDATE |(16th Jan):
The Scripts appear to be working properly again now, but the website may still be sluggish. If you find any pages don’t work, please email me (click on the envelope at the top of this post, if there is one, or use the “Contact Us” page).

Some of you may remember Allan Jones, who was a GLUG member for several years. Unfortunately, an serious ear infection, picked up after diving a couple of years ago, has left him unable to dive.

He has a complete set of dive gear, which he obviously no longer needs, and asked whether any club members might be interested in it. I have no idea how much he wants for it, if anything.

So, if you’re interested, send me an email, and I’ll send you Allan’s phone number. Members can email me by logging in and then clicking on the envelope at the top of this post, or via the Contact Form (select General enquiries).

The lovely Lydia at Oonasdivers has now agreed to give me 19 places on The Southern Red Sea trip ( dep 27th July ), a 7 day liveaboard on the fabulous, brand spanking new Panorama Explorer. This means that GLUG now has the boat to itself with the 20th place hopefully being taken by a diving journalist. Already 10 people have registered interest and one has paid, in full! At £649, incl flights, I think this is a great price. Let’s fill this boat and make this a great trip.

For those already registered, I will be sending out a group email shortly, regarding deposit amounts.