DATELINE: 22nd December 2000

PUMPKIN GAMES
It has to be one of the oddest diving competitions ever devised. The Underwater Pumpkin Carving Competition, hosted by Cirencester Dolphin Sub-Aqua Club, added an unusual challenge to an inter-club bonfire and fireworks night dive on 4 November.
Some 25 divers from clubs around the area responded to the idea, proving beyond doubt that sport divers are beyond all rational help. They descended into a Cotswold Water Park lake armed with pumpkins, knives and torches.
Scary Halloween films are nothing on the scene that developed as they carved away at a depth of just 2m in near-freezing water.
The appointed judge, Barry Whitfield, brought his artistic sense to bear on the results. "I awarded first place to Kate Edey for producing the nicest eyes of the lot," he told Diver. "Second went to Paul Rodriguez for the best toothy grin, and third was Louise Clarkson's unusual green pumpkin with carved hair." Prizes included a £100 travel voucher and numerous goodies.
Another diver, Ray Wilce, won a flashing pumpkin to "remind him to be nicer to pumpkins" after producing a sculpture looking as though it had been "attacked by a blunt potato peeler instead of a dive knife".
For everyone who took part there were Halloween pitchforks "which double up as buddy-prodders, minnow-terrifiers or crab-ticklers", and bags of "severed fingers and toes".
The devil knows what they'll get up to next year.

---