I remember the day when -

I met Dave for the first time in the Bar of the Langrove country club in 1993. He had moved down into one of the cottages in the grounds after getting a job in Swansea working for Comcen computer supplies. He was dressed in a sharp grey suit and looked every inch the successful salesperson. I remember him immediately making friends with my neighbours, Sally and Lee, whom I had never really spoken to, and just being so friendly.

I played him at pool and had a couple of drinks and the next day he came round to my cottage for a chat and a cup of tea. It has always remained with me how Dave could take the bull by the horns when making new friends. He didn't wait for it to happen, he made it happen. On loads of occasions I've heard him say to relative strangers 'Can I come', and having gone they've come back firm friends too.

My wife Jen remembers Dave from this time as Immaculately groomed (he once spent 20 minutes on his hair before we went out), chivalrous and courteous, and he was one of the only people who could ever call her 'Jenny' and get away with it, in fact she loved it.

Dave spent the next couple of weeks doing up his cottage, stripping down the painted wood to stain it and decorating the walls to his tastes.

We all had a party in the cottage next to his after he had been there about a week and he came to it and proved to be the life and soul. He introduced us to his party games and entered into them with great gusto and absolutely no inhibitions. I invited Jen to that party when she was just an aquaintance and she phoned to say her car had broken down and couldn't come. Dave suggested we phone her back and we could go and get her. She managed to get a lift and we've been together now for 10 years and married for 3 with a lovely son Coby.

We went to Pwll Du Bay (Pronounced Puth Dee) on the gower to a rock he'd discovered that he fancied getting onto and fishing the high tide. He was like a mountain goat skipping across little rocks jutting out of the water to reach the rock he'd set his mind on. I was like a mountain pig. I could feel myself starting  to go and for a moment it was like a cartoon where wile-e-coyote realises he's over the drop and then starts scrabbling for a foothold. I went right under and my wellies filled with water. Dave was on top of the rock 'picking his spot' to jump in and save me, apparently he had some lifeguard skills, but I managed to get a grip and climb the rock. We then sat on the rock fishing for 6 hours til the tide went out, me in my pants, him in his waterproofs. If you ever needed a washing line making out of fishing line, Dave was you man.

We even spent a night on Worm's Head Island which you reach over a natural causeway which is open for 2 hours either side of high tide. We weighed our equipment and it came to almost 100Lbs each, mine in a huge sports holdall and Daves in a backpack and a couple of carrier bags. We had a kettle, stove, an iron frying pan, pints of milk, a ridge tent, the whole works. We set up the tent on a bit of grass on a slope where the wind hadn't reached 100Mph yet and as we were about to have our supper a mad looking guy passed us and said 'see you later boys', now that's enough to get you concerned, especially since it was before the days of mobile phones, although we had taken the hall mirror to signal for assistance if anything went wrong. We turned in for the night, I with my quilt and hypoallergenic pillow, Dave in his scruffy old fishing blanket. Turned out he was allergic to the blanket. He kept waking me up to ask me questions and in the end admitted he was a bit scared as it was so dark and then I heard the snuffling outside. Two scared blokes in a tent now. To cap it all of he needed a wee, so we eventually rigged the door to open just around his most personal part and hoped the snuffling wasn't a pig intent on locating a tasty morsal for its supper. Night went fine after that, and we had a huge fry up breakfast. We were prevented fishing by the seals who kept chasing our spinners and we tried to catch an 8ft Jellyfish with size 10 hooks and 8lb breaking strain line. All we caught was one dogfish. It took 2 hours getting back because of all of the debris scattered on the rock from the high winds and we were absolutley shattered. It is also one of the best 2 days of my life.