Bennet Springs Sat. Dec.8th anyone?

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If the weather holds, (I don't think it will) have a safe trip. We're a little gun shy down here in Springfield. January 06 brought ice that knocked many out for over a week. Needless to say, the Walmart is packed. Safe diving, Matt.
 
Looking at the forecast I decided it wasn't going to hold, the ORM decision was that the risk outweighed the benefits. I hate to cancel a dive, but we are expecting an ice storm before I would have been able to return home and I just don't know how the other driver will be. I can drive slow, but who says the rest will.

I know Brandon and Chad went so I look forwards to their report.
 
Brandon and Chad went, they had a good time based on the phone call but I haven't seen a posting here from them. Hopefully it went well but I suspect it will be a late arrival back home. I know I typically get home from there about 8 PM or so.
 
Yesterday went well. We got home around 9pm. Travel times were a little longer than normal due to the weather. The park only had maybe 20 fisherman the whole day. As far as diving, Chad and I were the only ones. Water Temp was 50* and vis was unlimited. Could see as far as your light would shine. Also tons of fish! I really enjoyed it for something different. Our only problem was when an old fishing lure snagged my drysuit on the very first dive, consequently flooding half of my suit by the dives end. Luckily the general store just outside the park had Aquaseal for repairing fishing waders. While the patch was drying, my undergarmets hung in front of the kerosene heater and dried significantly. All was well and dry on the latter dives. All in all it was a great day and a neat dive site. While it is pretty much a benign cavern as Cummins said, I can see some divers not liking it only because the deeper you go, the lower the ceiling gets. I probably would not recommend this to anyone with clausterphobia issues. I supposed they could still dive it just not venture much into the cavern. They will surely not see that kind of visibility too many places in the midwest.
 
What does one do to get out of the weather during your surface interval? Can you set up a canopy or something? I was thinking about trying to rent one of the cabins next door, but besides adding extra cost, it’s hard to get a cabin reservation and diving reservation at the same time.
 
We used a pop-up shelter with four sides on it and a kerosene heater inside for heat. Worked out very well. Just make sure that you tell the Nature Center employee when you sign in because the Ranger on occasion has hassled people in the past before he knew that it was divers using it as a shelter. Not campers.
 
Thanks for posting the report bgray. I have been lurking here for it with some anticipation. It sounds like a place to plan for this winter.

Thanks also to SteveC for the follow-up questions about shelter.

Larry
 

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