After a few weeks off, (for Beneath the Sea and Easter) it
was definitely time to get back into the water.
I talked to Rob earlier in the week, and we were bound and determined to
go. We just had to make sure that everything
was good on the home front before we totally committed, and on Friday, the “go?”
was a “GO!” We put it up on the Scared
Turtle page, and John was on board within minutes. We all arrived at the quarry, only to see
what appeared to be an Open Water class prepping. I was thinking “wet suits…yikes!” But they all had that determined look in
their eyes. Not the water I want a wet suit, I was thinking, but you do what
you gotta do!
Now in MY case, I have to use the old idiom; “The best laid
plans of mice and men oft go astray”. If
there was ever a time that applied, today was the day! If you remember a few weeks back, I had the
slight glove leak that froze my right hand, so I was bound and determined to
find a solution that would help if I ever got a tiny leak like that again. I saw an ad come through that had some dry
glove solutions that I thought would be helpful if I ever had a slight leak
like that again… I picked up one part online, and figured that I’d get the
other part when I got to Beneath the Sea at their booth. One part was a half glove that went through
your wrist seal, to help both the flow of air into your dry glove, and also
stop any water leakage if it DID get wet. (as well as help keep your hands warm) The
second part was a thin neoprene glove that went on your hand over the wrist
part, and under your dry glove that would work as a warm glove and as a normal
neoprene glove would, should any water
get in. I thought that this was a nice combo to try, given my usual slight
glove leaks. I got the parts together, and tried them on one of my hands in my
garage, and it all seemed like a good combo.
Well…when you have all of this ready to go, it’s about time to have
a major dry glove malfunction! Of
course when I was all suited up and ready to put my dry glove on over the new
configuration, the ring that holds the glove to the receiver popped off, so I
had to figure out in a pinch how to get it back on. (it’s been at least since this time last year
that I had to mess with it) It took a few of us a minute or two to finally
figure it out, so we got it. And then as
I put the other glove on, same thing, so once again I had to quickly connect
the glove back to the receiver. I
thanked my helper, and ran down to the water.
When I put my hands into the water, they seemed fine, so I put on my
fins, then went to put my mask on…as I did, I saw a piece of neoprene floating
on the water, I turned to Rob and said “Is my hood ripped”? He said “yep, you’re missing a part over your
eyes” I was going to just leave it be,
and give the dive a shot, figuring that my head will get wet anyway, and the
amount of space that would have been covered would be insignificant, but as my
hands were in the water, I could feel that they were getting cold, and a little
wet, so I decided that I should run up, swap hoods, and get into my 7mm wet
gloves. I guess this only counted for two strike's since one problem was a glove, and one was a hood...so still a go!
Ok, all problems solved, so we were a go; we dropped in and
met at the 20 ft. tree. We all looked
for any errant bubbles, and no one had any, so we all gave the “ok’s” and we
were off. We heard from Jim that the visibility was decent ABOVE 50ft, and not so great below, but we didn’t think it
would be as bad as it was. Passing along
some of the attractions, we were soon at the CAT. We all checked in and were ready to slide
down the hill. The scenery wasn’t as
nice as it HAD been, and as we got closer to the Deep Boat, it got worse. I was
wondering if it was someone that might have kicked it up, or if it was just
from the odd weather we had over the past several days. Passing the boat, it appeared that we were
continuing along the ridge, and looking for the line that ran us out towards the Box
Truck and the Tool Box. After a little swimming, the line was in sight, but I
mostly just made sure that I kept Rob’s (thankfully yellow) fins in my light path. We checked in occasionally, and all was good,
(although I was still a little messy and felt slightly floaty here and there,
every time I tried to get off of the bottom. I figured that at this rate, If I
clogged up the viz more than it was, it MIGHT deter people from coming this way
and not seeing anything anyway!) We
were soon at the Tool Box (which was all that I saw) and were then heading out
with John in a different direction. A
little while later, we were staring at the Outhouse. (well I was staring UP at it) I totally stopped finning and moving, and
didn’t drop or ascend, so I think I finally got myself to where I wanted to be,
but 10-15 minutes into the dive…(and my hands were freezing) We all checked in and continued on along the
bottom of the slope. We were soon passing the Pump House, so I checked to see
if the little lobster was there, he was, but would have to wait for a cleaning. Up the hill, and we were soon passing the CAT
again. We followed along the slope, and
along one of the cliffs, until John turned and pointed back. I agreed, and followed. As we approached the Pickup Truck, I saw John
hold on to the side of the bed, then I
saw him stand and thought; “cramp?!” Yep…I
could see him standing on his fin, and stretching his leg…must have been a
nasty one. We continued on, and were
soon at the safety stop. I found my spot
(at 24 feet) and did my five minutes, which I could barely see since it seemed
that the second time I put my mask on, the defog I put on my magnifying lens,
must have washed off, and the lens was foggy most of the dive. As soon as we
were done, we exited.
Deepest Depth: 95 ft.
Duration: 44 Minutes
Coldest Temp: 35º
Not my best dive ever; but definitely not my worst. And I actually SAID that once I spit my regularot out when we surfaced! I HATE to say "what else could go wrong" before a dive, because it messes with my head, but that would have just "made my day"! Honestly, I love dives when I know there’s room for
improvement the next time, because I know that I CAN do better from a technique
stand point, but when it’s equipment related, I get a bit annoyed because I
have a little work to do, and it’s not guaranteed. So besides needing to get a fill Monday
night, I need to check out new hoods. (I hate my back up hood) and I also need
to play with my dry gloves again this week, (got the Si-Tech book back out) And... I might even swap out wrist
seals, because I think I MIGHT have a slight leak in the right one (which wasn’t
the ‘glove’ that leaked THIS week, so I know that when I pulled my new inner
system, it wasn’t wet on that side..the other side worked, so who knows?) I’m not
sure if the glove issue had to do with my new inner glove configuration (as I
said, it worked in my garage last week) or if I was just trying to make sure
they closed, and closed it too tightly…but
I will have to check… I expect major dry glove system work this week, just
something else to do.
After we packed, we headed to MooDuck brewery in
Elizabethtown for some micro brewed beer, and a nice lunch. A decent
beer if you ask me, if you get down that way, give it a shot! (The chili was pretty good as well) That’s it for this week, we’ll see what
happens in the coming weeks, it’s only about eight weeks until Wednesday night
diving !
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