What a weekend this past weekend was. I attended the Michael Norwood Memorial Dive at Olympus Dive Center in Morehead City, NC. It was a fantastic time! This was the 2nd year of the event. There was a banquet on Friday night. The dinner was held at the NC Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores. Dinner was served while we were surrounded by sand tiger and sand bar sharks, grouper and amberjack...who were housed in the main tank. Before dinner, John Chatterton gave a presentation and played a video about the upcoming show on the Britannic Expedition. I can say, after seeing the promo, that it is going to be a fantastic show.
On Saturday John went diving on the Olympus dive boat, captained by George Purifoy and I went out on the Midnight Express, captained by his son Robert. Richie Kohler was supposed to dive the Midnight Express but was unfortunately unable to attend the benefit. After the dives we had a big barbecue dinner on the dock.
Sunday....What can I say about Sunday...I was on the same boat as Chatterton that day. Let me qualify this by saying that I do not know John Chatterton personally, but he and I talked alot about everything from decompression procedures to the environment. We joked around alot. The man is a hoot. He will say things to make you laugh your ***** off. We got to the dive site...the Papoose...geared up and dove into something I have never experienced. My tech instructor, Jon Belisario and I did a penetration of the wreck and the bait fish were so thick that I could not see Jon 6 feet away...and he had an OMS cannister light. We swam through the wreck for awhile then came out followed by a big school of amberjack. I mean there was intense activity going on all around us. What was happening, as we soon found out by seeing fish parts floating amongst the intact fish, was the sand tigers and sand bar sharks were feeding. There were times we were caught in a swirl of fish. On the ascent Jon and I were on the anchor line at about 50fsw and watching sand bar sharks below us when a huge school of bait fish swam by us followed by a sand tiger hot on their tails. When we surfaced it was like we had been in a dream world. A few minutes later everyone was back on the boat except....Chatterton...John was missing
He finally surfaced a good bit later. We told him...that would be great...lose John Chatterton on a dive He got on the boat and could not stop talking about that dive. He finally said, and I quote..."That was one of the 10 best dives I have ever done."
Felt kind of good to hear someone who has dived all over the world say that.
Chatterton had to cut the trip short yesterday because he had to be in New York to discuss the Shadow Diver movie. Yep...It's still on. The dive was a wash anyway because of the storm that many of us on the East coast are experiencing right now. We got out about 5 miles and turned around. No matter what Gentile thinks, John Chatterton is a great guy.
I want to mention Lauren Hermley at Olympus. She puts this event together and did a fantastic job. So thank you Lauren!
I can't wait until next year. Hope some of you who read this will consider going.
On Saturday John went diving on the Olympus dive boat, captained by George Purifoy and I went out on the Midnight Express, captained by his son Robert. Richie Kohler was supposed to dive the Midnight Express but was unfortunately unable to attend the benefit. After the dives we had a big barbecue dinner on the dock.
Sunday....What can I say about Sunday...I was on the same boat as Chatterton that day. Let me qualify this by saying that I do not know John Chatterton personally, but he and I talked alot about everything from decompression procedures to the environment. We joked around alot. The man is a hoot. He will say things to make you laugh your ***** off. We got to the dive site...the Papoose...geared up and dove into something I have never experienced. My tech instructor, Jon Belisario and I did a penetration of the wreck and the bait fish were so thick that I could not see Jon 6 feet away...and he had an OMS cannister light. We swam through the wreck for awhile then came out followed by a big school of amberjack. I mean there was intense activity going on all around us. What was happening, as we soon found out by seeing fish parts floating amongst the intact fish, was the sand tigers and sand bar sharks were feeding. There were times we were caught in a swirl of fish. On the ascent Jon and I were on the anchor line at about 50fsw and watching sand bar sharks below us when a huge school of bait fish swam by us followed by a sand tiger hot on their tails. When we surfaced it was like we had been in a dream world. A few minutes later everyone was back on the boat except....Chatterton...John was missing
He finally surfaced a good bit later. We told him...that would be great...lose John Chatterton on a dive He got on the boat and could not stop talking about that dive. He finally said, and I quote..."That was one of the 10 best dives I have ever done."Felt kind of good to hear someone who has dived all over the world say that.
Chatterton had to cut the trip short yesterday because he had to be in New York to discuss the Shadow Diver movie. Yep...It's still on. The dive was a wash anyway because of the storm that many of us on the East coast are experiencing right now. We got out about 5 miles and turned around. No matter what Gentile thinks, John Chatterton is a great guy.
I want to mention Lauren Hermley at Olympus. She puts this event together and did a fantastic job. So thank you Lauren!
I can't wait until next year. Hope some of you who read this will consider going.
