Lucy Fanet briefs Alisha and Aaron Squirrell before a sheltered sea trip maximum of £ 10,000 . However , as Sport England is running the scheme , sadly only clubs “ for the benefit of people residing in England ” are eligible to apply .
What did you need to do ?
Both Sport England and Crowdfunder have some great guides to help you through the initial build of your crowdfunding page . Sport England assigns a case officer too : these guys really were a font of knowledge , especially advising on the type of rewards that would bring non-members to the page to increase its reach . We met our target of £ 1,500 in October and received £ 1,500 from the scheme and £ 1,000 from Grow Nature . We needed to set up a virtual wallet , this was simple enough to do but took a number of emails to and from Crowdfunder , as every document had to be just right .
What is the club planning for the next few years ?
Like most clubs we enjoy annual trips and our plan is to expand our training programme and tie the two together , to help develop a sense of community within the club . It can be difficult pairing instructors and students for practical training ; it ’ s frustrating for both , so we ’ re looking at a new approach for 2021 . We ran a Dive Leader course a couple of years ago with all theory and pool work completed in the UK and the practical elements on the annual club trip . We ’ re going to try to formalise this a bit more in 2021 and include the trip in clear , warm , blue waters as part of our Ocean Diver training . The last couple of trips have been to Malta , diving with Corsair Diving ; the 2020 trip was cancelled but we ’ ve pencilled it in for late September 2021 . Fingers crossed !
We want to raise our profile locally , hoping to get out diving more , which keeps our existing members happy and entices new ones in . We want to hold more try-dives . The pool is booked : we just need it to open .
What about skill development training ?
We usually tie up with fellow north-coast club Ilfracombe ( in Devon ) and attend SDCs with them or attend regional courses , especially for rescue management . We were going to host an IFC in February , but it was cancelled . That would have been our first input to an IFC , with our lead instructor helping as the local organiser .
We haven ’ t talked about your local diving …
We probably shore dive more than boat dive . From Bude and Port Gaverne , the north coast of Cornwall has some of the best reefs in the UK to dive , especially when the weather has been calm and the viz explodes out to 20m +. That said , around 20 per cent of our dives are from the club RIB and another 20 per cent take place on local ( ish ) hard boats . Atlantic Scuba , Dive Newquay and Red Alert at Bovisand are three regulars .
Our wrecks really are just that – wrecked – as the winter storms really do pound the shallower wrecks . That said , local sites such as SS Sphene and SS Arthur Town get visited regularly , as they are so full of life . Being so weather dependant , we aren ’ t adverse to seeing the sea flat , sending a few messages and jumping in after work : we ’ ve learned to grab the viz while the surf ’ s off elsewhere . �
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