I went to the Seliger lake - 300 km away from Moscow - for a three-day get together of spearos that hang out at the spearfishing/diving club of the Russian Naby's central sports club which culminated in a cup hosted by this organization. We drove for about 3 and a hafl hours (heavy traffic) and then rode about 3 km in a fast boat by a beautiful monastery to a wild spot where about 50 spearos and their families were camping out. The visibility turned out to be low - only about 1 meter in most of the lake, but 3-meter in one of the parts connected to the main lake by a small channel. We scouted the lake for two days on boats, but could not find anything decent, other than pikes, tenches, although more experienced spearos (mostly local guys) got some eels. The second day was my birthday so my buddy (it was the second time in his life that he tried to spearfish - I convinced him to give it a try) got real drunk and the next day when the cup was to take place he would not wake up! So my team, which I officially designated as Nagorno Karabakh team, turned out to be a one-man show. First I dove for eels - there is a grassy spot in the middle of the lake - at about 6 mm, but visibility is real low there - less than a meter - and only if use a flashlight - so that affected my breath holding ability and I switched to a place with better visibility and scouted the borderline between open water and reed(?) that way I got two pikes - but I was braining one, I let go of my Belarussian-made gun and it sank! (the spear rod didn;t come out fully so it didn't go up as it usually does) - I spent about hour looking for it - but water got real murky after one dive in that spot so I could not find it. And the other gun failed me in the end too -- Omer Tempest - it would not shoot. I ended up being second to last amont those spearos that had fish, but there were quite a few that didn't get anything at all, including the guy who won the spearfishing cup in Anapa, Black Sea, in May. The winner got about 10 kilos of different fish, including dog fish, eels, as well as pikes and tenches. You can find some photos of scenary here.
moscowhack - Селигерская Охотопьянка
I made them using my phone cause my camera had drowned in Portugal. But I will post pics of fish as soon as my friends send me shots they took with their cameras.
