Certified and my FIRST DIVE at Dutch Springs

Well, I did it. I am now a PADI Certified Open Water Diver. My permanent card will have a picture of a shark on it. And now I know I can only dive to 130 feet, but that is still deeper than my pool.

Now I can plan my own dives. I stopped at the shop and bought some 2lb soft weights just in case I had floaty issues. And this time the dive was scheduled for a reasonable 10am. No way Dennis was going to feign sleeping while I loaded the heavy stuff in the car.

We dove on Saturday morning and I found a hermit crab and some starfish and blue claw crabs and baby flounder. I even took my mask off and stuck my tongue out at the dive master and took a couple of pictures with the underwater camera. We will see if they turn out. We took a spin under the railroad bridge and all around and then went to lunch.

On the way home I stopped at the shop to have my tank refilled and as I pulled up there was an explosion and smoke came out of every door and window of the shop. Before I could get to the door the dive tech came out of the smoke like in a Bruce Willis movie. Now I would have to get my tank filled somewhere else cause I had decided to meet some local divers at Dutch Springs on Sunday. I was taking along one of the other students divers I took the class with just in case the people I was meeting were axe murderers or something. I figured in an emergency there was a 50/50 chance they would get him first.

As it turned out they were great people and at the end of every dive they even brought me back.

Dutch Springs is a spring fed quarry that is for scuba diving (they have sunk all kinds of things to dive around like a firetruck, helicopter, bus, airplane, cars, etc) and then it has an Aqua Park for non-divers that has rafts and floats and water slides and stuff.

It was an interesting day. I brought doughnuts for breakfast but the 2 hour trip took me 4 hours using the navigation system in Dennis truck. (Does anyone remember the trip report to Hooters? Apparently it doesn‘t like me) So I missed breakfast.

Then we did 2 dives so I had to put on “The Wetsuit” twice!

The first dive we went along this quarry wall and checked out all the sights. My buoyancy issues caused me some distress when I suddenly popped up in the middle of the Aqua Park like the creature from the black lagoon. I said “Scuse me, never mind” and quietly sunk back down and started swimming before one of them came off the slide and fell on my head.

Getting out was tuff. One of the other divers had to carry my weight belt or I wasn’t going anywhere. Then I remembered that we had walked downhill (about 50 yards) to get here. I hoped to get back up the hill before the second dive, I needed some more air in my tank.

I was the only girl in the group of 7 divers. While I was “slow” getting into “the wetsuit” for the second dive, they were discussing how there was only one female diver who actually did justice to a wetsuit. I said “Excuse me!!! And I don’t?” I don’t take 40 minutes getting into a wetsuit for nothing ya know. All those other women divers just slap one on in 3 minutes and off they go without even looking in the mirror, that’s the problem.

On the second dive we were going to the firetruck. I was following my buddy and looking around, he had bright blue fins and I made sure I kept them in sight out of the corner of my eye.

Suddenly, we were in shallow water and my buddy stood up. So I did too… and then I screamed and scared the beejeezes out of some total stranger with bright blue fins I had followed home. And now I was lost……. Again.

So I swam in a circle for a while, and you know what? THEY CAME BACK AND FOUND ME. HA! They could have gone back to the campsite, packed up and left without any forwarding address but they didn’t.

We then went on to the firetruck which was kinda cool and then we played with the local fishies. Steve the fish will have a great time here, I will bring him next time I come. They picked up rocks and found these little crayfish and fed them to the bass that were swimming around and one of the guys caught a baby bass in his mask. It was half flooded with water and this little bass was swimming back and forth in it.

The trip back was uneventful but I still had to get back up the hill and into my car before the park closed at 5 and it was 3 oclock already! One of the guys carried my weight belt again and I made it.

They said they would keep me and I could come back.

I’m a diver now and I have dive buddies!! Imagine that.

The Inlet Dive was Interesting

Now we get to the interesting part of the Inlet Dive.

It was way cool. At Manasquan Inlet, on the Point Pleasant side, there is a park where people can walk along the seawall, crab and fish or sit on benches and watch the boats go in and out. At the end of the park is a rock jetty where people sometimes fish and at the end you can see the ocean.

We jumped off the seawall into the inlet and went down. I actually stayed down after one of my dive buddies stuck a 5lb weight in my suit.

Under the water down the wall and on the rocks along the side of the inlet was a whole different place. Gazillions of mussels (no that is not an exaggeration) are stuck to everything. I understand I can harvest them and you can eat them although you want the mussels closer to the ocean (cleaner) but they weigh a ton to bring up (remember part 1?) so I wont be doing that just yet.

There are different color algae and plants growing, not just the green stuff. There were these really cool red ones that looked like red ruffles stuck to the rocks. I will have to find out what they are called. In the crevices of the rocks all these fish and eels are hiding. They back into the crevices and so when you shine your light on them you see their faces first. They have really big eyes. When the light hits their eyes sometimes it blinds them and they shoot out at you but not too often. There are oyster crackers which you do not want to put your finger in their mouth and striped things, I don’t know what they were.

There were also some little baby manta rays swimming about, if you didn’t pay attention you wouldn’t see them. I understand that in another couple of weeks there will be seahorses and some tropical fish like puffer fish that get carried in with the warmer currents.There were hundreds of starfish in every size everywhere. They are bright orange underwater.

And there are blue claw crabs in every size just swimming around and when you put your hand on one cause you are not looking, they bite and you have to snap your hand and fling them off like in a cartoon. I guess I never considered what they eat. I kinda thought they were like scavengers and lived off chicken people tied to string and threw in, I don’t know. But we were looking around and came across this really big blue claw crab really working at something and stopped to watch. This crab was pulling mussels off the rocks and would separate a good one from the bunch and then using its pinchers pried open the mussel. It was really a struggle between the two of them. Then when it got the mussel open it used its pincers like chop sticks to eat the mussel. I guess I never really saw a crab open up its mouth up close before. I’m pretty sure I saw teeth. They are pretty agile and use their claws and pincers like arms and hands putting things precisely where they want them. It was really interesting and they taste good with garlic too.

I think this is where they grow fishing lures too. There were several patches of them in the crevices of the rocks I saw as we swam along.It was kinda cool.

I will do it again.

Cheryl

First OW Dive

Have you ever gone swimming on a hot summer's day
And seen the little fishes swimming in the bay
With their hands in their pockets and their pockets in their pants
Doing a little hoochy koochy dance

Well I am going diving in the ocean, actually where the ocean meets the canal in Point Pleasant and it is a training dive, there will be a test. I am the only one who signed up for this so it will be like a private lesson or actually private test. There will be no one there worse than me. Hmmmmmm

This is at 7am I don’t do 7am who decides on this shtuff?

I decide to check out all my divey stuff the day before, while awake and fully caffeinated. All 78 lbs of it. One mask check, 2 fins check one hood check 2 gloves check one snorkel….wait a minute there was something about the gloves, maybe I should have taken the smaller size, I will try them on again. Left glove on, other left glove….oops, even I know this could be problematic. So off to the dive shop I go…. somewhere in that display of gloves is a pair almost exactly the same as mine only righties!

5:30AM comes around awfully quick. I put on my bathing suit and load all 78 lbs of gear in my car and now I have to rest….and pee before I put on “THE wetsuit” Guess who just got up. Dennis! What timing. And he is only retired 11 days! What a quick study. Bastard.

I have “Scuba Juice”. this is a little diver y diver hint I got from one of my buddies on scuba board to help my wetsuit slide on more easily. It is ½ water and ½ hair conditioner in a spray bottle. And when I use tropical scent conditioner, not only will I smell good but the hair on my legs will be soft and manageable. This was obviously from a guy scuba buddy , I hope.

I will wear the jumpsuit portion of “THE wetsuit” to the dive site since it will take an act of Congress and 2 helpers to get it on. I can put the air conditioner on in my car for the trip there. I go out on the back deck and spray “THE wetsuit” and slide it on….kinda….sort of…after 20 minutes and breaking 3 nails.

Dennis is standing in the kitchen window watching me and laughing. Damned old people and their getting up early to pee.

I leave for the dive site. Once there I have to put my gear together and place it on the bulkhead to pull in the water after I get in. Do you see me lifting this thing off there and into the water, me neither. I also have to put the onesie part of “THE wetsuit” on. The part where you DO NOT make a fist in the arm part. Now the arms stretch to twice my arms length before my hand ever gets through. I am now jumping up and down in a circle because I am sure this will help get my hand through the sleeves. (It seemed like a good idea at the time) And I am now trying to get the zipper started when the instructor says “Did I tell you to zip the suit a quarter of the way before you put it on?” NO! Now get the H*** over here and zip it for me. He does and what does he say, “It’s a little big under the arms.” Too freakin bad, I am not buying a smaller one.

A quick lesson in wetsuits. The keep you warm by the thickness of the neoprene starting at about 0.5 ml and going to 7.5 ml (“THE wetsuit” is 7ml) and in the neoprene are air bubbles which compress at depth. Between the neoprene and you are air and water which your body heats up and keeps you warm. Remember that air and air bubble float and so you use weights to sink the suit. Because the air bubbles compress at depth there are a lot of them and they eventually stay kinda compressed after you use them 10 or 20 times and are not so floaty.

I get in the water and I am correct, I cannot drag the tank from over my head into the water while sinking in the sand in the water below it. It is 7AM and 82 degrees and I am wearing a wetsuit that could keep me warm in Antarctica. With a “little” help I am geared up. My BCD no longer velcros shut due to the thickness of “THE wetsuit” “I don’t understand this says the instructor, it fit you fine on Sunday. DOH! “THE wetsuit” We may have to duct tape the tank to you it floats up on you.” Has to be a men thing, but I am not taking all this off and climbing back up there sooo…. We are ready to make the 25 or so yard swim out to the dive site. I put my snorkel in my mouth and start to swim out following the instructor, who keeps talking to me. So I open my mouth to answer and almost drown.

No biggy, us divers are taught not to panic. So I continue on and out of the water comes my fin. No longer on my foot. Lets chase it and catch it and put it back on and the instructor tightens them for me and now I cant get the fins back in the water cause my legs keep on floating to the top. (see wetsuit floaty lesson) So we swim the 25 yards back to put some weight on my ankles.

The park we are diving from is across the street from a 7-11 and people who have walked down to get coffee are now gathering on the benches and watching while drinking their morning coffee.

Now we swim the 25 yards back out to the dive site. I deflate, exhale and….. Nothing happens. Not enough weight to sink the suit, so…..we swim the 25 yards back to put some more weight on my ankles and vest.
Now we swim the 25 yards back out to the dive site. I deflate, exhale and pull myself down on the guide rope and….. Up out of the water shoots a fin like a surface to air missile. My legs go flying over my head and I shoot up to the surface upside down.

Those coffee drinkers are still there and I think they called their friends to come watch. They are probably actually tea drinkers like Dennis. Damned tea drinkers.

So…… we swim the 25 yards back to put some more weight on. I am now wearing 6 ankle weights (about 10 lbs) hooked on to my ankles and at various parts of my equipment and there is no where else to put them so the instructor unzips the neck of my wetsuit and drops a 5 lb lead weight in my suit and zips it up again .
Now we swim the 25 yards back out to the dive site. I still have to do a diver tow where I tow a tired or unconscious diver 25 yards through the water as part of my test. I tell the instructor it is now or never cause I am not swimming back and forth again. So I tow him out to the dive site, now wearing 90 lbs of equipment, 6-8 pounds of extra ankle weights on my ankles. The instructor deflates, goes under and…. And….. And…comes back up. Everything OK? NO! I am the same age as your mother not your wife and am sucking air from surface swimming 175 yards (525 feet) carrying 90 lbs of equipment and your dead ass! Give me a minute. BTW that 5 lb lead weight in my suit is now in my crotch.

I deflate, exhale and….. Go down. It took less weight to sink the Titanic.

After the first 20 feet things start to compress and squeeze out the floaty air bubbles and I plummet like a rock from all the weight. But No biggy, us divers are taught not to panic. I adjust my buoyancy at the bottom and continue on. I pass all my skills and we kind of start to look around.

There is all kinds of cool stuff on the bottom. I probably shouldn’t have stuck that blue point crab in front of the instructors mask while he was trying to pick up a starfish for me to see. I don’t think he was ready for that when he looked up. No biggy, us divers are taught not to panic. Starfish are cool too. And all kinds of other awesome stuff. I like this. Steve the Fish will like this too. I will take him next time.

But now we come up at the bulkhead and have to get our gear off and back up and on the bulkhead. Can I do this? No. I will have to get a big strong dive buddy or this will not work. I ask if this stuff is disposable , you know one time use and you leave it. Apparently not so he gets my tank up on the bulkhead and we start to climb out.

Did you remember the 4 ankle weights on my ankles? Me neither. When I hit the bulkhead there was quite a loud THUMP. Did you remember the 5lb lead weight in my crotch? Me neither.

I have one more test dive and then I will be an official Scuba diver. I am very good at this. Cool huh?

Love
Cheryl

Steve the Fish

Long time ago,
There lived a fish named Fred,
Made of many colors,
Yellow, blue and red.
He swam through the ocean,
Swimming wild and free,
Away from the fishermen,
They wanted him you see.

Well Freds great grand son is Steve, Steve the Fish. He is red and yellow and blue and runs on 2 AA batteries. And Steve came to scuba diving on Sunday. He swam with us for 3 hours before he got really tired and slowed down a lot. It was our classes first encounter with tropical fish and in the pool we were guaranteed great visability.

The instructors had to rescue him from the filter, twice, he wasn't paying attention and got sucked in.

How sad is it that by the end of the afternoon 8 adults were yelling "Steve! get away from there!" "hold on, let Steve through" "can he go deeper?" "Steve! Look out! Do you think he's hurt? " "Can I pet him?"

And none of this seemed odd to them.

Steve later spent the afternoon in the pool at my house while Christopher and I checked out my equipment for my....... OCEAN DIVE.

I have pictures of Steve and some of the other scuba learners at the dive shop pool and pictures of Steve and me in our pool. You will have to wait for them because the camera is not done yet. Anyway, going diving in the ocean and I have the tank and all the divey stuff and everything.

Christopher stood on the scale and held eveything cause we couldn't pile it all on and get it to stay and I couldn't hold it all (do we see a story coming? Oh yea)

Anyway, all the gear weighed 78 lbs this included the wetsuit (remember that puppy?) mask/fins/etc, snorkel, booties, hood and gloves (yes they came in) 26 lbs of lead weights, BCD with attached waterproof flashlight and waterproof knife and waterproof alligator whistle, regulator , gauges and computer and air tank.

I cannot bench press a volkeswagon and I cannot carry 78 lbs. This is not good. I have to be at Gull Island in Pt Pleasant at 7AM tomarrow. I will start to putting on my wetsuit now.

First Pool Dive

Why don't sharks eat clowns?
Cause they taste funny.

Well, I went diving. And I did good, all things considered.

Last week we learned that while your equipment is heavy on land it weights nothing in the water.

I had to go get a tank but I told them I couldn't carry it. It has three thousand pounds of air in it, I cant lift that much! One of the assistant instructors carried it for me. I told him I would breath it all and carry it back myself when it was empty. He was a happy guy he was laughing. Little did I know that he would become my personal assistant before the end of the session.

First we had to learn to put our tanks together. The breathing hose went on the right and the gauges went on the left, I kept checking my hands for the "L" and trying but I must have had like a European model or maybe I assembled it wrong or something cause everytime I tried to put the hoses on the tank with the valve away from me like the instructor was explaining, the hoses were on the wrong sides! So I would put the valve towards me and the instructor would say "No Cheryl, the valve goes away from you" But the hoses were on the wrong side! Very frustrating. My personal assistant is smiling again, he is very happy guy. He says try flipping the valve left to right instead of front to back. And the hoses are suddenly where they should be. He is smart, I will keep him.

Then we turn on the valve. Which way? I know nothing of valves. "Lefty lucy, righty tighty" I also know nothing of left and right. My personal assistant "Other left Cheryl" Thank you.

Now I roll my tank into the water and put it on. I have to make sure my weights are in place in my BC (vest) so they dont fall out while I am diving so I tug on the weight pocket and out it comes. Good thing I checked! I put it back in and tug again, out it comes, must be something wrong with the clip it wont stay in!

I tug on the pocket and out it comes. I put it back in and tug again, out it comes,I tug on the pocket and out it comes. I put it back in and tug again, out it comes, Everyone is now looking at me cause I am holding up progress here, but I have a problem this BC is defective or at least the clip is.
Over comes my personal assistant. He is a little too happy, he has this grin on his face like he takes the little bus to the dive site.

Apparently there is a quick release saftey feature on my BC and you release it by pulling on the pocket. He puts my weights back in and tells me "Dont do that" so I dont do that and the weights stay in.

Did you know that there are no left and right fins? My personal assistant is very smart.

Under water I can take my regulator out of my mouth and put it back and can take my mask on and off and clear it and can put air in and out of my BC (vest) without shooting up to the surface like a rocketship.

When we get to the diving part I get a dive buddy, he is the young guy who lapped me last week in the 200 mile swim. OK Maybe it was yards. We actually work well together. I can do a diver tow and push. I practiced on my buddy and then he practiced on me. I told him if he needed extra practice he could pull me around on all of our dives. He told me that I was a very generous person. I'm good like that.

During the open dive one of the other students kept falling on me and knocked the regulator out of my mouth. He had bouyancy control issues, so I just got out. I was cold any way cause I didn't wear my wetsuit. Next time I may have to bedazzle them with my wetsuit skills.

Next week will be all classroom work so I will not do any diving, but I will keep in touch

Love Cheryl

Communication from Florida

This was sent to me by one of my "dive buddies" in Florida. Apparently I will fit right in. Amazing huh?

"Depending on the size of the gators present you should perhaps carry a "Gator Bell" to warn them of your presence and some pepper spray for defense. To figure out the size of the gators present though, you have to inspect their poop. Gators under 12 ft have poop that is small to moderate in size with a normal smell. Gators larger than 12 ft have a much larger poop with tiny little bells and it smells like pepper spray."

So I bought a whistle.

Dennis is happy to know I take the threat of gators seriously. It puts his mind at rest. I think he upped my insurance again.

Cheryl

sAVE-a-dIVE kIT

FACTS

1. More people are killed each year by dogs, pigs and deer than by sharks. The United States averages just 16 shark attacks each year and slightly less than one shark-attack fatality every two years. Meanwhile, in the coastal U.S. states alone, lightning strikes and kills more than 41 people each year.
2. the Mako shark is the fastest swimmer in the ocean clocking between 43 and 60 miles per hour
3. Alligators can run at speeds of up to 20 miles per hour. However that speed can only be maintained for a very short distance.
4. Alligators are not immune to snake poison. However, they do have extremely tough skin

RULES OF DIVING

1 Dont stop breathing
2 Plan your dive and dive your plan
3 Dont stop breathing

I know I know I should be diving but I wont be until Sunday. Long story, but then again all of mine are.
My booties are in! and they fit.

I have removed my knife (with great effort and at personal risk) and placed it in a safebox in my dive bag for safe keeping. I figure I will not need it to dive inthe pool and do not want to be tempted to use it. I promise to use it "only for good" (like my marshmallow shooter. {You will learn more about that as the summer goes on})
Just need my hood and gloves and probably a safety sausage. Every diver should have one of those. I think I want a yellow or orange one, to coordinate with the rest of my stuff. it should blend with the theme but be a splash of color. These decisions are not to be made lightly.

Anyway, I now have a logbook to enter all my dives in (actually I have 3 but cant figure what goes where in any onf them so I will draw my own stuff) and a rashguard (we would not want me getting a rash now would we) and I have begun my saveadive kit.

A saveadive (save -a-dive) kit is the little kit divers have for things that they or their dive buddy might need, break or have use for in the case of emergency. this should include extra straps, o rings, extra batteries and other items.

I have a first aid kit with cat in the hat band aids, a pocket knife with 12 attachments of which I only recognize 8 and can only get 4 out anyway, mask defogger, D rings , duct tape (Dennis says I can fix anything with duct tape.finstrap breaks? duct tape it to your foot. Hole in hose? Duct tape it Tank strap sliding? duct tape it to you Makes sense and that scares me) an empty bottle/paper and pen, tissues, a map of NJ, 2 stamps, q-tips and tic tacs. I have no idea what it would take to save my dive but I guess I will find out.

I have watched the video and taken the first test in the book. I am ready.

I think I will buy a new towel for Sunday, one with fishes on it. Sounds like a plan. See...I am thinking like a diver already. 2 Plan your dive and dive your plan

Bye! Love yas I have to go shopping

Cheryl