Dive Report - CSSP 081508

[ZzzKing]

9:30 Stopped for breakfast. Heavy rain falling. Unseasonably cool.

10:30 Arrived at CSSP. First to sign in for the day. Light rain falling. 71 degrees. Set up on the west side in the middle. Goal was to break out the drysuit for a shakedown cruise prior to Sunday's Armadillo Hunt and visit with the sirens of the deep.

11:00 Set up heavy rig and donned very light undergarments and drysuit. Rain stopped. Overcast.

11:30 Dive 1: Nailed the weighting on the first try. Never corked and was good till the end of the dive at 700psi. Visibility varied from 1-10 feet. It's cold below 40 feet with very light undergarments, no hood and no gloves. Saw some fish. Saw some hydrilla. Saw some limestone. Dive time 1 hour 5 minutes.

1:00 Dive 2: Swapped from steel to aluminum tank. Added 4# to camband. Otherwise, the same as Dive 1 but going south instead of north. Dive time 55 minutes.

Saw no Swampers or DIMWITs but absolutely the most beautiful day we've had since sometime in spring.

That's my report and I'm stickin' with it.

 

[Foo]

Thanks for the report, I'm jealous. We're still working around our house non-stop, getting it ready to sell. We've decided that we've about done all we're gonna do, with just a few finishing touches remaining, so I'm hoping to hit the pond a lot this fall.

Saw fish, hydrilla and limestone, eh? No turtles? Was the vis worse going south? Yes, I'm diving vicariously through you. Hopefully we didn't pee our drysuit...

 

[ZzzKing]

Saw a turtle on the surface. Vis was spotty no matter where I was except in the shallows and no, we didn't pee our drysuit.

 

[cruiser]

Yep, Friday was "dive by Braille."

 

[ronbeau]

9:30 Stopped for breakfast. Heavy rain falling. Unseasonably cool.

10:30 Arrived at CSSP. First to sign in for the day. Light rain falling. 71 degrees. Set up on the west side in the middle. Goal was to break out the drysuit for a shakedown cruise prior to Sunday's Armadillo Hunt and visit with the sirens of the deep.

11:00 Set up heavy rig and donned very light undergarments and drysuit. Rain stopped. Overcast.

11:30 Dive 1: Nailed the weighting on the first try. Never corked and was good till the end of the dive at 700psi. Visibility varied from 1-10 feet. It's cold below 40 feet with very light undergarments, no hood and no gloves. Saw some fish. Saw some hydrilla. Saw some limestone. Dive time 1 hour 5 minutes.

1:00 Dive 2: Swapped from steel to aluminum tank. Added 4# to camband. Otherwise, the same as Dive 1 but going south instead of north. Dive time 55 minutes.

Saw no Swampers or DIMWITs but absolutely the most beautiful day we've had since sometime in spring.

That's my report and I'm stickin' with it.

Out of curiousity why would you not be wearing a hood if it is cold enough to require a dry suit considering that 40 % of the heat is lost from the head?

How warm was the water below 40 feet?

 

[richerso]

I don't really want to speak for ZzzKing; but normally around these parts, if you dive CSSP, you wear some sort of hood even if the water temp is 90 F. Preserves the ears from fish bites.

Besides that, the water temp at depth is cold enough to permit a comfortable dive in a dry suit; but it's not necessarily required. Lots of folks dive CSSP deep in wet suits. It just limits bottom time. ZzzKing, had a specific mission in mind. Tune up the dry suit. He's taking a much colder, deeper, longer dive later this week. Stay above the thermocline, and a drysuit is not even required.

There. I ended up speaking for ZzzKing. I didn't mean to. Please forgive me Craig.

 

[ZzzKing]

Out of curiousity why would you not be wearing a hood if it is cold enough to require a dry suit considering that 40 % of the heat is lost from the head?

How warm was the water below 40 feet?

I was diving my drysuit because I haven't had it on in several months and I have some cold, deep dives coming up tomorrow in Oklahoma that I will need it for. I don't really want to be refreshing my skills at 110' in the dark so I wanted a quick refresher dive. I didn't wear gloves or a hood because I didn't think they would have a profound effect on buoyancy.

Edited to say: MAN! Beat me to the punch by five minutes!

See you in the morning.

 

[richerso]

Edit:
I forgot to mention, that most times around here, we don't mention the hood just because it's a given; as I explained.

Edit:
See you in the morning ZzzKing.
I am mapquesting your address now.

 

[ZzzKing]

what time are you going to be here?

 

[richerso]

5:00am ???
Is that appropriate?