A good couple of days out in North Wales recently, diving through Cambrian Slate Mines near Llangollen.
It started a bit eventful when Chris Ryan took a tumble on the steep mud slope leading to the mine, with a suspected snapped ankle we considered a couple of rescue options, yet in the end he crawled himself out of there, back to the car – the mans made of some serious metal! He headed of to A&E, and the remainder decided to carry on the dive.
As such Dan Higgins and I did a fantastic dive down the old slate staircase and explored the lower levels. Amazing dive, albeit a bit hazy below 15mtr and like crystal shallower than that.
Laura and Matt were awesome as our kit mules and provided surface cover for the duration. Thankfully Chris has soft tissue damage, so although bad, wasn’t as bad as first suspected. Now for some beers and food.
Day two of our mine diving weekend… today we visited Aberlas, known as the lost mine. This was easier to get to than yesterday’s Cambrian Mine. Utilising a ladder and rope system we were able to descend into the entrance adit which then descended to the header pool.
An explore for Dan and I around the upper level, amazing place although a little eerie… poor visibility near the entrance, but once in the level it was hazy but good. No underwater pictures on this dive due to GoPro failure. At 25mins into the dive I had a free-flow from my second stage, so after a quick shutdown we turned the dive – that’s why we train hard and dive safely.
Upon our exit bacon butties and brews courtesy of our amazing support team! A brilliant weekend in some spectacular locations, with fantastic friends.
