OP
The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
30: 09/28/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Tim Waldo... This was the dive that almost never happened. It took me several trips to the Sprinter and back to resolve a bubbling regulator leak and then I had a mask that was way to foggy, so it got thrown away. We made it to just past the Keyhole and turned on a technicality. Dive time 34 minutes
31: 09/28/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Tim Waldo. We had barely made it 100 feet in when my primary light failed. Dive time: 11 minutes.
32: 09/29/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. Solo! I went looking for the whale bone off of Hill 400. This was my first solo dive with a stage in a cave and it went very well. I breathed down to thirds on the stage just before the Hill 400 jump. Switched to primary gas, and ditched the bottle after I tied in the jump. Found all the jumps, but my reel just wasn't long enough to get back there. The final passage was a bit tight, and there was def river water intrusion back there: very gloomy. It was good to do the turn and see absolutely no additional silt from my passage.
The way back was uneventful and I think I was the only one in the cave. Picking up the stage and taking out the jump seemed to take forever! Also, I had to keep reaching back to keep the now fairly light AL80 from bouncing against all the walls. I need a better solution for this. Any ideas? PDC seemed to clear deco a bit quicker than I thought it should. I thought it was telling me "High NI", but a subsequent dive showed me I was wrong. Finished with oodles of primary gas (2700 and 2400). Dive time 1:32
33: 09/29/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Dave ???. He was hoping to find a buddy, and I was the only one around. I had plenty of primary gas, so why not? We made it to just past the Keyhole and he turned it. Dive time :26
34: 09/30/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Jim Wyatt on his Optima Rebreather. TRAFFIC JAM!!! Two rebreather divers preceded us and two scooter divers followed us. The plan was to head up to the Bats and possible to the Hinckle Tunnel. Jim wanted to move s-l-o-w and I was OK with that. We entered at the Devil's Ear and I dropped my deco bottle at the sign. Dropping and picking it up again has become fairly routine, and I like it like that. Then we waited for the two rebreather divers in front of us to make some headway. Was that flutter kicking? Jets sufficiently cooled, I followed Jim but his primary completely outclassed mine. My second Primary didn't work either... I think I have a charging system failure. So, I tried one of my back-ups and it was more than bright enough to serve as my primary. My first primary then became a back up and I had one more back up in reserve. Three functioning lights and I'm OK with that. Jim was leading and kept checking to be sure I was there. Sorry Jim. I'll get my 21 Watt Light Monkies back today so I can see again.
We got to the Lips and had to wait again. We got to the Key Hole and had to wait again and I heard the distinct sound of scooters behind me. They waited too. We got to the Park Bench and had to wait again. We were almost to the Hill 400 jump and, you guessed it, we had to wait again. At this point, the scooters had enough room to pass us all. It was then I realized that I wasn't mistaken before either... one of them is flutter kicking. Neither is using pull and glide. There's a lot of CO2 being made in front of us. They duck up Hill 400 and I put in the jump for us. Then they go left on another jump and we stay on the line. Now we settle into a gentle rhythm of pull and glide. No, it's not fast: just right to keep moving and not start huffing. We made it to the Bat Cave and since I was 200 psi off of thirds, I turned the dive. I was a bit concerned about the amount of Deco I had, so I went a little faster than Jim probably wanted. I kept back, so as not to outpace him and we made good time. Picked up my bottle at the sign and we exited at the Eye. I was 1:08 into the dive and after I switched to O2, I had 12 minutes of deco. At 1:15 I got the error message again, but then I actually paid attention and it said "High PO2". I was at 14 feet and simply stayed until my PDC said I had been down 1:20.
31: 09/28/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Tim Waldo. We had barely made it 100 feet in when my primary light failed. Dive time: 11 minutes.
32: 09/29/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. Solo! I went looking for the whale bone off of Hill 400. This was my first solo dive with a stage in a cave and it went very well. I breathed down to thirds on the stage just before the Hill 400 jump. Switched to primary gas, and ditched the bottle after I tied in the jump. Found all the jumps, but my reel just wasn't long enough to get back there. The final passage was a bit tight, and there was def river water intrusion back there: very gloomy. It was good to do the turn and see absolutely no additional silt from my passage.
The way back was uneventful and I think I was the only one in the cave. Picking up the stage and taking out the jump seemed to take forever! Also, I had to keep reaching back to keep the now fairly light AL80 from bouncing against all the walls. I need a better solution for this. Any ideas? PDC seemed to clear deco a bit quicker than I thought it should. I thought it was telling me "High NI", but a subsequent dive showed me I was wrong. Finished with oodles of primary gas (2700 and 2400). Dive time 1:3233: 09/29/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Dave ???. He was hoping to find a buddy, and I was the only one around. I had plenty of primary gas, so why not? We made it to just past the Keyhole and he turned it. Dive time :26
34: 09/30/2015, Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Fl. With Jim Wyatt on his Optima Rebreather. TRAFFIC JAM!!! Two rebreather divers preceded us and two scooter divers followed us. The plan was to head up to the Bats and possible to the Hinckle Tunnel. Jim wanted to move s-l-o-w and I was OK with that. We entered at the Devil's Ear and I dropped my deco bottle at the sign. Dropping and picking it up again has become fairly routine, and I like it like that. Then we waited for the two rebreather divers in front of us to make some headway. Was that flutter kicking? Jets sufficiently cooled, I followed Jim but his primary completely outclassed mine. My second Primary didn't work either... I think I have a charging system failure. So, I tried one of my back-ups and it was more than bright enough to serve as my primary. My first primary then became a back up and I had one more back up in reserve. Three functioning lights and I'm OK with that. Jim was leading and kept checking to be sure I was there. Sorry Jim. I'll get my 21 Watt Light Monkies back today so I can see again.
We got to the Lips and had to wait again. We got to the Key Hole and had to wait again and I heard the distinct sound of scooters behind me. They waited too. We got to the Park Bench and had to wait again. We were almost to the Hill 400 jump and, you guessed it, we had to wait again. At this point, the scooters had enough room to pass us all. It was then I realized that I wasn't mistaken before either... one of them is flutter kicking. Neither is using pull and glide. There's a lot of CO2 being made in front of us. They duck up Hill 400 and I put in the jump for us. Then they go left on another jump and we stay on the line. Now we settle into a gentle rhythm of pull and glide. No, it's not fast: just right to keep moving and not start huffing. We made it to the Bat Cave and since I was 200 psi off of thirds, I turned the dive. I was a bit concerned about the amount of Deco I had, so I went a little faster than Jim probably wanted. I kept back, so as not to outpace him and we made good time. Picked up my bottle at the sign and we exited at the Eye. I was 1:08 into the dive and after I switched to O2, I had 12 minutes of deco. At 1:15 I got the error message again, but then I actually paid attention and it said "High PO2". I was at 14 feet and simply stayed until my PDC said I had been down 1:20.
