Oy. What a night.
So a boarder and HighSchool buddy who I haven't seen for a zillion years (like 1978) and I are going to dive. I'm way into that. Turns out there is a special dive at Vets park tonight, so at the kind invitation of Claudette, I extend the same to HS buddy. He and I get to hang and dive, he gets to meet some SoCal locals and some 'boarders, its all good.
Tonight is to be a "Block Party" - as in BYOB (cinder block) as the Vets park underwater trash heap that has slowly become "the monument" is now, brick by brick, becoming a respectable home grown reef.
I'm so into this. But I tells her "no way am I bringing a cinder block... lets get creative..." So my mind starts to race.
Mistake Number one. (you may count them...)
We get there - its pretty windy and a little rough. No biggie. I've done harrier surf entries than this. Good thing I blew off the block idea and "got creative." I loaded into my Lobster bag a hand full of CD's (I'm turning the Monument into a "bring a CD, take a CD" thing) my ScubaBoard Mug and two 24" pieces of 4" ABS drain pipe. Thought I'd get some Habit-trail thing going. Idiotchild, here.
As I'm gearing up, I crush my mask. Nice. No biggie, I have a spare. Of course, the real spare is in the BPD in Belize someplace, so I have my retired beloved Sea Vision that I haven't dived for like 2 years. I put on some AntiFog and we hit the water.
Mistake number two.
HS buddy (Mark Vlahos) is the only sane one who is sans blocks and reef raff. Claudette and a couple of others (who's SB handles escape me) kick out, with their Lift bags and their blocks (Claudette found a pretty PINK block!) Claudette has never used a lift bag, and I believe this is a first for one of the other two gentlemen... maybe both. Who knows. So lets examine this, shall we:
* 4' surf
* Lots o' wind.
* Night
* Lift bag rookies
* Cinder Blocks
* Taking cinde blocks INTO the water, through the surf, at night with a liftbag... for the first time...
Oh yeah - this is going to be smoooov.
So we get to the drop point (and I do mean DROP) and the clustry begins. My mask is hopelessly fogged. Nothing I can do. Its an insta-silt out. The block brigade is trying to get their blocks semi neutral while they manage their lights while they navigate to the site as we all kick up clouds and I'm trying to get a little water into my mask to swish around while my super buoyant lobster bag is flapping in the surge...
OY!
Two minutes into this I lose Claudette (who I'm following) and Mark is following me. I do a spin and look to Mark through the silt and my fogged over mask and thumb the dive. He and I pop up. I tell him we're gonna nav towards the Monument on the surface (I have a rough idea where it is) and try to find their lights, then re-drop.
We start kicking south and a lift bag pops up. A moment later, Claudette's dome pops up. She can tell you the rest - but now she's on top with the two of us and her floating block. Cool!
We giggle a bit, get our bearings and drop again. I should insert here that we drop at about 55' (not the 16' we originally dropped in.) On the way down blind Sea Vision here is trying to manage a very buoyant lobster bag, clear my mask (for the 27th time), clear my ears, re-deploy my light, not contribute to the silt out, blah blah blah... Long story short, I kinda land on Claudette, who herself just lawndarted into the silt with her Pink block.
Well, not so Kinda. I REALLY landed on Claudette. I pull myself off of her and her no-so-floating block, untangle my fins from her lift bag and sort of settle in the bottom. Mark is watching this, doubtless thinking "who are these idiots...?"
So we follow her to the Monument (I still can't see a dang thing) and I'm stunned to see a zillion bricks... like 15 or 20! All stacked, etc.... very cool.
I open my bag, and instantly one of the ABS pipes rockets to the surface. I grab the other and jam it into one of the blocks. I place my Mug on a block, and stack the CD's into a block. Pretty cool. Take some hopelessly silted out photos and clear my mask for the 50th time.
I motion to Claudette (through the ooze) that I want to go back and not go dive Vets, as I can't friggen see, and I'm just not comfy with all the previous clustry. She says OK and leads Mark and I back.
Its all good. Oy.
Mistakes & Lessons I Learned:
Mistake #1 - if you're going to take something into the sea, KNOW IF ITS POSITIVE OR NEGATIVE FIRST.
My mug is Neg. CD's are barely Neg. ABS pipe us mutha poisitive. I was fighting this stuff all the way out there and one just shot out of my bag at 65 feet.
Mistake #2 - Be sure you're friggen back up mask will work! The back up I've had these years has been cleaned and checked a number of times... this one not so much. It would have worked in an emergency, but as my main mask for this dive, THIS DIVE, it sucked too much to mention.
Lesson - Liftbags are tough work. I read through a zillion posts yesterday and I got the impression that they're tough (Uncle Ricky, your input was totally the best in the threads I read - the be cautious, take it slow, etc.) I almost got one this week, but decided not to, as I thought taking a block through the surf at night was a bad idea for a first timer like me. The crew tonight were gamers, and they all managed, but it was clearly tough. I think I'll practice taking stuff off the bottom and managing it in the water column a bit when I finally start my liftbag work - I will NOT start off first thing by taking stuff IN through the surf and swell. At night. :11:
Lesson - do not make your first dive with a buddy you haven't seen in a zillion years an event dive! This was not my finest hour. Remember in A River Runs Through It, when at the end of a tough day (the sunburn day) Paul said to Norman "lets come back and wipe this day off the books..."? That's how I felt tonight with Mark. I wanna dive this again, just without all the foo foo rah.
Some pics are attached. This was jolly fun - just messy and silly. Really silly. Really fun. I was giggling most of the way. When I wasn't cursing at my friggen mask.
I was never scared or anything - plenty of gas in the Waterheater, not cold, never really lost, etc. I haven't downloaded yet, but I'm sure my SAC will be in the .70's or .80's as I was huffing most of the dive with all the clearing and burning eyes and stuff. No worries, really - I just couldn't see, and I knew if we were going to do a drop and run (that was the plan) I would not have had fun diving for another 40 or 50 minutes with this mask issue.
I'm sure the others will chime in.
What a night.
---
Ken
So a boarder and HighSchool buddy who I haven't seen for a zillion years (like 1978) and I are going to dive. I'm way into that. Turns out there is a special dive at Vets park tonight, so at the kind invitation of Claudette, I extend the same to HS buddy. He and I get to hang and dive, he gets to meet some SoCal locals and some 'boarders, its all good.
Tonight is to be a "Block Party" - as in BYOB (cinder block) as the Vets park underwater trash heap that has slowly become "the monument" is now, brick by brick, becoming a respectable home grown reef.
I'm so into this. But I tells her "no way am I bringing a cinder block... lets get creative..." So my mind starts to race.
Mistake Number one. (you may count them...)
We get there - its pretty windy and a little rough. No biggie. I've done harrier surf entries than this. Good thing I blew off the block idea and "got creative." I loaded into my Lobster bag a hand full of CD's (I'm turning the Monument into a "bring a CD, take a CD" thing) my ScubaBoard Mug and two 24" pieces of 4" ABS drain pipe. Thought I'd get some Habit-trail thing going. Idiotchild, here.
As I'm gearing up, I crush my mask. Nice. No biggie, I have a spare. Of course, the real spare is in the BPD in Belize someplace, so I have my retired beloved Sea Vision that I haven't dived for like 2 years. I put on some AntiFog and we hit the water.
Mistake number two.
HS buddy (Mark Vlahos) is the only sane one who is sans blocks and reef raff. Claudette and a couple of others (who's SB handles escape me) kick out, with their Lift bags and their blocks (Claudette found a pretty PINK block!) Claudette has never used a lift bag, and I believe this is a first for one of the other two gentlemen... maybe both. Who knows. So lets examine this, shall we:
* 4' surf
* Lots o' wind.
* Night
* Lift bag rookies
* Cinder Blocks
* Taking cinde blocks INTO the water, through the surf, at night with a liftbag... for the first time...
Oh yeah - this is going to be smoooov.
So we get to the drop point (and I do mean DROP) and the clustry begins. My mask is hopelessly fogged. Nothing I can do. Its an insta-silt out. The block brigade is trying to get their blocks semi neutral while they manage their lights while they navigate to the site as we all kick up clouds and I'm trying to get a little water into my mask to swish around while my super buoyant lobster bag is flapping in the surge...
OY!
Two minutes into this I lose Claudette (who I'm following) and Mark is following me. I do a spin and look to Mark through the silt and my fogged over mask and thumb the dive. He and I pop up. I tell him we're gonna nav towards the Monument on the surface (I have a rough idea where it is) and try to find their lights, then re-drop.
We start kicking south and a lift bag pops up. A moment later, Claudette's dome pops up. She can tell you the rest - but now she's on top with the two of us and her floating block. Cool!
We giggle a bit, get our bearings and drop again. I should insert here that we drop at about 55' (not the 16' we originally dropped in.) On the way down blind Sea Vision here is trying to manage a very buoyant lobster bag, clear my mask (for the 27th time), clear my ears, re-deploy my light, not contribute to the silt out, blah blah blah... Long story short, I kinda land on Claudette, who herself just lawndarted into the silt with her Pink block.
Well, not so Kinda. I REALLY landed on Claudette. I pull myself off of her and her no-so-floating block, untangle my fins from her lift bag and sort of settle in the bottom. Mark is watching this, doubtless thinking "who are these idiots...?"
So we follow her to the Monument (I still can't see a dang thing) and I'm stunned to see a zillion bricks... like 15 or 20! All stacked, etc.... very cool.
I open my bag, and instantly one of the ABS pipes rockets to the surface. I grab the other and jam it into one of the blocks. I place my Mug on a block, and stack the CD's into a block. Pretty cool. Take some hopelessly silted out photos and clear my mask for the 50th time.
I motion to Claudette (through the ooze) that I want to go back and not go dive Vets, as I can't friggen see, and I'm just not comfy with all the previous clustry. She says OK and leads Mark and I back.
Its all good. Oy.
Mistakes & Lessons I Learned:
Mistake #1 - if you're going to take something into the sea, KNOW IF ITS POSITIVE OR NEGATIVE FIRST.
My mug is Neg. CD's are barely Neg. ABS pipe us mutha poisitive. I was fighting this stuff all the way out there and one just shot out of my bag at 65 feet.Mistake #2 - Be sure you're friggen back up mask will work! The back up I've had these years has been cleaned and checked a number of times... this one not so much. It would have worked in an emergency, but as my main mask for this dive, THIS DIVE, it sucked too much to mention.
Lesson - Liftbags are tough work. I read through a zillion posts yesterday and I got the impression that they're tough (Uncle Ricky, your input was totally the best in the threads I read - the be cautious, take it slow, etc.) I almost got one this week, but decided not to, as I thought taking a block through the surf at night was a bad idea for a first timer like me. The crew tonight were gamers, and they all managed, but it was clearly tough. I think I'll practice taking stuff off the bottom and managing it in the water column a bit when I finally start my liftbag work - I will NOT start off first thing by taking stuff IN through the surf and swell. At night. :11:
Lesson - do not make your first dive with a buddy you haven't seen in a zillion years an event dive! This was not my finest hour. Remember in A River Runs Through It, when at the end of a tough day (the sunburn day) Paul said to Norman "lets come back and wipe this day off the books..."? That's how I felt tonight with Mark. I wanna dive this again, just without all the foo foo rah.
Some pics are attached. This was jolly fun - just messy and silly. Really silly. Really fun. I was giggling most of the way. When I wasn't cursing at my friggen mask.
I was never scared or anything - plenty of gas in the Waterheater, not cold, never really lost, etc. I haven't downloaded yet, but I'm sure my SAC will be in the .70's or .80's as I was huffing most of the dive with all the clearing and burning eyes and stuff. No worries, really - I just couldn't see, and I knew if we were going to do a drop and run (that was the plan) I would not have had fun diving for another 40 or 50 minutes with this mask issue.
I'm sure the others will chime in.
What a night.
---
Ken
