Doing it with your eyes closed....

Take any basic task you do, walking, running, even eating... now do it with your eyes closed.   Whole different experience isn't it... did you feel the nerves?  Especially if you try running, normally you'll run or walk at a casual pace, you won't think about where you put your feet, or what you're doing with your hands.  You may even be talking with someone or listening to them.  But with your eyes closed you are very careful where you put your feet, your hands are generally feeling around in front of you or around you and typically you want it quiet so you can hear whats going on around you and focus.  Now if you were smart about it, you went slow, I had a young man at my house in the summer who learned this lesson the hard way by running with his eyes closed, misjudged his location and ran into a fence, face first.... split his tongue in two (looked like a snake) and chipped teeth... that's one trip to the ER neither he nor his mother will soon forget...lol.  So why is it so much harder to do our day to day activities with our eyes closed?  It's because our eyes are like the scanner on your computer, it's how the information gets to the brain, sure you can type it all, or use a mouse to click one character at a time, but to put a whole page of information, or several, into a computer quickly the best most accurate route is a scanner.  Take eating, you eat without really thinking about it, (this also leads to why more than 60 - 80 % of the population of North America is obese, but that's another blog), you hold your fork in your one hand, knife in the other, cut your food, pick it up, place it in your mouth... simple.  With your eyes closed, you need to really focus to make sure you know where your food is, the placement of your fork, how big a piece are you cutting, finding that piece, picking it up and then carrying it to your mouth... all these tasks... SOOOO much harder with your eyes closed.


Why all this talk about eyes closed.... because Tuesday I was fortunate enough to join Dennis Chow and a fellow student for our classroom portion of our Night Dive certification.  Now this is not my first night dive, for the story about that adventure see It's Dark... Very, Very Dark...., but for this I will not just be doing one night dive as before, I will be doing three over the course of this weekend, one Friday and two on Saturday night.  Each of these three dives will have skills that must be demonstrated including Navigation (yeah my favorite....lol), Buoyancy, Orientation, etc.  Alone most of these skills are no issue and many of them are very natural after you have completed a number of dives.  BUT... much like basic stuff on the surface with your eyes closed, doing all these skills at night on a dive is much harder than in the day.  Under the water at night you only see what your light touches, and unlike in the open air, light does not travel very far under water,  leaving you with a very narrow field of vision.  At night, much like daytime activities with your eyes closed, you spend much of your time "feeling" for your gear as opposed to looking for it.  You need to know where your light, b/u light, compass, knife, BCD inflator, Drysuit inflator, gauges, etc all is, and be able to get it by touch and not by sight.  This adds an interesting dynamic and further emphasizes that you must be familiar with your gear, and must streamline your equipment as much as possible.  Now by streamlining, I do not mean under any circumstances that you want to avoid back-up items or safety equipment, etc, but until one is comfortable with night dives, it's probably a good idea to leave the cameras at home...lol.  With streamlining, you want to eliminate gear that you should not be taking with you (stick to your dive plan), if you're training for night, dive your night dive, don't load up on camera or video equipment.  Try not to have endless amounts of clips and cords all jumbled together, on the surface or even on some day dives you may be able to look to see which item is which and where cords attach, but in the dark, keep things simple and easy to remember, clip your main light in one location, easy to reach and control, simple enough to turn on with one hand and easy to recover should it be dropped (ie, clipped where you can follow the cord to pull back to your hand.)  Your b/u (and you must have at least one) needs to, again, be somewhere easy to locate, especially in the dark as this is used if your main goes out, but is secured where it is not dangling in the way or wrapping around other items and equally if not more important, not dragging where it will disturb, disrupt or injure any sea life.  Make sure your compass can be easily reached and used and that you can access your gauges and/or dive computer easily and read them all in the dark.  For me this has taken some practice, so despite looking like an idiot, I have geared up a couple times and hidden in a dark room to make sure I can find my compass, reach my lights, and control my computer... so far so good.  We'll see what Friday night brings and I'll let you know all about the adventures that await me in the dark, when once again I get "In Over My Head..."

Abort... Abort... Abort...

So health is a fickle thing... take the cold that I have, along with my jaw pain and mix in a little ocean water in the lungs and you end up with a recipe for bad diving!  I started this morning feeling a little under the weather but figured it might just be my jaw, or the slight cold I was working on, but nothing serious... boy was I wrong.  So we get to Whytecliff earlier today, gear up and head for the water, I feel a little tired, nothing too far out of the ordinary but it was definitely a harder trek than it usually is, or at least felt that way.  Out into the surf, if you can call it that.. lol, and along the wall with my group until Virpi gives the word, and partnered up, we descend.  It's so amazing underwater, I know I write this all the time, but until you have been down there, you really don't know what you're missing.  So the plan for today is 3 dives, our first being our deep dive to beyond 80 feet, followed by our Navigation dive and our Peak Performance Buoyancy dive.  Should be another great day!  Our deep goes great, despite the fact I feel a little more tired than I think I should and I seem to be using air faster today, maybe it's the additional buoyancy corrections I'm having to do... needless to say it was great.  As we progressed deeper and deeper and I'm watching my needle tip into the 90+ foot range, I look up... what a sight.  I am blowing bubbles and loosing track of them as they get to small to make out on their journey to the surface.  I am roughly 9 stories under water, breathing and visiting with the fish... life is good!  But inevitably, the party must come to an end, as unlike the fish, I am dependent on the tanks on my back to be able to stay here and air does not last forever.  So we start our return swim, and stop in about 12 feet of water for our safety stop, which involves a quick game of tic tac toe on one of my partners slates... no joke, I have played tic tac toe in 12 feet of water... my mom would be so proud.. lol.  Despite some buoyancy issues trying to stay at 12 feet and not have to work so hard, it was interesting sitting and watching the world move around you. Before long, the 3 minutes is up, we surface and a gentle surface swim (I hate surface swims...lol) back to shore.  Here is where the day started to break down, once shallow enough we stand or get our balance on the bottom and remove our fins, then walk up the beach, remove our BCDs and switch tanks, easy.... not today!  I hit shallow water, and try to stand, it takes all I have to get balanced on one foot and start working on my first fin, I am still on this fin and my partners are already on their way up the beach.  Virpi offered to help and she is floating in the water a few feet away keeping an eye on me.  Finally the second fin submits and it's time again to try to stand, hard enough on it's own, and then walk up the beach in full gear.  By the time I got to the log we were using to switch gear, I was exhausted and fighting to catch my breath.  My partners had already gotten their tanks and headed for the parking lot to switch tanks, so I quickly pulled mine and followed Virpi up the stairs.  This was sign number two, I had to stop!  I have been to Whytecliff diving twice previous, I have been up and down the hills at least half a dozen times with tanks and even once carried 2 tanks in a single trip... I have never needed to stop...  After getting going again from stop number 3 I finally reached my truck, switched tanks, and sat on the back of the truck... After my partners went down, and Virpi came by to check on me before heading down herself I sat and just tried to catch my breath and figure out what was going on.  So I grabbed my full tank, locked up the truck and headed back down to the beach, to start my next dive.... 3 stops later, I reached the log, I am sure by now I was flushed and looked like death warmed over.  Virpi just looked at me and said, "If you're not feeling up to it, call it a day, the last thing you want to do is risk hurting yourself."  That was about all it took, I looked at Virpi, nodded my head and told her I was done.  I felt like the Navy Seal ringing the bell, I felt like I had just quit, given up, chickened out.... I grabbed my gear, wished my team luck and headed for my truck, and home. 

After making it home, I relayed the story to Jenn (my wife), who sent me to bed...lol.  I am such a child sometimes..lol.  Virpi called later in the day to let me know they were all on their way back to the shop so Jenn drove me in to OPD so I could clean and put away my gear.  This also gave me a chance to get my book filled out from the dives I had completed and thank Virpi again for letting me skip my last 2 dives and make them up another day.  Now to just get healthy, O2 training on Tuesday, here we come.

It's Dark... Very, Very Dark....

So last night marked the first two of our five Adventure dives, needless to say I was a wee bit excited.  The shop had given me new gear to try, this time using a neoprene dry suit.  So after calculating the additional weight required to account for the new buoyancy of the suit, I was all good to go.  So with Virpi as our guide we geared up and descended into the depths.  Our first of two adventure dives on the night was our Wreck dive,  after a surface swim (I hate surface swims.. lol) to the Grant Hall marker, we grouped, signaled and descended to set foot, for the first time, on the deck of a boat that has been serving as a natural reef for years.  Once grouped at the bottom we made a slow search around the wreck both down where it was buried in the silt and along it's upper surfaces.  With our lights on and a careful scan of the underbelly of the ship we were able to discover an octopus den, not sure if our friend was at home or not, but you could tell he had been eating well, by all the crab shells outside of his house.  A beautiful kite fish caught our attention as it skirted along the bottom of the ship but staying just long enough for us all to have a good look.  Along the upper surfaces of the Grant Hall we were able to meet up with a Decorator Crab, no, not Martha Stewart, this is an actual crustacean who uses bits of seaweed, sponges and debris and sticks it to itself as a disguise, I didn't see him until Virpi pointed him out and disturbed the water nearby so that he moved a bit.  Then out of the corner of my eye I caught what surely have been a shark or a barracuda or some other man-eating creature of the deep.  It ducked down inside a crevice between a holding tank and the bulkhead, (ok, obviously not a shark...) so me being inquisitive (and a little dumb) I moved in on the crevice to take a closer look and with the help of my dive light, found myself face to face with one of the largest Ling Cod I have ever seen.  He must have been about 12 feet long and at least a thousand pounds... ok, maybe 4 feet long, but the menacing look he gave me was really scary.. lol.  After a quick once more over the surface of the boat we found ourselves back at the chain and ready for our ascent to the surface... and another surface swim in and back out for our next dive, our last dive of the night, our Night Dive!

So after a quick break, a Nutrigrain bar and a tank change, no that's not code for bathroom break, although it would work, this was an actually tank change, we headed back down the stairs of Porteau.  After some trouble with my fins, which should have been a sign that this was not going to be my night, we made our surface swim out the the marker buoy, fortunately not as far this time as the Grant Hall, and prepared for our decent.  I'll stop here so you can get a idea of what this looks like, it's after 8:00pm (closer to 9:00), it's dark, darker than dark.  Here in the city, night is spoiled by light pollution, street lights, neighbors, headlights, etc.  up at Porteau we have a couple parking lot lights and the lights in the distance on the opposite shore... it's DARK!  Add to that the fact that we are now going to drop down 30+ feet below the surface loosing color, light and visibility more and more the deeper we go... it's REALLY REALLY DARK!

Here is where life gets interesting or mildly more dramatic, unfortunately I was already having issues with my buoyancy by this point, neoprene is more buoyant so it takes more weight and a slightly different approach to obtain and maintain neutral buoyancy.  Little did I know I was already coming down with a cold and my lungs were already working harder than they should, add the fact that my jaw (a long standing medical issue I've been dealing with for years) decided to act up after nearly 9 months of no issues.  So lets condense, we have me 30+ feet under water, pitch black except for my (and my groups) dive lights, body already tired and sore, lungs already working over-time, and a dry suit that wants to make an ascent to the surface with or without me...lol.  So we are going to practice our Navigation swim, again not a skill I am fond of but one that is essential.  My job is to swim in the direction Virpi points, keep my needle in the marks, and my partner counts kick cycles, hit 15 cycles, turn around and swim back keeping the needle in the reverse position and after 15 kick cycles we should be back where we started.  Sounds simple, and I am sure for those with a decent sense of direction or even me under normal circumstances it would have been ok.  Now remember, I'm already having issues, so here is roughly what happened, my partner and I started to swim, I can't see bottom, all I can see is my compass and all I can feel is my partners hand on my arm.  I am struggling for some reason to keep the needle in the marks and my partner is pulling at my arm, not knowing what he was trying to tell me I turn to see him giving me the thumbs up, which in diving means ascend, so I turn to ascend and grab my low pressure inflator for my BCD to prepare for my ascent, look at my partner and break the surface... completely disoriented, I thought we were still right along the bottom, apparently the pulling at my arm was my partner realizing I was ascending the whole time and he was trying to signal that I was going up.  After getting my bearings and swimming back to the marker buoy with my partner we started our re-decent and that is when the "fun" started.  The hood i was wearing was too big for me so when I looked down on my decent and exhaled, the air caught in my hood, sliding my hood back and pulled my regulator out of my mouth. Unfortunately I was inhaling at the time and took water down my throat.  It's funny though, looking back, how fast your training, if you are trained by good instructors, kicks in automatically.  Upon hitting the surface and knowing buoyancy was my first and only concern, I reached for my BCD low pressure inflator, unfortunately my gauges were still over my shoulder from the navigation swim so I couldn't find the inflator, so I did the next best thing, I inflated my drysuit, giving me enough buoyancy to take a breathe or two, take my gauges back off my shoulder grab the low pressure inflator for my BCD and add air to my BCD.  Now that I was floating safely, it was time to kick back to the marker so that I was centralized for when my group surfaced, engage my lights in the possibility that in the dark my group may see the light above and realize I was still on the surface.  Sure enough, after only a minute (seems longer when you're waiting) my group surfaced, checked on me, we got regrouped and descended for a tour of the dark bottom and a surface swim back to the vehicles and on our way back to the shop to switch out tanks then home to rest.  After-all, we'll be back in the water today.

Schools back from Summer!

I know the Alice Cooper song is actually Schools out for Summer, and that was what my kids were celebrating a couple months back.  But for me, I am excited to be back at school, last night marked my return to OPD (Ocean Pro Divers) for the start of my Advanced Diver training.  I have spent the last week trying to read through the entire Adventures in Diving book which includes an intro, a review quiz of Open Water diving to make sure it is fresh in your mind and then a chapter and review for each of the potential, I believe, 14 specialties you can choose from.  In this we were supposed to have at least a few read and try to narrow down what we were interested in doing.  To complete your Advanced you need to complete 5 adventure dives, Navigation (my least favorite), Deep (the one I am most excited about) and then 3 of our choosing.  Options include, Altitude, Aware Fish ID, Boat, Photography, Video, Naturalist, Drift, Dry Suit (which I am already certified on), Multi-level, Night, Search and Recovery, Wreck, and Peak Performance Buoyancy.  Our group of three managed to narrow it down to Night, Wreck and PPB (Peak Performance Buoyancy.)  Now it's time to read through the 3 additional sections and get the homework done and be ready to dive Saturday afternoon.  We will be starting our dives late on Saturday as we are going to try to get 2 dives in (probably Wreck and PPB) before the sun goes down and then in the dark of night slip back into the water for a night dive... I'm both excited and afraid... is now when I tell people I'm not a huge fan of the dark...lol.  Sunday will be our final 2 dives including the one i am most looking forward to, our Deep dive, I believe we are going to 80 feet... that's a whole heck of a long way down!  Well, wish me luck and I will report on Sunday (or Monday) how the dives have gone.

Seals to Emergencies

Today marked one of my most exciting days of diving to date, our schedule today was meet at Whytecliffe Park, check out the site, discuss our dives, gear-up and hit the water.  Upon arrival we were greeted by a smiling face saying "You must be Andrew?", with surprise and a little trepidation I agreed and laughing and obviously realizing my surprise, Ward Conley (again another in the long line of amazing staff and DM's from Ocean Pro) introduced himself and advised that he was just speaking with Virpi and had had noticed us and Virpi figured it was me.  Once our whole team arrived, we geared up and headed out for our first dive of the day.   Our morning dive was fan-freakin-tastic!  The wildlife we saw on our tour with Dennis including nudibranchs, crabs, jelly fish and a few of our team even saw (and a couple swam with) a seal.. of course I didn't see it... some partners they turned out to be... lol.  We moved through our skills, complete mask removal and replace, and our open water C.E.S.A. (Controlled Emergency Swimming Ascent) finishing the ascent by manually inflating our BCD's to maintain buoyancy.  We finished our morning moving into shallower water for our weight belt removal and recovery and then our BCD removal and recovery.  Weight belts are much harder to replace in open water, with current and waves from the ferries banging into you, plus the additional weight in the BCD makes it hard to lift to get the weight belt secured above the hips.  I was able to finish the weight belt and move on to my BCD, now this would have been a viral YouTube video if someone had caught it... here I am trying to squirm my way out of my floating wet, vest while battling current and waves... OH, HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY!!!  I probably looked like a hippo having a seizure... lol.  Now it pays to note at this point in time, especially for family and friends who read this and are going to ban me from diving... lol, there are releases on the shoulders of the BCD that I could have released and would in an emergency, but given that I knew I had to put this back on... and not wanting to have to wrestle with getting the clips back together, I chose the seizing hippo method.

Now with the BCD off, and me trying not to sink.. lol, it is time to show Virpi it is off and then... get it back on.  YEAH ME, more hippo imitations!  Actually truth be known, getting it back on wasn't nearly as hard as it was in the pool, I went one step at a time, pushed my tank down, sat on it, spun it around behind me, put my arms in the straps and slid off letting the tank and BCD rise to my back... bing, bang, boom... straps done up and I was done... and then.. oh yeah.. the words I have been wanting to hear... Virpi looks me in the eyes, shakes my hand and says, "Congratulations on becoming a certified open water diver."  YEEHAW!! I'm sure I was smiling from ear to ear when I got out of the water and headed up to switch tanks and grab a snack and water before kitting up for my last open water dive and my Dry suit certification. 

The afternoon was not what any of us were expecting, we managed our trek up the hill with our empty tanks and back down with our incredibly heavy full tanks, got them attached to our BCD's, regs fitted, pressure on, gauges checked and ready to dawn our kits and gear for our last Open Water dive and the final step in our Dry suit certification, when the worst sound you can ever hear crossed the bay and reached our ears....
HELP!!
The details of what happened to cause the emergency are unclear, and not mine to share even if they were not.  What details have been made public, and the most accurate account out of all the reports I have seen so far of what happened can be read in the Vancouver Province's article ~ Woman critical after West Van scuba diving accident.  What I will say though, and I hope this is apparent in my writing, I am SO proud to be a part (however small) of Ocean Pro Diving.  The reactions and selfless actions of Ward and Dennis (our Dive masters for the day) who went in the water to assist with just masks and fins, of Virpi who co-ordianated our team (her students) on the beach in seconds sending one for the first-aid kit and emergency air, while another to phone 911 and me to assist at the shore as divers came in and to relay messages.  I applaud the efforts and actions of the men and woman of the Police, Fire and Rescue, Ambulance Service and Coast Guard, I was honored to see how tight the dive community is, and how it pulls together to help a diver in need, I was proud to see how quickly my dive family responded, I was excited to see the rescue boat and hovercraft and BC Ambulance helicopter and if I never see any of it again..... it'll be too soon! 

I have been asked a couple times since the incident, "How are you doing?" and "Are you still going to Dive?".  The answers to those are, "I don't know" and most resoundingly "YES!."  This incident this weekend has shaken me, in my life and various work I have seen far too many people hurt, injured, dying and in many cases gone, but despite this it does not desensitize you but only further reminds you of the reality that we are only mortal and accidents can happen.  The Ocean Pro staff did an amazing job debriefing everyone after the incident and Shannon has even phoned to ensure everyone is ok.  Dennis was able to point out that in his 15+ years of diving and over 1500 logged dives he has only seen the Ambulance Helicopter called in 4 times.  So all things considered I don't see diving as any more dangerous now than I did when I started my course, it is an amazing world down there, but like most amazing things in this world it must be approached with the respect and preperation it deserves.  I will continue to dive, hopefully for many, many, many years and hope I am never in a situation like I was this weekend again.  But I will be prepared! This is why, despite any other decisions or courses to take, i will be completing my EFR (Emergency First Response), Rescue and Emergency O2 Provider courses as soon as possible.

Stay tuned for the continuing adventures on diving... after all.... I still need to log my final Dry suit dive for my Dry suit certification...

The "future" and the past!

Today marked my first session of ocean dives in my Open Water certification.  We had our gear from Thursday night and after lugging all this wet gear into my house including gear bag with BCD, Regs, mask, snorkle, fins, boots, gloves and hood, my undergarments, a bag with my "dry" suit, my weight belt  and weight bag containing ankle weights, bullet weights, and my integrated weights and, last but not least 3 full air tanks. I got to carry it all back outside this morning at 7:00 so that I could load up in my dive buddy's vehicle and drive to the dive site.  I barely slept last night, excitement, nerves, all of the above... whatever it was... not a great sleep... thank goodness for Monster energy drinks...lol.  Morning was great, got lost a couple times going to the site, but we found it (good thing we left early and allowed a lot of time).  Unloaded everything, started putting together our kits and got everything lined up for ocean dive number one.  But before we can dive.. we must... da da da...

TEST!!
So, 50 questions, multiple choice, covering all 5 chapters, minimum 75% to pass... that's like, like, like.... oh man, my brain is so full of diving I can't remember my math.... what in the world is 75% of 50... this should be so easty... it's... it's... oh yeah right 37.5, thank you to all of you screaming that out for me... lol.  So, if I can manage 38 right.. I'm golden.  I'm doing OK out of the gates, "What happens to air in a balloon filled at the surface as you descend to 30 feet?" "B", "What happens when you ascend with a glass full of air?" "A",  "What are the most important features of an exposure suit?" "D, all of the above"... lol.  Then we get to the eRDPml (remember this from Tuesday "  ") Now for those of you who remember high school math where you had the word problems like "A train traveling from Chicago headed to Seattle detouring through Salt Lake City traveling at 75 miles an hour except in the mountains or during lunch on Tuesdays, leaves on Friday at 2:03, with 271 passengers 5 crew and a full luggage car.  What did they serve for lunch?" lol.. will understand what it feels like to use one of these dive calculators under pressure on a test that decides if you are diving, or just watching!.  Needless to say, I passed.. I managed a 48/50, 96% missing 2 of the dumbest questions that I should be shot for missing, on one I ended up selecting the box for the obviously wrong answer that they throw in there as a gimme...

Well, we all passed, now into the water for dive one, on dive one we will have a tour of Porteau Cove and some of the spectacular life and items under the surface, dive two is skill tests and a tour and dive three is a few more skill tests before our final tour of Porteau Cove and the swim in.

Dive one, was interesting, we make a buddy descent to approximately 20 feet, group up and follow Dennis for our initial tour of the bottom.  Now to try to achieve and maintain neutral buoyancy, not as easy as it sounds, but once this is accomplished and you take your first few kicks of open ocean diving, you have experienced a small slice of heaven!  At this point the group is more or less relaxed, no more kicking so hard we stir up sediment, less crashes into the bottom and off for our first tour of our section of the cove.  It's amazing what you can see down there, crab everywhere, fields of jellyfish, starfish running (albeit not very fast) across the bottom and when you finally get your bearings and your focus, you start noticing the little things like the sole and ling cod and the occasional green ling.  What an amazing world!

Dives two and 3 were skills, like body breathing, mask and regulator recovery, introduction to navigation and buddy navigation and other basic skills followed another tour with Dennis in the lead and Virpi bringing up the straglers.  These dives were the best, by this point most of us had sorted out buoyancy issues, and had calmed down allowing us to just float through the water and REALLY experience the life down there you don't see anywhere else like over 100 species including octopus, and plumose anemones and some items from our past that you would never imagine seeing like the Granthall (a steal hulled tug boat), the Centennial III (a steal dredger) and a 15 m ferrocement sailboat hull.

Overall, this was the final thing needed to firm up my decision to keep diving as often as possible, because again, in the words of Nathan Hale Bridger - "For beneath the surface ... Lies the Future."

Dry Suit - "It's a relative term!"

Last night brought the last and final classroom and pool sessions for my Open Water course, we were again happy to have Mathew Mendes join us in class and in the pool and the always wonderful Virpi Kangas was able to walk everyone through their questions and put everyone's minds at ease over the upcoming impending 50 question final exam!  It was a good class, again most people had their homework done and it was great to have a few minutes to discuss gear with Matt and Shannon. They were able to educate me on the downsides of buying used equipment especially regulators, especially given the cost of service and the warranty on new ones.  Case in point, (actual example) I was looking at a used Apeks XTX 200, only $400!  New, this reg is $800, that's half off!!  What Shannon was nice enough to point out though, is (1) this is your most important piece of equipment, without it, you don't breathe, (2) a used one will need to be serviced, add $150, plus any parts count on at least $100 (if not more),  plus any additional parts down the road.  A new XTX 200 comes with a lifetime parts warranty and won't need servicing for a year (all regs should get serviced every year).  Overall, used is $650+, and any parts until the end of time... a new one is $800 parts included... for $150 (or less) in difference, I'm going new.  Shannon and Matt were also great enough to walk me through how to check tanks (as this is an item Shannon says can be a great deal used), they showed me where to look for the inspection labels, hydro stickers and engraved codes required on tanks in Canada.  All things that if you didn't know about could result in spending a ton of money.... twice!  Once to buy the "Great Deal", and once to pay full price for one you can actually use.   The conversation then turned to Dry Suits (which I was learning how to dive last night) and what to look for and the different levels and costs and accessories... etc.  Bottom line, if you want to do this right... it's not cheap!

As mentioned, class was great, we reviewed our Review Questions, and took our quiz... 10/10.. yeah me!  and then watched our Dry Suit video, and then got into the discussion (this was one of our review questions) on next steps beyond Open Water certification.  These steps include, Adventure Diver, this includes a taste of a couple of specialties (typically Deep Diver and/or Wreck Diver), then Advanced Diver, this includes LOTS of specialties to chose from and you get to try out 4 or 5. Then there is the big daddy of them all, the one I am looking at, the Master Scuba Diver Challenge! In this program you get all 12 offered specialties over the course of the year, your Advanced Diver and your Rescue Diver certifications.  This is the highest level of recreational diving and the door way to Dive Master and beyond if one is interested.  You end up saving almost half the cost over what you would pay if you paid for each specialty separately.  This is an amazing deal!

Last night finished at the pool as we learned and practiced our "dry" suit training.  After practicing our Controlled Emergency Swimming Ascent, righting yourself from an upside down (feet first) ascent, buddy breathing, mask recoveries (yes, again...) and practicing our Neutral Buoyancy we exited to clean up and found out that Dry is a relative term, I WAS SOAKED!!  Apparently doing aquatic acrobatics is not conducive to keeping all your seals closed...  I have been moderately assured that I shouldn't leak in the cold ocean... at least, not as much... weee!  Well, here's looking forward to an early Saturday morning, and my first of 5 Open Water ocean dives.