Went to the shop to borrow a drysuit since mine is out for repair (no charge since I bought the suit there). PeeYew!! It stinks pretty bad, doesn't have dry gloves or dry hood and the boots are XL (I normally wear M). The owner asked if I was going by myself - Yep, unless he knows of someone who wants to go? As a matter of fact, he does! A guy who is a recently certified instructor and wants to teach through the shop. We meet up - he drives and I spring for the tunnel pass. During the hour drive, we exchange experience levels, which means I tell him I'm pretty inexperienced and he says he has about 500 dives in 5 years, about 1/2 in cold water. He doesn't know the cove we're diving very well and I do, so he asks me to play tour guide.
We get in the water and as I turn my head to watch the new buddy (NB) bouncing his way down the boat ramp, I'm suddenly reminded that this rental drysuit's neck seal isn't snug enough for my neck :frosty:
I show the NB where we usually set the flag so we don't piss off the barge or boat ramp operators :livid:
We then proceed to "the box," which is a shipping container with 2 man doors on one side and one in the middle. NB swims in the end door and proceeds to silt out the box before exiting via a side door. Oh well, I'll check it out later when the dust settles. We find the line and follow it out to the plane wreck. As we get there, NB signals low on air and he's turning the dive. He had mentioned that he's an air hog, but I notice he's got 130cf tanks, so I was definitely NOT expecting him to be low on air 18 minutes into the dive? And we were only at 36'? He then hauls butt back toward the box. This is more work than I'm interested in doing, so I tap him on the arm (which scared the pee out of him since he though I was going to continue the dive!) and ask him to please slow down a bit, which he does. I collected the flag and did a safety stop, so took a couple minutes longer to exit than he did. Dive time 25 min, 36' max, viz 40'+ (the kelp and plankton have died off for the season) Water temp 48F.
Turns out NB had lost an ankle weight and was struggling a bit, which was why he burned through so much air. He also mentioned he thought I would continue my dive when he turned. I let him know that since we hadn't discussed that before submerging, as far as I was concerned, my dive was over when his was. Not a big deal. For the next dive we agreed on splitting up when he was ready to go back.
Returned to the water after a little more than an hour. NB only bounced off the bottom a couple times this dive, so having both ankle weights apparently helped. Bypassed the box, went to the plane and poked around for a bit. At about 20 min, NB signals he's going back. I continue on to the crane, which is in 2 parts. Not so much life there, but interesting structure. Head on down to the Tanker (a railroad tank car). It's got lots of life on, around and under it. It also has a memorial to a diver that died in the cove a couple years ago (this had a starfish on it). Circled over part of the debris pile - which is a HUGE, spread-out pile of pipes and other steel that was dumped (along with the crane and the tank car) off the end of the now defunct dock back in the 40's. This debris pile is good for many, many dives without getting tired of it. Anyhow, continued back to the plane and made a slow trip back to the box. It's at 32' now that the tide's up. I spent a few minutes looking around inside it now that the silt had settled. It has pretty good growth on the walls and ceiling. Left there and hung out near the flag (20') for a few minutes watching a couple of little hermit crabs fighting over something. Collected the flag and proceeded slowly to the bottom of the boat ramp (12') and spent some more time there while a greenling harassed me. He looked pretty defensive and kept coming to within an inch or two of my mask and flaring out his fins. Pretty cute, actually. Then a 5 minute ascent up the boat ramp, by which time I was pretty much a popsicle after 65 minutes in 46F water with a partly flooded dry suit :cold: Awesome dive, 20-40' viz, depending on location.
The NB and I exchanged phone #'s and agreed to meet weekly when possible.
As I pulled into the shop to drop off the dry suit, I got a phone call from a guy who's OW class I helped with last summer. I've dove with him a couple times since, he wants a dive buddy for whatever weekends work out this winter. He also said his wife (who certified in the same class) wants me to dive with her. She was extremely nervous during the class, but for some reason she decided she was comfortable with me. She's decided she really likes diving and wants to get more experience, but her comfort level is good viz and less than 30' depth. No problem - I'd love to dive with her!
On my way home, I talked to my more regular dive buddy. She wants to fly us to Seldovia in her little plane next week and spend a couple days diving.
After I finally got home, I got a call from a woman I dove with a few times a couple months ago. Her GF (I haven't met her yet)just got certified in Oregon and is planning to come up here in Dec. The woman I know wants a buddy to dive with so she can work out some buoyance issues.
WooHoo!! In one day I went from rarely finding a dive buddy to now I'm going to have to sneak off if I want to dive by myself!
Now I've got to go wash my undergarment that reeks like a stinky dry suit
uke:
We get in the water and as I turn my head to watch the new buddy (NB) bouncing his way down the boat ramp, I'm suddenly reminded that this rental drysuit's neck seal isn't snug enough for my neck :frosty:
I show the NB where we usually set the flag so we don't piss off the barge or boat ramp operators :livid:
We then proceed to "the box," which is a shipping container with 2 man doors on one side and one in the middle. NB swims in the end door and proceeds to silt out the box before exiting via a side door. Oh well, I'll check it out later when the dust settles. We find the line and follow it out to the plane wreck. As we get there, NB signals low on air and he's turning the dive. He had mentioned that he's an air hog, but I notice he's got 130cf tanks, so I was definitely NOT expecting him to be low on air 18 minutes into the dive? And we were only at 36'? He then hauls butt back toward the box. This is more work than I'm interested in doing, so I tap him on the arm (which scared the pee out of him since he though I was going to continue the dive!) and ask him to please slow down a bit, which he does. I collected the flag and did a safety stop, so took a couple minutes longer to exit than he did. Dive time 25 min, 36' max, viz 40'+ (the kelp and plankton have died off for the season) Water temp 48F.
Turns out NB had lost an ankle weight and was struggling a bit, which was why he burned through so much air. He also mentioned he thought I would continue my dive when he turned. I let him know that since we hadn't discussed that before submerging, as far as I was concerned, my dive was over when his was. Not a big deal. For the next dive we agreed on splitting up when he was ready to go back.
Returned to the water after a little more than an hour. NB only bounced off the bottom a couple times this dive, so having both ankle weights apparently helped. Bypassed the box, went to the plane and poked around for a bit. At about 20 min, NB signals he's going back. I continue on to the crane, which is in 2 parts. Not so much life there, but interesting structure. Head on down to the Tanker (a railroad tank car). It's got lots of life on, around and under it. It also has a memorial to a diver that died in the cove a couple years ago (this had a starfish on it). Circled over part of the debris pile - which is a HUGE, spread-out pile of pipes and other steel that was dumped (along with the crane and the tank car) off the end of the now defunct dock back in the 40's. This debris pile is good for many, many dives without getting tired of it. Anyhow, continued back to the plane and made a slow trip back to the box. It's at 32' now that the tide's up. I spent a few minutes looking around inside it now that the silt had settled. It has pretty good growth on the walls and ceiling. Left there and hung out near the flag (20') for a few minutes watching a couple of little hermit crabs fighting over something. Collected the flag and proceeded slowly to the bottom of the boat ramp (12') and spent some more time there while a greenling harassed me. He looked pretty defensive and kept coming to within an inch or two of my mask and flaring out his fins. Pretty cute, actually. Then a 5 minute ascent up the boat ramp, by which time I was pretty much a popsicle after 65 minutes in 46F water with a partly flooded dry suit :cold: Awesome dive, 20-40' viz, depending on location.
The NB and I exchanged phone #'s and agreed to meet weekly when possible.
As I pulled into the shop to drop off the dry suit, I got a phone call from a guy who's OW class I helped with last summer. I've dove with him a couple times since, he wants a dive buddy for whatever weekends work out this winter. He also said his wife (who certified in the same class) wants me to dive with her. She was extremely nervous during the class, but for some reason she decided she was comfortable with me. She's decided she really likes diving and wants to get more experience, but her comfort level is good viz and less than 30' depth. No problem - I'd love to dive with her!
On my way home, I talked to my more regular dive buddy. She wants to fly us to Seldovia in her little plane next week and spend a couple days diving.
After I finally got home, I got a call from a woman I dove with a few times a couple months ago. Her GF (I haven't met her yet)just got certified in Oregon and is planning to come up here in Dec. The woman I know wants a buddy to dive with so she can work out some buoyance issues.
WooHoo!! In one day I went from rarely finding a dive buddy to now I'm going to have to sneak off if I want to dive by myself!
Now I've got to go wash my undergarment that reeks like a stinky dry suit
uke:
