Win Some Lose Some

[ZenDiva]

As some of the greatest stories ever told go, "There We Were."
Another member who wishes to remail nameless, (you will be named later) and I went to Venice yesterday afternoon. As with any dive that you should just pass on, it started with forgotten gear, frustation and the infamous Murphy along for the dive.

We finally get heading south from Tampa and have decided to save on some air and a considerable surface swim so we will rent kayaks, stow the gear and paddle out to the site, no worries. Gear is loaded, hopes are high and the weather is moving in, damn.:no

No getting comfortable in the small kayak laden with gear, oh well paddle on. Waves are getting rougher, no worries, be in the water soon. Get the spot, per se, luckily I have inflated my BC already just in case. Just in case happens, overboard I go, BC is on and I am getting ready for the dive. My buddy in the other kayak will wait to see if we are where we think we are when I come up. Anchor line in hand I descend, bottom is as rough as the surface and viz is deteriorating quickly. No dice. I surface, hemming and hawing.

Enter the infamous Mr. Murphy, the Torquemada of the deep.

My buddy looks one way and rolls overboard going the other. Gear goes everywhere. We recover the stuff floating and back in the kayak it goes. Alas, Murphy is just warming up. Said dive buddy is now bobbing up and down and is struggling with something. You guessed it, the BC that is already set up, weighted but not inflated. He is trying to inflate it before it sinks and he drowns. Did I mention the anchor line?

In the course of events, Murphy saw fit to get the anchor line around his neck. Yeah, this is about to suck. I grab my back up reg and he tries to take a few breaths. Although he is a new diver, he used his head and training and ditched the gear. Better to dive for it later than have a memorial service.

Anchor line is gone and so is his rig. As we are getting our $h!t sorted out I tell him I will be right back I am going for his rig. Waves are getting higher and current is getting stronger. I drop down, bottom out at 15' to find viz is now down to about 2 ft and the grass is getting churned up from the bottom. Viz is almost zero. I have been pushed about 20-30' away from where he ditched and cannot see much. Dive light on, no good, tuck it away. Time to start a pattern search.

About 10 minutes later and with no help from Mr Murphy I spot the faintest glimmer of yellow. Gotta love those brightly covered hose protectors on his rig. It was the only thing that I could see as the grass and bottom were in the blender. That $5 piece of plastic saved him about 1k in gear.

We swim the kayaks back to the shore, you guessed it here comes the lightning with a vengeance and the cool air that says, you are not getting off that easy. Suffice to say we must have been a sight right out of creature from the black lagoon. Covered in grass, weeds, sand and humility we get it all loaded and decide that dry clothes and food are in the immediate future.

Win some lose some. 11 hard earned minutes of bottom time. Better luck next time. Now go have a good laugh on us, myself and JRMFG17 (sorry bro' I aint going down alone on this one...hhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaa).

Dive Safe All,

Scott

sorry to hear about your mishappen day, but better you are both safe , warm n dry

 

[BadAzzCarp]

Glad to hear everything worked out in the end. I have met "Murphy" several times. Can't say that I like him either...ha ha.

 

[eandiver]

Kayak diving is fun. It works better, at least for me, to don the gear in the water though.

 

[DiveBandit]

Kayak diving is fun. It works better, at least for me, to don the gear in the water though.

Thats cause diving doubles with a kayak is like trying to run a sail boat with no keel and a 3 ton ball at the top of the mast.

Oh, thats right, you dive singles now too..

 

[eandiver]

Oh yeah....can you see me trying to dive a set of doubles off a Perception Prisim?

 

[Missdirected]

That damn Murphy guy has been messing with me for nearly a month now! If I ever get my hands on him.....

jrmfg17 I'm sure you learned a lot. As with everyone, I made some bad choices/had things go wrong in the beginning of my diving. I believe thankfully, I am a better diver because of it. Remember it is a good friend that throws you under the bus I'm impressed you kept your wits about you - kudos - that is one of the most important things.

Now do we have any pics?

 

[427Dave]

Some story. Just remember that Murphy was an Optimist. Always keep an eye out for him!!!! I have been witness to him quite a few times!

 

[CBulla]

At least we can chock this up to a good learning experience. I

Yeah... Venice has this way of being sneaky like that.. some folks think "oh, easy beach dive" and then there are some of us who have a few dives there and we smile at people who think that.. sure.. there are some easy ones there, then there are those that make you say "hmmm"

Glad to hear you survived

 

[Sh@rkW@tcher]

Sounds like y'all had a hellva time. I'm glad to hear you're both ok, with nothing worse than bruised egos. You must have arrived at Venice about the time dkramer and I left (1500). If you had arrived early, like we did, things would have been different. We arrived at 0800 to flat seas, no wind and about 10-15 viz. Yak diving is cool and a lot of fun, it does require some practice and planning and you have to pick your days, and not force a bad situation, regardless of how much ya planned or how far you drove. My general rule is when two things in a row hint to me not to do something, I call it, rather than wating for the third bad thing(when it all goes to hell). All you can do is chalk it up to a lesson learned, and now ya know who your buddies are.

 

[dkramer]

Enter the infamous Mr. Murphy, the Torquemada of the deep.

Said dive buddy is now bobbing up and down and is struggling with something. You guessed it, the BC that is already set up, weighted but not inflated. He is trying to inflate it before it sinks and he drowns. Did I mention the anchor line?

In the course of events, Murphy saw fit to get the anchor line around his neck. Yeah, this is about to suck.
Scott

I gotta tell ya, this line scared the snot out of me. That could have gotten ugly real fast. Thank goodness for your buddy's level head in ditching the gear. I always inflate my BC before I even leave the beach. My thought was in case Murphy caused me to do a roll over, at least my gear wouldn't go to Davy Jones. In this case, better the gear goes than you. Glad no one got hurt.