There we were, on the road - Sean, Petra and me – looking forward to a nice seaside weekend, enjoying the heat wave promised by the weather forecast! It was Good Friday morning under a sunny sky and we were headed for Salcombe down the Devon coast.

Halfway through the journey, Mother Nature decided she had favoured us enough. It started to rain…HEAVILY... and temperatures dropped along with our moods! The rest of the journey was a misery and we had almost given up for the day when finally the sun popped out again and Salcombe welcomed us with brilliant colours and Easter scenery.

We soon found our diving friends Graham, Mark, Chris and John with his family, coming in from a boat trip, and followed them back to the campsite. “Us Girls” quickly put up tents and then enjoyed the evening sun sitting in the grass and watching the men work hard on some steering problem on the boat. Dinner was in the local pub, after a quick stop at Hope Cove to see some WAG-fanatics having a “night dive” wade-in into the shallow ice-cold water. A couple of pints of the local cider brew and a night-cap in the back of Graham’s van, and we were ready for bed.

The next morning I woke up from the noise of my flapping tent. A good start to what was supposed to be a nice and sunny day… When I opened my tent I found a world covered under a big white blanket! I followed a noise of stumbling in the mist and found the guys preparing a beautiful traditional English breakfast...

Because of the strong wind and rain it was impossible to go out for a dive, so we decided on a speed boating trip instead. Dressed in as much waterproof gear as we could find, we braved the choppy estuary. Slowly but surely the sun broke through and we stopped to waste an hour on fish that did not want to bite, then bumped into the WAG Group again, this time having a problem with their boat. It had shipped a lot of water (not surprising since their little “Jinx” was overloaded with six people and complete diving kits...) and ran out of fuel as well! We gave them a hand and made sure they took a beeline back to sort it out...

Now it was time for some real action. We fetched Sean’s canoe and went back to the mouth of the estuary. The weather had improved further and the waves were not as daunting as before, so it was safe enough to pass the rocks and sandbar that shelter the harbour, marked by a set of breakers rushing in at irregular intervals. This was where we dumped Sean for some surfing fun. He looked tiny in big waves, but seemed to be a happy bunny, so we left him to his play and blasted out of the estuary to test the speed limit of our engine…

It was quite a while before we returned and Sean, knackered from ploughing against the incoming tide to catch yet another set of breakers, happily agreed to be towed behind the speedboat. A first in his canoeing career, he soon felt at home there, surfing and hopping the boat’s wake, doing all sorts of silly things. At times, he seemed daringly near the powerful engine, actually surfing faster than the boat!

Under a brilliant sun, we kept towing Sean into the harbour and he was still fooling around when all of a sudden something big jumped out of the water right next to him. And again... - two little DOLPHINS at play!!! We disconnected Sean from the boat so he could get closer to them, but found they were more interested in the wake created by the boat, so we kept on driving and the dolphins followed us all the way back towards the sea. They jumped around our boat, dived underneath and suddenly appeared somewhere else, sometimes so close we could almost touch them! We could not believe our luck!

Other speedboaters noticed the commotion and joined in the play, a phalanx of boats racing down the estuary with the dolphins now playing in ALL the wakes, jumping happily from boat to speeding boat. Too bad that we had left Sean behind in his canoe, so soon we had to give up and go back to fetch him.

What a spectacular end to a day with such a dreary start! And just to top it off, we managed to get lost in the fields in an attempt to get hold of the sunset over the cliffs. As a result, we ended up slip-sliding down a muddy forest trail to a lonely road that was still a long way off our campsite home. Once there, we went straight into the back of Graham’s van for another night-cap -and stayed there until we eventually found the energy to crawl into our sleeping bags.

Sunday morning started even more miserable, weather-wise, then Saturday. Nevertheless, we were on the water by 10.30 to have a look at the conditions and hopefully cram in at least one dive for the weekend. The sea was rough again, but we did go as far as the sandbar and – surprise, surprise – our friends, the dolphins, were there again!!! It was almost incredible!!!

This time readily equipped with snorkels and fins, our diving friends jumped in and joined the dolphins in the water. They had never, in their 25 years of diving experience, swam with dolphins or seen them from that close. It was an exhilarating adventure for them, and even for us left in the boat it was absolutely amazing. Unfortunately, the steering of the boat played up again and due to the heavily rolling sea we had to abandon our once-a-lifetime encounter and head back for the safety of the harbour.

It was not the sunny seaside weekend we had hoped for, but for sure one of the most remarkable journeys one can have!!!

by Fera de Vries, Easter 1999