JAMIE MCG
Contributor
Last year a couple of friends of mine were talking about taking a cavern class, so I started researching. I posted here and ran across a member in our area who offered to do the class and pool work localy, then go to north Fl, for the dives. Richard Blackburn is the instructor, and a fine one he was. He offered to do the class and pool work at our local dive shop, which was conveniet, and gave our LDS owner a kick back, at no additional cost to us, because he didn't want to steal us from him. The class room was very well planned out and taught. The pool work gave us time to work on a few things, such as working with the line in no current, which turned out to help alot. Then last weekend we went to Ginnie Springs for our checkout dives, we ran the reel out in open water did our skills then came our first overhead enviorment, man was that something else. I first got the reel tangled on the primary tie off, then we didn't stay in order, someone thumb the dive and we forgot to do our saftey stop. When we surface we went over our mistakes, and each dive after got better. The Devils Ear was a ripping current, the Devils eye was my second time running the line with no incedents. The next day we went to Royal Blue a bigger cavern and we gelled as a team. In all it was a great experience, a great teacher very kind and pollite, and a hole new diving attitude. After taking the class I couldn't imagine taking the course in 2 days, we all felt so perpared for what we were partaking in. We spent a total of 4 days training for $250 everything included, no extras. I would highly recommend anyone checking into a cavern class to contact Richard Blackburn you wont be disapointed.
www.AtlantaTechnicalDivers.com
www.AtlantaTechnicalDivers.com
