handben
Contributor
I was diving last month at Alice in Wonderland with my daughter as well as my brother who buddied up with his wife. I'd already made a dozen or so dives that week without any navigational difficulties and without using my compass. So I just left it back in the room. I figured navigation would be pretty straight forward. I'd just swim straight out to the first reef, perpendicular to the shore, then continue on in a straight line out to the second reef. Once on the second reef, I figured I could swim either way, but then to return, I'd be going perpendicular to the second reef and back east, I'd get back with no problem.
I was wrong. First, the visibility was considerably worse on this dive for some reason, than most of the earlier dives. We made it out to the edge of the first reef without any difficulty. As I was descending down the slope of the reef, I decided to not go all the way to the sand as it was pretty deep (over 100 feet by my estimation, though I could be wrong). I wanted to save air and bottom time, so I swam across around 50 feet deep. Anyhow the distance from the first reef to the second reef was well past our visibility that day. I don't know the real distance, but seems in retrospect to have been a good 100 yards. It's funny how strongly you can believe in your own minds "internal" compass. Mine had worked just fine up till this point. I set across in what seemed to be a straight line. I was so sure of myself that I pointed the way and kept going how I thought was straight, even though my brother who had a compass pointed the other way. I followed my internal sense of direction, till I finally made it to the second reef. (My brother told me that I'd been veering to the left the whole way across).
Once on the second reef, I was a little disoriented as I came at it at a funny angle (Didn't hit it straight on like I thought I should have). So rather than enjoy the dive, I began question where I was and which way was back. My biggest fear was that I'd swim West rather than East when it was time to go back. It's funny how once that sense of doubt enters in, it's hard to be rational. So I decided the only safe way back was to surface, get my bearings, then head back toward the truck. So I did just that. After surfacing and getting my directions back in order, I set course back East. I decided that it was too deep to go back to the bottom, so I'd have to swim back in the mid water column. I chose to go around 20 feet. I didn't want to surface swim with the wind pushing against me the whole way and it is nice to get below the surge. Anyhow, it was too shallow to see the bottom well; and I am sure my minds straight line was actually very zig zag without any reference points to keep on track. We did eventually reach the first reef and then the sandy shallow which was a big relief. At this point my daughter and I were both just wanting to get out of the water as we'd swam nearly the entire time not near the surface or the bottom and with poor views of either.
I realized how well "Alice in Wonderland" was named as we both felt very small compared to the vast blue surrounding us in the mid water column. I learned an important lesson on this dive and that is not to trust the brain to navigate correctly without good landmarks to guide oneself. For the remainder of the trip I used my compass and took bearings to the buoys (or whichever way out from beach I had decided on) and took reciprocal courses to find my way back. This works much better then dead reckoning with the brain. I hope others reading this will also bring and use their compasses while diving Bonaire.
I was wrong. First, the visibility was considerably worse on this dive for some reason, than most of the earlier dives. We made it out to the edge of the first reef without any difficulty. As I was descending down the slope of the reef, I decided to not go all the way to the sand as it was pretty deep (over 100 feet by my estimation, though I could be wrong). I wanted to save air and bottom time, so I swam across around 50 feet deep. Anyhow the distance from the first reef to the second reef was well past our visibility that day. I don't know the real distance, but seems in retrospect to have been a good 100 yards. It's funny how strongly you can believe in your own minds "internal" compass. Mine had worked just fine up till this point. I set across in what seemed to be a straight line. I was so sure of myself that I pointed the way and kept going how I thought was straight, even though my brother who had a compass pointed the other way. I followed my internal sense of direction, till I finally made it to the second reef. (My brother told me that I'd been veering to the left the whole way across).
Once on the second reef, I was a little disoriented as I came at it at a funny angle (Didn't hit it straight on like I thought I should have). So rather than enjoy the dive, I began question where I was and which way was back. My biggest fear was that I'd swim West rather than East when it was time to go back. It's funny how once that sense of doubt enters in, it's hard to be rational. So I decided the only safe way back was to surface, get my bearings, then head back toward the truck. So I did just that. After surfacing and getting my directions back in order, I set course back East. I decided that it was too deep to go back to the bottom, so I'd have to swim back in the mid water column. I chose to go around 20 feet. I didn't want to surface swim with the wind pushing against me the whole way and it is nice to get below the surge. Anyhow, it was too shallow to see the bottom well; and I am sure my minds straight line was actually very zig zag without any reference points to keep on track. We did eventually reach the first reef and then the sandy shallow which was a big relief. At this point my daughter and I were both just wanting to get out of the water as we'd swam nearly the entire time not near the surface or the bottom and with poor views of either.
I realized how well "Alice in Wonderland" was named as we both felt very small compared to the vast blue surrounding us in the mid water column. I learned an important lesson on this dive and that is not to trust the brain to navigate correctly without good landmarks to guide oneself. For the remainder of the trip I used my compass and took bearings to the buoys (or whichever way out from beach I had decided on) and took reciprocal courses to find my way back. This works much better then dead reckoning with the brain. I hope others reading this will also bring and use their compasses while diving Bonaire.
