I thought I'd post my trip report from this weekend.
Actually my diving this weekend started Saturday with some dive training at the Lake Travis Test Station. We fully inflated to two 2000lb lift bags, two 1000lb lift bags, and one 500lb lift bag. That was cool. (not all at the same time of course but we used a 9000lb anchor and inflated the bags to look for leaks. But that's a dive team report so on to my recreational dive.
Today I divemastered for Rob on the Giant Stride. We had a great time! Mike Lutz was there teaching an AOW Class and his divemaster Doug was there to help with there four students. The only one not teaching or taking a class was Dede (I hope I got the name right and spelled right sorry if I didn't). Our first dive was at the Oasis Wall. We descended to 93 feet and before it got silty vis was pretty good. Dede and I got away from the class and struck out on our own doing brief contours at 60, 40, and 20 feet. At first I thought she was picking up all the trash in the lake because after I showed her a bottle she kept it. Out of peer pressure I put a couple of cans in the pockets of my new Zeagle Ranger. Then we came across a lot of cans and bottles and I decided I was done picking up trash. When we surfaced she told me she was collecting bottles (and only bottles) for some top secret classified project. (I wonder if she and Frank are planning to connect Lake Travis with the Paris tunnels using beer bottles somehow.) I put my cans in the tash.
Then we went to the Old Scuba Park, Wreck Alley, or whatever you want to call it. Now I'd dove this place many times before all the lines were down and even one other time with Bob. My impression was always that it was cool but lacking a map and a good feel for the place it was always hit or miss. Today with Bob's laminated map and plenty of underwater lines it was easy to find our way around.
We decended on the Botel. This is a large boat that is now in 20' of water. It's large but there's not much to it. We followed it to the bow and passed an upsidedown swimming pool to a line leading to a house boat. Rob told us we could swim through it and at first we were going to pass on his advice but then we decided to do it. It was really cool. Once through we followed a rope that led us through trunks and branches of some very large submerged trees. It crossed my mind we might find some lines that might confuse us but that never happened. We came up on a large collapsed boat and using the map found the toyota. This was really cool because as it cme into view the first thing I saw was the grill and headlights. It looked just like a car in a horror movie, so cool. Then back to the collapsed boat and back along a line to the Botel. But there was another car to see. Passed the Botel and we came up on a Corvair. That took us to the end of a 57 minute dive.
Vis was fair 10-20 in most places. I know good vis is overrated but it's when it's there I'm not going to complain. Temp wasn't bad. I dove both dives in a 3 mil and only got cold at the end of the second dive.
Rob runs a first class operation and diving with Mike and his friends was a lot of fun too.
Dive number 287
Actually my diving this weekend started Saturday with some dive training at the Lake Travis Test Station. We fully inflated to two 2000lb lift bags, two 1000lb lift bags, and one 500lb lift bag. That was cool. (not all at the same time of course but we used a 9000lb anchor and inflated the bags to look for leaks. But that's a dive team report so on to my recreational dive.
Today I divemastered for Rob on the Giant Stride. We had a great time! Mike Lutz was there teaching an AOW Class and his divemaster Doug was there to help with there four students. The only one not teaching or taking a class was Dede (I hope I got the name right and spelled right sorry if I didn't). Our first dive was at the Oasis Wall. We descended to 93 feet and before it got silty vis was pretty good. Dede and I got away from the class and struck out on our own doing brief contours at 60, 40, and 20 feet. At first I thought she was picking up all the trash in the lake because after I showed her a bottle she kept it. Out of peer pressure I put a couple of cans in the pockets of my new Zeagle Ranger. Then we came across a lot of cans and bottles and I decided I was done picking up trash. When we surfaced she told me she was collecting bottles (and only bottles) for some top secret classified project. (I wonder if she and Frank are planning to connect Lake Travis with the Paris tunnels using beer bottles somehow.) I put my cans in the tash.
Then we went to the Old Scuba Park, Wreck Alley, or whatever you want to call it. Now I'd dove this place many times before all the lines were down and even one other time with Bob. My impression was always that it was cool but lacking a map and a good feel for the place it was always hit or miss. Today with Bob's laminated map and plenty of underwater lines it was easy to find our way around.
We decended on the Botel. This is a large boat that is now in 20' of water. It's large but there's not much to it. We followed it to the bow and passed an upsidedown swimming pool to a line leading to a house boat. Rob told us we could swim through it and at first we were going to pass on his advice but then we decided to do it. It was really cool. Once through we followed a rope that led us through trunks and branches of some very large submerged trees. It crossed my mind we might find some lines that might confuse us but that never happened. We came up on a large collapsed boat and using the map found the toyota. This was really cool because as it cme into view the first thing I saw was the grill and headlights. It looked just like a car in a horror movie, so cool. Then back to the collapsed boat and back along a line to the Botel. But there was another car to see. Passed the Botel and we came up on a Corvair. That took us to the end of a 57 minute dive.
Vis was fair 10-20 in most places. I know good vis is overrated but it's when it's there I'm not going to complain. Temp wasn't bad. I dove both dives in a 3 mil and only got cold at the end of the second dive.
Rob runs a first class operation and diving with Mike and his friends was a lot of fun too.
Dive number 287
