I Hurt Myself Today

[alohagal]

Happy to report, Maracaibo was an awesome dive. Okay, don't try this at home: Today our dive PLAN was to go to 160 feet. I went to 161 feet. DM went o 164 feet. Great dive. Exceeded my 143 feet at Blue Hole in Belize.

Second dive our DM from Blue Angel, spotted, captured and bagged a juvenile lionfish to take home to his collection. He is my hero!

Mary

 

[alohagal]

Oh dear, should we revisit the "let's bring mongoose to St. Thomas to eat the snakes"? Snakes diurnal; mongoose nocturnal; now they have plenty of both.


Hate to hear that not all operations are doing their best to keep the numbers down. David came up with one off Barracuda today. #8 for him, and the first he's caught without my videoing it. I was in the other group.
He definitely has snagging them down to an art now. It's seconds... in the bag, on with the dive. Was interesting when he snagged two on one dive early in the week... and they did the rest of the dive with us.

Deadly sharptail eel. Yeah. OK...

Mary, if you pick up some details of where you see them (don't know if I could...) and let me know, we'll watch for them.

We are supposed to do Maracaibo, too, again tomorrow. What boat/operation and what time do you leave the dock?


There's room on the boat tonight, should you decide to come. Leslie isn't going.

Had a fin blowout today. Was it your luck rubbing off? The front of the foot pocket detached from the blade. The other one was starting to go, too. I lost about 3/4 of my kick power. Very aggravating!
I mean, what's the deal?!? They are only 18 years old and have 1700 dives on them. Think I am going to get loaned a pair of good fins and not have to buy new ones until after I get home.

Right now they are duct-taped together. Me and my ghetto fins, as they were called on the boat. Worked like always, though...

It's nap time I think.
:sleeping2:

Hey Sallye,

Won't be making the night dive. Met Sylvia from Boulder on my two last dives to Maracaibo. She has a house here in Cozumel and group of us are going to have a get together there tonight! Maybe you can join us there. She is a great person to know. Speaks fluent spanish!! She is a DM and Ski Instructor. Best of both worlds.

I am off to Fiesta at the Casa!

 

[jeancmo]

Happy to report, Maracaibo was an awesome dive. Okay, don't try this at home: Today our dive PLAN was to go to 160 feet. I went to 161 feet. DM went o 164 feet. Great dive. Exceeded my 143 feet at Blue Hole in Belize.

Second dive our DM from Blue Angel, spotted, captured and bagged a juvenile lionfish to take home to his collection. He is my hero!

Mary

whoa! appears you graduated from the kindergarten boat to the scholar boat today!!
congrats!!! who was the DM?

Jean in MO

 

[alohagal]

whoa! appears you graduated from the kindergarten boat to the scholar boat today!!
congrats!!! who was the DM?

Jean in MO

Our Blue Angel DM today was Jose. I was with a great group of divers and a professional DM who knew his business and his customers abilities.

And he showed great respect to an ocean he cares about.

 

[ggunn]

Happy to report, Maracaibo was an awesome dive. Okay, don't try this at home: Today our dive PLAN was to go to 160 feet. I went to 161 feet. DM went o 164 feet. Great dive. Exceeded my 143 feet at Blue Hole in Belize.

What was great about the dive other than depth bragging rights? The one and only time I went to Maracaibo, the top of the reef was at about 130' and not visible from the surface. It took us quite a while to get down to the reef; we went down the face of the wall to about 160' or so. We got about 5 minutes at depth before it was time to make our ascent, which took about 30 minutes of dealing with deco obligations. All but about 10 minutes of the dive we were either in descent or ascent mode with nothing to see but blue water and each other. I was underwhelmed; all in all I'd rather have been at Palancar.

Was your experience different from that?

 

[billindenver]

What was great about the dive other than depth bragging rights? The one and only time I went to Maracaibo, the top of the reef was at about 130' and not visible from the surface. It took us quite a while to get down to the reef; we went down the face of the wall to about 160' or so. We got about 5 minutes at depth before it was time to make our ascent, which took about 30 minutes of dealing with deco obligations. All but about 10 minutes of the dive we were either in descent or ascent mode with nothing to see but blue water and each other. I was underwhelmed; all in all I'd rather have been at Palancar.

Was your experience different from that?

I could see how a dive like that might be a bit on the boring side, in the same way that climbing a mountain is just looking at rock and going one hand over the other for hours on end...but...in the end...it is an experience that not a lot of people get. I imagine something like that isn't a dive I would want to do every day, but it certainly is a dive I want to do. Looking up and seeing 160 feet of water between me and the air we were born to breathe....would be worth the $30 or so it cost to get there.

Besides, when stranded (yeah right) in Cozumel as long as the heroin of this novel has been...she's probably looking for adventure surpassing the average Palancar dive. Who knows, she might have tripped over a seam in the water column down there and found a new reason to visit the emergency room! More adventures for her loyal readers....though many of us are probably hoping the next great adventure doesn't involve blood, or surgery etc. I'm happy to read about her boring dive to 160 feet....as long as tomorrow's report isn't describing the decor on the inside of cozumel's chamber.

 

[jeancmo]

I could see how a dive like that might be a bit on the boring side, in the same way that climbing a mountain is just looking at rock and going one hand over the other for hours on end...but...in the end...it is an experience that not a lot of people get. I imagine something like that isn't a dive I would want to do every day, but it certainly is a dive I want to do. Looking up and seeing 160 feet of water between me and the air we were born to breathe....would be worth the $30 or so it cost to get there.

Besides, when stranded (yeah right) in Cozumel as long as the heroin of this novel has been...she's probably looking for adventure surpassing the average Palancar dive. Who knows, she might have tripped over a seam in the water column down there and found a new reason to visit the emergency room! More adventures for her loyal readers....though many of us are probably hoping the next great adventure doesn't involve blood, or surgery etc. I'm happy to read about her boring dive to 160 feet....as long as tomorrow's report isn't describing the decor on the inside of cozumel's chamber.

I'm glad I'm not the only one enjoying this "novel" - I just hope it has a happy ending!
pass the popcorn- Jean in MO

 

[ggunn]

I could see how a dive like that might be a bit on the boring side, in the same way that climbing a mountain is just looking at rock and going one hand over the other for hours on end..

Um, not really, at least the way this dive was; when we finally got down there there wasn't anything different to see, and we only had about 5 minutes of bottom time. There wasn't anything particularly thrilling to me about hanging there watching the numbers change on my computer for half an hour (or however long it was) on the way up. I would have loved to have had some rocks to look at.

To each his own, though; you might have loved this dive just as we dove it. I didn't.

BTW, I didn't post what I did as any sort of criticism of those to whom this dive would have been a little slice of heaven. I just wanted to know if there was some way that this dive could have been planned and executed that would have made it a more enjoyable experience for me.

 

[geokr]

I just wanted to know if there was some way that this dive could have been planned and executed that would have made it a more enjoyable experience for me.

A really cool wreck like the Vandenberg or the Oriskany would have helped. Unfortunately you'll have to go elsewhere for that experience. In my view, no pun intended, if there's nothing down there, there's not a lot of beauty in the dark and murky depths so I keep it above a hundred.

 

[okiejeff]

No a Dork tries to walk it off or not seek help for hours/days, you did the right thing. You're in another country and injured, scarey enough. Vacations will come and go, but losing the ability to sincerly flip someone the bird in traffic...well, that is a life changing moment.

You will live and get better, just pray someone/anyone asks directions and not you can point them the way....and laugh about it.

Joe

A few years ago, I had a slip and fall at the Fiesta Americana. Dealt with a swollen hand and extreme pain for about 5 days before I got back to the states. I was pretty sure I broke a bone in my hand, but just didn't want to go to a doctor that I did not know. My wife is a therapist and she treated the swelling and had me immobilize it for the remainder of the trip. Well when I got back, the xray revealed that I had two fractured metacarpuls that were more seriously broken than I had anticipated and surgery was required. With the break I had, the doctor said the surgery needed to occur within 14 days of the injury. At that point, I had already burned half way through that window. I was not able to get into a local surgeon that specialized in hand surgeries, and my wife was in no way going to let me use the other two choices I had which were more feet specialists. In the end, I had to commute about a 100 miles to another reputable hand specialist for the procedure. Two titanium plates and 8 screws later I was repaired.

I guess the moral of this story is that it probably is worth getting the real damage identified in a timely manner so you know what is in fact broken and no further damage is caused. In my case, if I had not had the care my wife was able to help me give my hand I could have likely ended up with some tendon damage from bone fragments sticking up. Even with that, luck was probably a factor as I continued to enjoy the rest of my trip, including diving. Also, there appears to be a timeline for how quick a surgery needs to take place with a fracture. I would not have taken a chance on the surgery in Cozumel or even another location in the states where we did not have a hand specialist available; however, the knowledge of the real damage caused may have been enough for me to return back home early to get it taken care of.