Ok, Portage Legends is in the books. Jeff Rice and the employees of Portage did a fantastic job. The giveaways from the various organizations such as Vintage Double Hose and Scuba 2000 were top notch. In fact my Mermaid won some brand new Cressi single hose regs donated to the Legends event by Scuba 2000. Another VERY lucky lady won a totally tricked out USD Mistral donated by VintageDoubleHose.com. VDH also had tons of giveaways from save a dive kit scissors to screwdriver sets and beer cozies. Jeff also provided the divers another one of his world famous Whole Half a Chicken Dinners! on both Saturday and Sunday! Let me tell you that is one fine whole half a chicken.
The quarry conditions were without a doubt the best I have ever seen in a quarry. The visibility was at least 40 feet maybe 50 plus! I was able to see for the first time from the Hanza to the mirror. Dont take my word for it check out the video that Karl posted on youtube. The water was a warm 75 degrees above the thermo cline at 24 feet. I was diving in a 3mm and not cold at all. The 2 hose divers had the single outnumbered big time and the Portage staff was very vintage friendly as always.
We had a lot of the regulars like Gary Reece, Gayle Peterson, Luis, Christine, Barb, Greg Barlow, Ron Sivoda, Roger VanFrankooooooo, Jerry Lang, Karl, Bryan, Teri Stevenson, and Allan. We also had a bunch of new faces Like Eva Colon, George Fee and his wife Lilia, Scott, Dave and his wife Helen, and many more that I am forgetting right now, Sorry. The excitement was palpable and infectious. A lot of horse trading went on between dives for tanks, gauges, regs, and dare I say T Shirts and hoodies.
The equipment was varied and exciting as well. Karl stole the show with regs from every continent I think. I dived the Broxton for the first 4 dives, as it seemed only right with the new triples. Later I donned the FX and put the 1st prototype I dived in the Bahamas through its paces. Barb dived several FX 50 Fathoms and said the Blue case is still her favorite. George Fee was seen diving a super sweet Over Pressure that he had rebuilt by VDH recently as well as a PRAM he picked up from the RVF collection. Allan was slithering though the water with a nice green labeled Voit as well as a gorgeous FX 50 Fathom. Greg also seemed to be a big FX diver, but it was hard to tell as he was under the water more than on the surface. Ron and Bryan both dived the heck out of their brand new vintage dry suits and they seemed to be leak free, but one of them cannot say they stayed DRY! I will let the diver explain that one. There were 4 sets of triples at the quarry; mine were the coolest, but 4 sets nonetheless. It was quite a sight to behold to see Jerry, Karl, Bryan and me marching to the water with the coolest tank set ups ever made. The only other set of tanks that may be nearly as cool would be Gary Reeces concave bottom Rene twins. Speaking of Gary, he had a sweet video housing and was cool enough to let me shoot some video of the divers. Gary is a really good video subject since he is one well dressed vintage diver with his Sea Hunt silver suit. A lot of video was taken of Barb as well with her flowered cap, which is becoming quite a fashion statement. Eva seemed to like the RAM and looked UBER nice in her slick skin Spiros suit. Christine attacked me on one dive and stole my watermelon, destined for the shark dart. I think she was objecting to the fate that she knew was to become it. Eventually 5 or 6 divers overpowered her and reclaimed the melon and the shark darting continued. All told 3 melons met their demised at the point of the mighty shark dart. At one of the melon massacres several divers snacked on the flesh of the melon carcass. After Gayle and I had our fill of melon flesh we took turns wearing the melon shell on our heads in a ritualistic scuba dance. Luis fed the fish at the silo with car cheese as the video was rolling. I doubt that you will be able to make him for all the fish in the way.
The legends were awesome as usual. I dont know how Jeff gets them to all come every year. We have been so blessed to have join us at Portage every year. Body Glove Bob Meistriel was a really great guy. This was the first time a lot of us had ever met him. After seeing Eva, Barb and others in the beaver tail twist lock suits, Bob was heard to say that Body Glove may need to make these available in the catalog. He probably should not have said that for afterwards he had a train us following him around with our measurements. How great would that be if we could get these suits made by the Body Glove!
Dottie Frazier was all over the quarry and full of energy. She is a true peach and was more than willing to spend time with all of us. I know that Barb will treasure the picture they took together, which Dottie autographed graciously.
Bob Croft, gave another outstanding presentation to the crowd on Saturday night ending with the showing of the Kuralt special Dive into the Unknown chronicling Bobs record breaking free dive to 240 feet in 1968. After the film Bob answered questions where he stated he smoked 4 packs of cigarettes a day at that time!
Thanks again Jeff and Employess of Portage Quarry for putting on a top notch event. I for one will be looking forward to next year.
