Go deep, stay long

Nuidbanch

Too often, I’ve had some fantastic diving experiences but can only share them with words.  California is one of those experiences.  I have sworn to myself that I will never again dive without a camera.

Here on the east coast our shore is composed of white sandy beaches.  Great for sunbathers, but not much to look at for divers.  Other coasts have rocky shores.  On rocky shores, fish have places to hide, plants have places to take root.

The west coast enjoys these rocky shores.  Kelp anchors to the seabed, and a variety of sea life thrives in it’s shelter.  While east coast diving is all about shipwrecks, west coast divers can simply drop in the water and enjoy diving the kelp beds.

Last week I had another opportunity to dive California’s underwater forests.  On my first trip to CA, my 35 mm film camera failed me, and I came home with only memories.  My last trip, I was involved in  some intensive training, and did not bring the camera.  This time, I was taking pictures one way or another.

The reason for the trip revolved around training, again.   This time I was working on an instructor cert on the new KISS GEM pSCR.   After diving the unit for many weeks in our local quarry, I felt comfortable in it’s operation.  Now I had to teach others.  My IT set up the class that involved system operation, buildup, pool and open water.  The first portions went quickly, and we were soon discussing open water.

Point Lobos

In the Monterey area, there are many options for open water dives.  After a few discussions, the decision was on Point Lobos, a small peninsula south of Carmel.  The area is mostly state park with some fantastic vistas.  Shore entry is in a small lagoon with a facility for divers.  Upon arrival we were greeted by local divers, and quickly discussed conditions prior to their second dive.  Our entry was uneventful, and we were soon swimming through the kelp beds.  There is no comparable feeling in Northeast diving.

The next day Alan borrowed a friends boat, and we headed to the Monterey marina breakwater.  I’m sure there are better placed to dive, but on my last visit we saw many Rainbow Nudibranchs close to the breakwater.  We have no such creatures here in the Northeast, so I expressed my fascination, and desire for a picture.

While preparing the boat and gearing up, we observed a number of large red jellyfish floating near the surface.  I gathered as many photos as I could on the surface, and anticipated seeing them in the water.  After a quick boat trip and back roll entry, we headed down to find the anchor a few inches from a line Alan placed a few years earlier.  Over on the breakwater we heard the Sea Lions barking above us and the shrimp crackling in the rocks.  Between drills and sea lion fly byes, Alan helped me snap a few shots of the abundant flora and fauna.

After the class, I spent my preflight surface interval photographing the topside environment.  Seals, sea lions, pelicans, … all posing for the tourist.  It was a great trip with lots of things to learn.  If you ever have the opportunity to visit, I highly recommend getting wet.

OW Class

When our local shop asked if I could lend a hand with classes this spring, I had no idea what I was in for.

Lately, I’ve only been teaching technical and CCR classes.  These students usually have many dives under their belt, and are looking to take the next step beyond recreational diving by honing their skills, learning new ones and expanding their dive planning and preparation.

It was fun working with newer students that were just learning their dive skills.  Since I was assisting where needed, I had the opportunity to work with a number of classes; Open Water, Advanced, Specialties, Rescue…  Then, to top it all off, the shop had nine Diver Master Candidates this spring.

I must admit, to having a lot more fun than expected.  There are always some new students that struggle with simple skills like mask clearing and U/W gear donning.  However, they’ve never done it.  We all struggled with those skills.  Once we learned how it’s done, and had some time to practice, our fear faded.  That’s when we can relax and enjoy the adventure of diving.  This is exciting to see and be around.

Technical diving involves more complicated skills that are much more demanding.  Some of my Tech students joke that I enjoy torturing them.  Not so.  The skills are required by the standards.  Once learned and practiced they become second nature, and can get you out of a bad situation.  Again, that’s when we can really enjoy the adventure.

To all those students that kept me in the pool and up at Dutch, dive safe, practice your skills, and look me up when you need a dive buddy!  Now I’m off to go diving!

Flamingo snail

After a few weekends of being snowed in, I had the opportunity to work through my piles of photos and relate some memories (and pictures) of past trips.Val and I visited Bonaire on two separate trips. I’ve attached some shots of resort (Buddy Dive), and added a new gallery.

For those of you unfamiliar with Bonaire, it is 50 miles north of South America (Venezuela to be exact). The island part of the Nether Antilles. This location of the Caribbean is constantly swept by easterly trade winds. The east side of the island is subject to rough waves and the shoreline is rocky. The western side of the island is protected in the lea. Here is some of the best diving of the Caribbean.

Sunset over Kline

The shore diving really is about as easy as it gets. The dock at Buddy Dive is only a few feet from the dive shop, and the reef is only a few fin strokes away. I spent the first day draining tank after tank poking around the reef. I was working with a new still camera, and practicing with the video housing. Surface intervals were only a quick stop for fresh tanks, batteries, or tape. The top of the reef is about 20 ft deep An Al 80 lasts quite a while at this depth, and decompression is impossible, especially on Nitrox. After 6 tanks, my wife dragged me out of the water for dinner.

The next day we got a map of the island and headed out in our pickup truck (provided with the suite). The west side of the island is rimed with a seemingly continuous reef. In some places it is a double reef with sand in between. On the shore, there are areas where you can park a your truck, gear up, and make an entrance. Some areas have docks and with ladders to facilitate access. These entrance sites have names, which are both on the map, and written on yellow stones along the side of the road.

Clearner shrimp on a butterfly

Our package included boat a few boat dives. These were mostly spent visiting Kline Bonaire. This is an uninhabited island to the west of Bonaire, also protected from the trade winds. Many of these dives were deeper as the slope to Kline was much steeper.

Many sections of the reef hold different microcosm and wild life. There are many web sites describing, so I’ll just point out some of the highlights. The Hilma Hooker is a shipwreck in the sand between a double reef. It’s a nice dive, and if you’re one of the first there, you will find a few large Tarpon hiding in the holds.

Salt Pier is where the dried sea salt is loaded onto ships. The structure of the pier seems to attract schools of fish, and event the shallows are full of life.

Fish to look for:

Eels: this is the one of the first times I’ve seen eels out hunting during the day.

Frog Fish: Another first for me. They are hard to spot, as their camouflage is nearly perfect.
Tarpon: They are huge, and will follow you on a night dive.

Sea horses: Ask your Dive Master where to find them.

School of fish: There are so many fish, that sometimes you feel like one of the crowd

Spotted Eagle Rays: These majestic rays swim effortless and leave you breathless if you try to follow.

Dolphins: I’m not sure how often these appear, but on one day we got snorkel with them on the surface interval.

Shooting a bag while maintaining buoyancy

This fall in the Northeast was a bad season for blowouts and poor visibility.  Several hurricanes passed by, stirring up the surf.  Often, this can help the conditions by mixing the surface water with the cooler water below the thermocline.  Unfortunately this fall it cleared out the plankton on the surface, then just stirred up the bottom into soup.  At this point, the surface had over 50 ft of visibility, but the bottom would drop to less than 5.  That’s on the days we could make it out.

On the plus side, this gave me the opportunity to drag some students up to Dutch and finish up classes.  Once most of the drills are done, I dragged the camera along to grab a few shots.   After this fall, I needed the practice or I’d forget how to work the housing.  Also, I’m playing with a new lenses/port combination that takes some getting use to.  For what it’s worth, here are some of the photos that came out well.

Cave 2 Kick your butt off

Butt kicking again!

In the early spring, a good friend convinced me to take my cave training.    The first part (cavern and intro) was quite enjoyable.  While there were a good number of skills, the conditions were moderate.   This past week we completed the class ( apprentice and full cave).  The dives/ skills were significantly more challenging.  I should have expected this, but it was quite a shock to the psyche.  In addition, I took the first half Open Circuit.  The second half I chose to take Closed Circuit (CCR).

Please don’t take any of this as a negative statement against my instructor.   Just the opposite, he did not hold back, and made sure we were capable of performing the dives safely.   The initial class was restricted by the systems available at the time.  The class was in February, when Ginnie and Manatee were the only systems that were still flowing.  The rest were siphoning river water, and unusable for training.

Given the earlier conditions, I was probably spoiled.   Ginnie is huge with bright, wide open, passages.  Manatee was open with dark but clear passages.    During the dives we practiced our skills and had some really great dives.

This week most of the other systems were open.  We dove Peacock (1 and 3), Madison blue, Cow Springs, and Orange Grove. After getting my butt kicked for a few days, I can say I did survive.   There were many points where I was ready to throw in the towel.  Either my head was not in the right place, or I was struggling with new gear configurations that I did not have time to practice with (my fault).  Either way, it was quite an eye opener.

Don’t get me wrong, some of these passages can be quite beautiful.  The formations and clay layers can be stunning.   On the other hand, I’m not a small man.  At 6′6″, I don’t fit into small passageways.  With full CCR and side mount bailout, I was fighting my way into places that were probably much easier on OC.   However, with the time and duration advantages of CCR, I wanted to finish the class in this configuration.

I’m not going to go into the detail of each dive, but I will say that Paul kicked our butts on most dives.  The skills included several out of air, lights out, lost line… which involved feeling your way along the passages ways.  Some passages ways were smaller than my gear, and involved pulling our way out, as swimming was not an option with OOA diver in tow.   With the low vis on entry, and tight restrictions, it was often difficult to even feel your way.  Only the gold line gave indication of the proper direction.

All in all, we had some great dives, some difficult dives, and some really uncomfortable dives.  Again, this is par for the course.    Many of the skills were to make sure you had the state of mind to survive the worst case.

After all the skills were done, we had the opportunity to just dive.   We hit Orange Grove, and headed over to Challenge sink.  It was a bit of a swim, but a nice open dive with lots to see.  Paul dragged my camera along and took a few shots along the way.  I wish we could have taken a few more shots at Challenge Sink as the light streaming in was quite beautiful, but once we signaled turn, the rest of the group bolted (I’ve got to be more careful with those signals).

The trip was worth the effort.  I know I’ve got a lot to practice before my next excursion.  Paul made me work hard, and he did push a few of my limits, but we also had some great dives, and saw a lot of new systems.  Next time down, I’d love to get some more photos, of these great systems.