Over the years, I’ve had several “lasts” that I knew I was
having… my last day of school, my last days of drum and bugle corps, the last
“gig” I had with the last bar band I played in, my last day at a job I had for
19 years, and the one thing in common with all of these was the last time I had
to drive to the “venue” for the last time doing “whatever”. So that last time getting into the car, putting
the “gear” I needed into it, and going to the place was always a mixed
thing. You always have that “life
passing in your mind” kind of feeling where you remember the first time you
walked into that place, and met those people for the first time, and did
whatever you were doing for the first time.
The past few weeks driving down to the quarry, I’ve had some of those
feelings, and have had to reminisce about some of the people and things that
happened while I was coming here. In
some cases, I’m thankful that I’ve written some of these memories down, and can
go back and read them! (my mind isn’t what it used to be…)
My first arrival at the quarry was on August 25 2004. Not long after I got into this activity. On my 40th birthday (October 7th
2003) I was snorkeling in the Florida Keys, and decided that I should give
diving a try. (hey it LOOKED kinda fun!)
Almost one year later, I was two dives in from a Discover Scuba session
in the Keys, and ready to take my Open Water “check outs” at the quarry. Being a rather large person at the time, renting
a wet suit wasn’t a good option, so I tried buying a BIG one from a place
online, and that seemed to do the trick…. No hood…no gloves, but in August, the
thermocline wasn’t an issue since we weren’t going THAT deep, and we weren’t
staying in THAT long…sucking down an 80 wasn’t a big thing! (And I also figured that since we were going
to the Keys with reckless abandon, who’d NEED a hood, gloves and anything more
than a 3mm!)(boy was I wrong!)(but more on that later) But 125 “diving minutes” later, I was a
certified diver, and figuring that I’d probably only have a few more dives in
that quarry for my Advanced Open Water, next summer.
The next six dives I did were all in the Keys, But for some odd
reason I hung out with a class using a rented steel 95 from BSC and did two in
August of 2005, before my next two dives in the Upper Keys after the Orange
Bowl in January of 2006. After I took my Nitrox course, I went along on two
dives with Jeff who was giving dives 3&4 to an Open Water student, and I
learned to use a 7MM with hood and gloves because my days in the Keys seemed
numbered. (and if I remember correctly, the 7MM was on sale, pretty cheap, and
I thought I could do the “occasional” dive up here in the frozen North) Not too
long after that, Jeff hooked me up with some guy named Rob Sullivan and his friend
Rick McCann since I mentioned that I’d like to maybe start doing a few more
dives at Bainbridge. Little did I know
that I’d be doing a helluva lot more dives with Rob! (and a helluva lot more dives at Bainbridge)
I originally met Rob at Lebanon Valley’s pool while he was
going through his Open Water classes, I was already certified, and Jeff said
‘come on down’ so I could do some warm up dives before I went on a Florida
trip. But this first Wednesday night at
BSC was one of my original “classic” dive reports that I used to put up on the
old Divers Descent website, and I think Rob still reads it occasionally when
he’s had a bad day. But July 19 2006 was the first night Rob and I did a dive
together at BSC and we’ve never looked back. Talk about someone that you are
“comfortable” diving with, you can anticipate their next move, you know when it’s “just not happening” and
you know when it’s time to call it. And you also don’t feel bad if each other needs
to call it because that’s just how it works.
(we’ve had a FEW of those! In fact I found one 12 minute dive in 2007
that just meant earlier beers!) When I
tell my wife that I’m diving with Rob (or John, or a few (very few) other
names) she doesn’t worry about my well-being.
During that time besides Rob, Rick was another one who was
with us a lot early on, Rick and I did a few here and there that we weren’t
supposed to do, and I always remember him saying “don’t tell anyone I had you
here” before I was “advanced”
certified! Rick was one who had to move
on, but we then had another guy, Lee Hansen who came along. Lee was a LT.
Colonel in the US Army who was being stationed in Carlisle for some advanced
military training, he found me on Scubaboard seeing my “Hershey” location and
figured that since I was in Central PA, I’d know where to go. He sent me a note and asked me if there were
any places locally to dive, and if there were any good dive shops around, he
needed to get his regulators serviced when he got into town. I told him about “DDS” and Bainbridge (not to
mention Dutch Springs where he pretty much became a resident on the weekends)
and said I’d meet him at the shop that Saturday, I also met John Weaver for the
first time there that day (who happened to be working in the shop) John’s
another person who’s been around for a long time, and continues to dive with us
to this day. It seems that the last
three people left in the “Scared Turtle” divers that continue to dive at BSC regularly
are Rob, John and me. Early on John
would dive a lot with his daughters, but as his daughters went away to college,
and did other things, he ended up with us more so than anything. He and Rob seemed to do a lot of different
dive courses together as well. It was
always fun with Rhea who made as much noise as I do down there! I remember one
dive when we came back up and Rob said to me “wow, you were really burping and
making a lot of noise down there tonight”, and Rhea goes “that was me!” With a big proud smile on her face! John’s wife Anne seems to only come to Dutch
Springs with us, but I seem to remember her a few times at BSC.
A few others that I met at that time besides some of the
shop principles were Frank Lynch who got “re” certified (I think “re”) about
the time I was getting certified, and did a lot of diving with us, Layne Wonica, who has apparently surfaced
again for one of the recent trips, (and I ran into him about a year back at the
”Grange Fair” up near State College) and
Christopher Rosing whom I originally met in a PADI Equipment course, but
started showing up on a lot of Wednesday nights, he ended up doing a whole lot
of diving with us. One fun time was during my Advanced course, Christopher was
there for a few of the “modules”… one of them being my search and recovery…he
saw where I dropped my “object”, helped me recover it, then we just did a “fun”
dive for about 20 minutes to pass the time and make it look good!
Another good regular at the time was Lee Millard. It seemed that if I wasn’t able to dive with
Rob, Lee was there, so I had a good Wednesday night crew to dive with. One of my favorite times at the quarry with
Lee was when I first got my dry suit, and Lee was ready to try his in open
water (he DID try it in a pool) But in
March (which was pretty early for quarry diving at the time) Lee and I decided to go “dust off the
platforms” (his comment) and try out our suits for the first time in the quarry. It was a fun time, and the dive report I
wrote up had some funny stuff, including my feet first ascent, and our passing
each other going up and down at the line!
A few years back Todd Swain started diving with us, I think
I first met him on his daughters Open Water dives that I was hanging out. Not
long after, he started hanging out with us on Wednesdays. He’s obviously gone
crazy with the cave thing, and purchasing the rebreathers and scooters, and…ok,
he wins as far as cool dive gear!
Over the years a few other people wove in and out of our
crew, John Cheeseman, decided to dive with us, then went to other shops, then
found other people, then stopped being affiliated with shops, but would dive
with certain people occasionally. Mostly a nice person though, as is his wife
Liz. Justin was another one that was
there early on, and disappeared after a while.
Lou Starzl came for several Wednesdays, but disappeared just as quickly
as he appeared. Lou experienced one of the FEW dives where I was able to
lead! I did the hard part and got us to
the pipeline that leads to the CAT, and he took over from there! Ron Hivner and his lovely wife Mindy show up
occasionally. It seems that the past few years Ron did a dive with Rob and me
the first and LAST Wednesday nights, although this season he went with us a few
more times. Mindy isn’t much of a BSC fan, but she’s taking her divemaster
course and has no choice.
Here’s where I get to mention Jeff and Annette again. I think the last time I got to talk about
them was when Jeff was closing down his website and I was starting this one to
post my dive reports, and I thanked them
for the help early on. Honestly, without the two of them, I probably wouldn’t
have one eighth of the dives I have in the quarry, and would probably be one of
those “need a refresher I’m going on a vacation where I might do four dives”
kind of people. I wouldn’t own my own
cylinders, a dry suit, or even one third of the equipment that I have. Jeff got me into the quarry, and that’s why
this is a tough thing!
Other people through the years that we didn’t dive with, but
saw on a fairly regular basis; Jim
Brown, who I originally met on a PA diving website while inquiring about the
whole Bainbridge thing way back, before Jeff just said “ come hang out on a
class, and I’ll introduce you to a few guys on Wednesday night”, “Beanie and Cecil” (Of which we
did a dive with Beanie a few Wednesday’s back since Cecil didn’t show up) Then there's the guy that blows in, does a solo dive and gets annoyed at everyone
because he left his DECO bottle on a platform, and thinks he need to do some
DECO, but blows it off because he’s mad. (but we guess is OK because he just
grabs his gear and leaves) The guy that gets annoyed because we all started
diving doubles, and continue to dive in dry suits during the summer. And thinks
we’re in over our heads (ok, we ARE diving!) And others that are just too numerous to
mention. (mainly because my mind isn’t
as sharp as it once was)(I blame the viz)
Now to the people that RAN the Quarry. Steve and Susie. Most of the time, it seemed that Steve was
puttering around doing something, either over by the barn, or on his little
golf cart, and Susie was in the shop
checking creds. 99% of the time when I got there I had to hit the men’s room
(due to the extreme hydrating that you’re supposed to do before diving that I
did on my way to the quarry, yeah I read the books!) and Susie wanted to
talk! Not being a rude person, I
usually stood there and talked to her, and was polite. Got to know her FAIRLY well over the past 11
years, and thought that she was really a nice person. (what's funny was we were talking today and she asked me how old I was...when I told her she was amazed that I was 51! She thought I was late 30's! God Bless her!!!) Steve got to know me from just seeing me, and
knowing that I was one of his patrons.
We’d chit chat about different things, and he’d join the conversation
when Susie and I were talking up a storm.
I always got a “Hi Ben, how are ya!?” whenever I saw him. Great people to know, and just fun to chat
with whenever you had the time. I feel bad that some people were rude as hell
towards them when they announced the closing, I’m not the happiest camper about
it, but when you want to retire, and you get no good buyers, what can you do!?
I wish them well, nonetheless!
Anyway…a lot of great memories from me, I can only imagine
what everyone else has…and the things that I forgot, forgot to mention, and the
things that I’ll remember after I post this!
We can only hope that at some point the new owners realize that this
place is still worthwhile for what it’s been used for over the past 30-odd
years! Things don’t look good as far as
diving here in the future, but we can only hope… I just checked my stats, I did
225 dives there from August 25, 2004, until today, including my Open Water,
Advanced Open Water, and Nitrox dives.
Rob and John said that they had a lot as well.
Leaving Bainbridge is like breaking up with an old easy
girlfriend…she may not be the prettiest thing, but you know you’ll always get a
reliable trip to the Pump House and occasionally: A Barn Run!
I’m gonna miss ya old
girl! So long old friend, thanks for letting us blow our bubbles and make some
great memories there!
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