Kona, HI Dive Report for my SoCal Buddies

[saf_25]

Hi everyone,
Yes, I am diving with one of my long time buddies Nap who I met when we took our Advanced class together (See Stacy....He was MY buddy, before he was YOURS!!! LOL))) Unfortunately John is not here with me. ( And I did invite you to go Stacy...your choice! You snooze, you loose as I used to say as a kid. LOL

On a sad note, Nap did take his Canon Digital Monster Camera diving. Everything was fine up until our second dive when it somehow got flooded in the camera tank!!! Fortunately, he has insurance for it, but it basically has ruined his disire to continue diving. So...I am buddiless for the next four morning dives. Thankfully I'm a 'socialable' kind of gal, and I will do just fine.

Mahalo

Oh no! That just sucks! Poor guy, he's had nothing but problems with that thing! Tell Nap that I send my condolences. Hopefully he won't give up on diving for good (it's bad enough that he's not diving with you for the rest of the week!). Remind him that there are still plenty of bugs for us to attempt to catch (although with my skill, it's more like a tickle and release program), and I'm counting on him to help me get them!

Believe me, reading your reports I'm kicking myself for not going - especially now that Nap's bailing on you. But, given that I need to work to make $ to support my diving habit, and seeing as how I have no vacation time left so going away would mean no job to come back to, I felt it was prudent to stay here instead. Hopefully next year?


Oh, and Jen - duh! Reading that over again, it's obvious what you were asking, I was just having a blonde day :06: (and focusing on the fact that my friends were havig fun that I could have been having too!). Don't mind me... :ignore:

 

[nap]

On a sad note, Nap did take his Canon Digital Monster Camera diving. Everything was fine up until our second dive when it somehow got flooded in the camera tank!!! Fortunately, he has insurance for it, but it basically has ruined his disire to continue diving. So...I am buddiless for the next four morning dives. Thankfully I'm a 'socialable' kind of gal, and I will do just fine.

Mahalo

What happen was my macro lens was set to manual . I opened up the port to set it auto. One of the two port latches are kinda stiff and I was aware of that so I always follow a specific routine to secure it. I have been doing it without a single incident in the past.

This time, when I finished latching my port securely, one of the divemasters (who I didn't like to begin with) came over and suggested that one of the port latches wasn't secured. I knew it was and I told him so. It should have ended there but he came over and made a latch adjustment for me. It happened so fast and I didn't realize what he did.

I make the first dive with no problems. I came back up and it was still okay so I placed the camera in a freshwater bucket. On the second dive, I was in water waiting for the divemaster to hand over my camera and then I saw the unthinkable. I didn't put two and two together until it was too late.

The moral of the story is "Don't let anyone touch your expensive equipment". I was so mad at myself. $2000 down the drain.

I did made a second dive in agony.

I cancelled 2 future trips (4 dives) but still kept manta ray dives. I wasn't worried about Jan because she seemed to enjoy diving solo (as she told me) and she practically socialized with everybody on the boat. After all, it's more like a tourist dive where a divemaster leads the group like a guide.

Diving without a camera is weird for me. I don't know if I am a diver who photographs or a photographer who dives. It's like having mashed pototoes without gravy.

I filed a claim with insurance. I'll wait and see what happens.

Here are links to my photo galleries (taken before the incident)
Pawai Bay (Wide Angle Shots)

Manta Ray Paradise

Wash Rock (Macro shots)

For video clips, you need Windows Media Player 9 and above

Manta Ray Video Clips (128 kbps, board band)

Manta Ray Video Clips (48kbps, ISDN line)