wb5plj
Contributor
- Messages
- 82
- Reaction score
- 0
Greetings and Salutations
It was suggested upon my joining this site that I put up some info about me to introduce my self. I thought that would be a good idea and then promptly forgot about it. But I remembered and here I am.
I am Completely new to diving, I am sure it is the same story as a lot of people, always interested but never got around to it. My friend Bob lives in New Mexico got me into it. He pushed me on into it by getting his certificate in January of this year and he has completed something on the order of thirteen dives. I live in Jefferson City Missouri so we have not gone diving together yet but we are planing on his next trip up to Missouri (The end of June) to get in some of the lakes and such during the week if I can organize something. That is if the weather will ever hold out long enough for me to get my Certificate. They talk about drugs like Tobacco and Heroin being addicting but they haven't compared it to SCUBA Diving I suppose. I new I was hooked from the first night in the local YMCA's pool. Even though it was just a pool I couldn't help smiling stupidly afterwards. Their are few things to do that are both tranquil and exhilarating.
A little bit about me, I am 33 and a Java J2EE Programmer, for those of you whom don't know (all the other computer geeks like me out there already got it) that means I develop web based applications like ebay for example, and bulletin board systems like this one (of course this one is not written in Java but rather PHP.) Some of the more astute observers, or people with more time on their hands would ask then why is my personal web site (http://www.wb5plj.org) so booing?! All I can say is when you start doing something for a living you often stop doing it for enjoyment. I went to collage in my late twenties to get my BS in CIS. Previous to that I was a Metal Fabricator (Welder mostly) and had tuns of other jobs including running my own produce stand in Mena Arkansas and working as a zoo keeper.
I am one of those people whom is interested in just about everything to some degree. I am a ham radio operator, I roast my own coffee (oh, it is worth the effort) and for a while used to grow my own mushrooms. Well suffice it to say that I have more interests than time or money but so far I haven't come across anything as exhilarating as Diving, at least not this week. Of course I have not yet been paragliding
I have only been diving once so far (I am not counting the two times in the pool), the first of the two Open water dives for my certificate. Last Tuesday afternoon on 4/25/06, Air temperature was in the upper fifties, lower sixties and I don't know the water temperature. This was in a small local quarry not far from Jefferson City owned by the dive shop where I am getting my certificate (SCUBA Adventure). On hand where the instructor (Jeff Adams), three other experienced divers to assist the Instructor and four of us students.
Visibility was not great but I guess it is about normal for a small quarry in Missouri. The instructor said it was over five feet but just getting used to all of the stuff floating around it seemed like less. My friend Bob has no idea about this of course. he has been diving mostly in a place called the blue hole (http://www.dtmag.com/dive-usa/BlueHoleStRosaNM.html) where visibility is something like sixty to eighty feet and the year round water temp is above sixty degrees Fahrenheit. how horrible for him.
Now I am normally the first person in the room to get cold, I can't stress this enough, I like my house to be about 70-72 degrees, but I was warm all through the dive and even after the dive while standing around and yapping. Mostly listening to the three experienced divers complaining about the cold, but then they have the tropics to compare it to. Two of us students where just fine and very comfortable the other two I did spot shivering after the dive. The instructor was wearing a dry suit so not surprisingly no complaints where herd from him.
I will admit that the first leak of water around the wrists and ankles and leaking through the zipper in my wetsuit where like ice water but by the time I had walked in enough to float and put on my fins it was not cold. I guess the whole theory of the body temp warming up the little bit of water that leaks in the wetsuit plays out fairly well. I was wearing a 7mm Aqualung "Aqua Flex" full suit with a 6mm hooded vest over that. Their was a bit of a cold shock on the cheeks and lips at the first thermocline around twenty foot and then again at the second down at about 40 foot. The first time through this was a bit of a shocking cold but quickly subsided and passing through the thermocline again did not have the same result. I made sure a couple of times to reach up and feel my cheek and lips to see if they where just numb and that did not seam to be the case.
Me and my dive partner (Charley, the other male student) completed all of the tasks quickly with the instructor and two of the experienced divers while the other experienced diver tended to the other two students. Two ladies whom where having more difficulties than Charley or I getting organized with their equipment.
Completing all of the tasks was very easy for both me and charley, I had a bit of struggle due to being under weighted. I started with a 24lbs weight belt which was not enough, after the first drop down to the platform at twenty feet (and the first few tasks completed) one of the other divers put four more pounds from his BC in the back pockets of my BC. this still was not enough. I did complete the second drop to the platform and the required tasks but had to keep from taking full breaths or I would rocket up. Tasks completed me and Charley both headed back to the truck to get more weight, charley wanted a few more pounds himself. I added eight more pounds to my BC pockets, this is now thirty seven pounds! I could get down ok after that.
They all then began to work with the two ladies while me and charley simply played around on our own for nearly an hour. We went down and up several times and where having a lot of fun despite the fact that neither of us where coming any ware near mastering buoyancy control. Finally we came up and saw that everyone was working on getting out of the water. The instructor basically told us that everyone else was to cold and where done for the day. I looked at Charley and he looked at me and I know we where sharing the same thought, which we talked about later. Not only where neither of us cold we both felt quite warm!
I suppose that I could have been having so much fun that I had not noticed that I was cold but if that where the case I would have expected the start getting cold some time after the dive. Their must have been twenty to thirty minuets at the dive site of standing around in my swim trunks and a polo shirt after removing my wetsuit. As dusk set in we headed out, unfortunately after leaving the quarry Charley had to stop at the corner gas station due to his truck being stuck in 4WD. That was another hour standing around in my swim trunks waiting for someone to come and get the truck. This was now after sunset and it had just started to rain as I started to feel somewhat cold.
I suppose this is, like so many things, a very personal issue. I am sure that depth and time also have their part to play in this issue. I took the class room and pool part of this course in mid March, had to wait until April for the open water dive due to concerns about the cold. And though we where scheduled to take the second open water dive (getting me my certificate) the very next afternoon on 4/26/06. the plan quickly switched to a full week later on May the third. Which due to rain was put off until some other time. I am still waiting! Hopefully one after noon this week.
I have most of the basic gear either here or on order but still lack some things like weights which apparently I will need a lot of. I haven't yet picked up my BC either. The list so far goes;
thanks for reading and I hope to see you under the water. But will be glad to see you else ware.
Dwayne
It was suggested upon my joining this site that I put up some info about me to introduce my self. I thought that would be a good idea and then promptly forgot about it. But I remembered and here I am.
I am Completely new to diving, I am sure it is the same story as a lot of people, always interested but never got around to it. My friend Bob lives in New Mexico got me into it. He pushed me on into it by getting his certificate in January of this year and he has completed something on the order of thirteen dives. I live in Jefferson City Missouri so we have not gone diving together yet but we are planing on his next trip up to Missouri (The end of June) to get in some of the lakes and such during the week if I can organize something. That is if the weather will ever hold out long enough for me to get my Certificate. They talk about drugs like Tobacco and Heroin being addicting but they haven't compared it to SCUBA Diving I suppose. I new I was hooked from the first night in the local YMCA's pool. Even though it was just a pool I couldn't help smiling stupidly afterwards. Their are few things to do that are both tranquil and exhilarating.
A little bit about me, I am 33 and a Java J2EE Programmer, for those of you whom don't know (all the other computer geeks like me out there already got it) that means I develop web based applications like ebay for example, and bulletin board systems like this one (of course this one is not written in Java but rather PHP.) Some of the more astute observers, or people with more time on their hands would ask then why is my personal web site (http://www.wb5plj.org) so booing?! All I can say is when you start doing something for a living you often stop doing it for enjoyment. I went to collage in my late twenties to get my BS in CIS. Previous to that I was a Metal Fabricator (Welder mostly) and had tuns of other jobs including running my own produce stand in Mena Arkansas and working as a zoo keeper.
I am one of those people whom is interested in just about everything to some degree. I am a ham radio operator, I roast my own coffee (oh, it is worth the effort) and for a while used to grow my own mushrooms. Well suffice it to say that I have more interests than time or money but so far I haven't come across anything as exhilarating as Diving, at least not this week. Of course I have not yet been paragliding
I have only been diving once so far (I am not counting the two times in the pool), the first of the two Open water dives for my certificate. Last Tuesday afternoon on 4/25/06, Air temperature was in the upper fifties, lower sixties and I don't know the water temperature. This was in a small local quarry not far from Jefferson City owned by the dive shop where I am getting my certificate (SCUBA Adventure). On hand where the instructor (Jeff Adams), three other experienced divers to assist the Instructor and four of us students.
Visibility was not great but I guess it is about normal for a small quarry in Missouri. The instructor said it was over five feet but just getting used to all of the stuff floating around it seemed like less. My friend Bob has no idea about this of course. he has been diving mostly in a place called the blue hole (http://www.dtmag.com/dive-usa/BlueHoleStRosaNM.html) where visibility is something like sixty to eighty feet and the year round water temp is above sixty degrees Fahrenheit. how horrible for him.
Now I am normally the first person in the room to get cold, I can't stress this enough, I like my house to be about 70-72 degrees, but I was warm all through the dive and even after the dive while standing around and yapping. Mostly listening to the three experienced divers complaining about the cold, but then they have the tropics to compare it to. Two of us students where just fine and very comfortable the other two I did spot shivering after the dive. The instructor was wearing a dry suit so not surprisingly no complaints where herd from him.
I will admit that the first leak of water around the wrists and ankles and leaking through the zipper in my wetsuit where like ice water but by the time I had walked in enough to float and put on my fins it was not cold. I guess the whole theory of the body temp warming up the little bit of water that leaks in the wetsuit plays out fairly well. I was wearing a 7mm Aqualung "Aqua Flex" full suit with a 6mm hooded vest over that. Their was a bit of a cold shock on the cheeks and lips at the first thermocline around twenty foot and then again at the second down at about 40 foot. The first time through this was a bit of a shocking cold but quickly subsided and passing through the thermocline again did not have the same result. I made sure a couple of times to reach up and feel my cheek and lips to see if they where just numb and that did not seam to be the case.
Me and my dive partner (Charley, the other male student) completed all of the tasks quickly with the instructor and two of the experienced divers while the other experienced diver tended to the other two students. Two ladies whom where having more difficulties than Charley or I getting organized with their equipment.
Completing all of the tasks was very easy for both me and charley, I had a bit of struggle due to being under weighted. I started with a 24lbs weight belt which was not enough, after the first drop down to the platform at twenty feet (and the first few tasks completed) one of the other divers put four more pounds from his BC in the back pockets of my BC. this still was not enough. I did complete the second drop to the platform and the required tasks but had to keep from taking full breaths or I would rocket up. Tasks completed me and Charley both headed back to the truck to get more weight, charley wanted a few more pounds himself. I added eight more pounds to my BC pockets, this is now thirty seven pounds! I could get down ok after that.
They all then began to work with the two ladies while me and charley simply played around on our own for nearly an hour. We went down and up several times and where having a lot of fun despite the fact that neither of us where coming any ware near mastering buoyancy control. Finally we came up and saw that everyone was working on getting out of the water. The instructor basically told us that everyone else was to cold and where done for the day. I looked at Charley and he looked at me and I know we where sharing the same thought, which we talked about later. Not only where neither of us cold we both felt quite warm!
I suppose that I could have been having so much fun that I had not noticed that I was cold but if that where the case I would have expected the start getting cold some time after the dive. Their must have been twenty to thirty minuets at the dive site of standing around in my swim trunks and a polo shirt after removing my wetsuit. As dusk set in we headed out, unfortunately after leaving the quarry Charley had to stop at the corner gas station due to his truck being stuck in 4WD. That was another hour standing around in my swim trunks waiting for someone to come and get the truck. This was now after sunset and it had just started to rain as I started to feel somewhat cold.
I suppose this is, like so many things, a very personal issue. I am sure that depth and time also have their part to play in this issue. I took the class room and pool part of this course in mid March, had to wait until April for the open water dive due to concerns about the cold. And though we where scheduled to take the second open water dive (getting me my certificate) the very next afternoon on 4/26/06. the plan quickly switched to a full week later on May the third. Which due to rain was put off until some other time. I am still waiting! Hopefully one after noon this week.
I have most of the basic gear either here or on order but still lack some things like weights which apparently I will need a lot of. I haven't yet picked up my BC either. The list so far goes;
- Aqualung Aqua Flex 7mm full suit (supper stretchy, very nice)
- Aqualung 6mm hooded vest
- Aqualung Blades 2 fins
- Aqualung Legend LX Supreme ACD (still on order)
- Air source inflator/octopus thing (also still on order)
- Suunto VYTec (writs model) with Transmitter (poor thing has never bin in the water yet)
- 5mm DeepSee Gloves
- Deep See Manta hard sole boots
- Aqualung Mask (I where glasses and got my lenses put in it, very nice by the way, very expensive but very nice)
- Aqualung impulse 2 snorkel that does not have the flexy bottom on it and I hate it, it is always in my way and it will be getting replaced
- And a big o'le 1660 Pelican Case to throw it all into
thanks for reading and I hope to see you under the water. But will be glad to see you else ware.
Dwayne
