Describe One of Your Favorite Dives

[MAXFACTOR]

Just thought I would post a dive I had recently in the  Upper Key's.    I rated it my 2nd best dive of all time.


In early Feb. 2006,  on a Sunday morning, I had the opportunity to dive the USS Spiegel again.  Truly a fun, and very interesting ship.  I dove from the front to the back, and penetrated the ship from 1/2 way in to the stern of the boat. 
BUT THE BEST DIVE OF THE DAY was the 4th dive on Sunday afternoon,   
Molasses Reef.  35 ' of water.      Sitting perfectly still in an area of approx.  25 feet by  25feet by 15 feet high.   
I KID YOU NOT....  225 BARRACUDDAS.      THE BIG ONES WERE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE  GROUP.  THE SMALLEST WHICH were still  2.5 feet long,  were on the outside edges of the group. 
They were sitting so still, as my dive buddy and I swam up to the pack,  appox. 10 feet from them,  I was able to count all of them while we were approaching them. 

We just had perfect bouyancy,    watched them for about 3 minutes from the 10foot mark and then we swam to the left of the pack. 

They were all facing the same way, and it was as I described my 2nd best dive of all time.      My first is the  SHARK DIVE out of Stewarts Cove, in the Bahamas last year. 

I would like to hear about some of your best dives. 

[MAXFACTOR]

Hi Fellow DIVERS..

LOOK....  I AM BORED TO DEATH NOT DIVING RIGHT NOW.  BUT WOULD LOVE TO HEAR ABOUT SOME OF YOUR FAVORITE DIVES.  THIS HAS TO BE A GOOD MOTIVATOR FOR EVERYONE TO GET THEY'RE DIVE GEAR CHECKED OUT AT THE LOCAL SHOP, AND START SHARING WITH US SOME OF YOUR STORIES.

WE'LL ALL BE BUSY DIVING SOON, SO YOU MAY AS WELL SHARE ONE OF YOUR FAVORITE DIVES HERE.  or.... MAYBE YOU DON'T HAVE A FAVORITE DIVE, then IF THAT IS THE CASE,  GO CHASE THE LITTLE WHITTIE AROUND 18 HOLES, INSTEAD  OF A DIVING HOLE.  ( LOL)

JUST WANT TO STAY MOTIVATED. 
HAVE A GREAT DAY.

MaxFactor

[jasondbaker]

Two years ago in July. Mount Olympus reef -- just off West End, Bahamas.  Rolling reef heads going from 30ft to 90ft. Slight current. 200ft vis.  Pristine coral, turtles, rays, reef sharks everywhere. Huge schools of fish. The best diving I've done in the bahamas.

Three years ago in the summer. Prins Willem wreck off of Milwaukee. 30ft vis.  Penetrated wreck at the pilot house.  Great wreck because everything is to intact.  Easily accessible with recreational gases.

[DiverQueen]

Last summer, just before I got my OW certification my son and I took the Alumacraft out to Christmas lake for a little wet time...We had a great time snorkeling and looking at the panfish on their nests.  A few weeks later I took a friend along on another snorkel trip, she loved it.  I took a Kodak underwater camera along and got some cool snapshots.  When I showed these pictures to friends at work, several said they were interested in learning to dive...One is now signed up for SCUBA lessons, another is planning on taking class in May.  My husband is taking his lessons next weekend...I am the Ambassador of SCUBA! 
My goal is to help others find the love of the water and the creatures in it!  Experience This!  It's cool!  Bring a friend! Share our 66% of the world with others!

[Roger Southwick]

Back in 2001 we had a nice trip to Cozumel.  On the last dive of the week the DM vigorously motioned us over to something.  It was a large spotted eagle ray asleep on the sand:



We quietly gathered around her.  I got about 3' from her eye, settled in, and just watched her breathe for a while.  Then she took off in a cloud of sand:



The DM had been diving every day in Cozumel for 9 years and had never seen that before.

[MAXFACTOR]

Jason, diverqueen and Roger,  thats what I was talking about,  I now have to go where Jason was, and Roger, I too have watched ray up close covered with sand, and watched it take off and bury itself again.  VERY VERY COOL, as the sand came off grain by grain as the ray swam away, and just a trace of sand was left on it when it started to cover itself again.  That dive was on the same dive as my baracuda dive was also in  Key Largo, 

AS for being an ambassador to diving,  thats what we should all be doing, because, if we are all very honest with ourselves, its one of the best things we've ever done in our life, and brings us the most joy,  WE SHOULD WANT TO TELL ALL OF OUR FRIENDS ABOUT THE JOY OF DIVING. 
Thanks for the above stories.

MaxFactor.    ;D

[Drifter1430]

I've got a website coming out hopefully this year for my underwater production company. One of the sections is "Letters To Mom". It will be explained more on the site... Here is one of the letters (sans pictures) that fits your favorite dives heading... The Milwaukee Carferry in Milwaukee. Sorry about the length...grin.


Hey Mom,      8-13-04
    Glad to hear you are happy and everything is good. You asked how the penetration dive went, well...
So as not to make this another 10 page letter... lol. I'll skip the facts about the Charter boat not being at the dock when we got there etc. and skip right to the dive. Crystal was going to be my buddy and dive leader. She’s the one that does all that cave diving in Florida. Our plan was to dive our 112 cubic foot single tanks, enter the Milwaukee Carferry wreck and do a 30 minute dive on 31% nitrox with a bottom depth of 120 feet. This meant roughly (along with a minute of deco every 10 feet coming up) 12 minutes of deco at 20 feet. We agreed to use our nitrox dive computers as a bailout plan in case something went wrong. We jumped into the lake and dropped down to the wreck. The current was fairly strong, though the water was warm down to 45 feet where we hit the thermocline. At that point the temp dropped to a frigid 38 degrees.
    Being that the dive boat was moored to the Milwaukee’s bow, heading to the amidships stairway that leads down to the engine room, was a bit of a swim to start off with. The Milwaukee is 325 feet long and the engine room is at about the half way point.  The current was flowing against us, but that would help us out later on the return trip. When we got there Crystal turned, climbed under some rubble, and wiggled inside. We had to go head first down a thin stairway ducking under some wreckage and a beam that partially blocked the way. Because I new I couldn't get through holding my video camera, I turned it sideways and passed it to Crystal, already inside. She held onto it while I used my finger tips to pull myself down the stairs and squeeze under the beam while trying not to stir up any of the silt that seemed to be everywhere. Once inside, she handed the camera back and swam forward. The room opened up larger then I expected, but there was a lot of silt along the bottom. We would have to stay close to the ceiling to avoid stirring it up and losing our primary way out. Shortly Crystal turned a corner and pointed her light at a small opening we could use as a backup way out. Though I couldn't see her, I could still see her light. I started to edge forward to get a better look, but as I did, my tanks gently banged the ceiling and something above my head stopped my progress. I couldn't fin any further forward. No big deal, there was a lot of low hanging pipe and beams etc. forever in the way. I backed up, dropped down a little and tried again, still no forward movement. One more time I tried backing up to drop still a little lower. This time I couldn't move either way, forward or back. I was stuck on something I couldn't see and now it held me stationary. Not wanting to stir up any silt, I hung there as motionless as possible and waved my camera light back and forth to attract Crystal’s attention Very quickly she noticed I wasn't following her, turned and came back. She signaled, "OK?" I pointed above my head to the area around my tank regulators and she nodded. She easily unhooked me from what looked to me to be a fallen line of BX electrical cable from one of the carferry's indoor lights. The low hanging cable had worked its way between my head and the 112’s H-Valve. Crystal and I continued around the engine room amidst the constant bit of rusty silt that snowed down on us caused by our bubbles hitting the ceiling. After some hopefully very good video, we exited. Crystal climbed back up and out of the stairway we had entered and I again passed her my video housing. Camera in hand, she exited the wreck and waited. After carefully working my way up the stairs, I realized that I had given Crystal my primary light with my camera. I looked up and even though evening was setting in above the water, I could still barely see the ambient light of the lake around me through a crack in the debris at my right. "She certainly wouldn't have fit through there, I thought." I looked up to my left and saw a slightly bigger area. "I could make it through there if I had to, but I know Crystal didn't go that way or it would be a little more silted up from her squeezing through". Right then from around more debris, and behind me, I could just pick out her (and my) lights. I quickly followed the light and exited the wreck. Returning my camera and checking our gauges Crystal realized we might just have enough time to do a quick run through the flicker or crew quarters. A cryptic message found days after the Milwaukee’s sinking in a water tight case, stated that the sea gate was bent and that the flicker was flooded. After checking that I was good with this plan, Crystal swam farther toward the stern and headed down inside. This entrance passage way was a little bigger, but narrower. I had to again hand off my camera and retrieve it once inside.
    The crew quarters seemed to be even fuller of silt then the engine room. As we moved carefully along a long hallway I noticed a previous diver had run a cave line along the wall. This would be vital if somehow a total silt out would occur and we needed to get back to the entrance totally blind. A little farther in, Crystal, using her light beam, pointed out a hand held light still hanging from a valve where a crewman must have hung it. Amazingly the pressure hadn’t shattered the bulb as the wreck plunged to the bottom. Next we passed some of the crew's bunks. The mattresses had long ago dissolved into the silt but the frameworks were still there. Then, on the floor next to a doorway, in Crystal's searching beam, I saw what looked to be one of the crew member’s shoes and then a couple more. Taking a closer look, the shoes looked as though they were still tied, leading me to believe this may have been the final resting place of some of the crew. Fifty two crewmen never came home from this disaster. As we continued down the corridor looking into one room after the next, I saw more beds and was amazed that you could actually still see the white paint pealing on the 1929 wooden walls.
    It was time to go!!!  We quickly exited and headed back toward the line. Two minutes left before our scheduled departure for the surface and we were still at the stern of the second largest wreck in Lake Michigan. We swam post haste with the current toward the line at the bow. As I was swimming I was thinking, "Geez, this is a big wreck”, and “Where ‘is’ that damn bow?" By the time we hit the mooring line we had already started to ascend. We stopped for our one minute intervals and then stayed at 20 feet until our computers were clear of deco. Since the water was warm and we had spare nitrox in our tanks we hung there and extended our deco another 7 minutes for extra safety. Being the last ones still in the water again, upon surfacing we helped get the boat underway and head back for the long ride home.
It was one of my greatest dives to date and hopefully I have some decent video, even though I still keep thinking a little solemnly about the shoes...
    See you as soon as I can.
      Rick~~~

[Magelk]

So Rick, after a great story like that, how do you expect anyone to follow?
That was a great read.

[CCRDIVER]

Rick, I cant compete with you, but here is my favorate dive.  For now anyway.  Hope this summer brings new and exiting things. 

My best dive would have to include, deep water, one shipwreck, and lots of time. 

The day began as any other day with the sun shining through the windows of an Aluminum boat where I had spent the last few nights with friends docked in a sheltered bay in Isle Royal National Park.  The weather couldn’t have been better, calm water and almost no wind gave the Lake a picture perfect view, and if I didn’t know better I would have leapt off the dock and taken a swim.  However, with water temperatures ranging from 40 to 55 degrees at the surface I couldn’t help but feel cold thinking about a quick dip.  After some much needed nourishment, and quick stroll to the funky smelling shack in the woods we motored out to the dive site and tied in to the mooring buoy. 

My dive partner and I studied the 250 foot wreck and contemplated where we would venture on this dive.  This wreck found its watery grave in 1927 as it slipped down an underwater cliff and came to rest on the starboard side with the bow driven deep into the mud at 260 feet. 

Deciding to cover the whole wreck in one dive, we geared up, complete with drysuits, Closed Circuit Rebreathers, a myriad of bailout bottles, and a host of other gear, then jumped into the water.  My partner and I descended to 20 feet and preformed a simple gear and bubble check, with everything a go we dumped all the air out of our dive wings, and started for the bottom.  We descend as fast as we can go only slowing up to add air to the wing and counter lungs or our rebreathers.  As we are diving a mix of Oxygen, Nitrogen and Helium, narcosis won’t play a factor in the dive, and quickly we pass 130 feet on our way to 180 where the ship starts. 

Arriving on the port side rail located in 180 feet of water and just forward of the engine room we moved methodically towards the bow and continued to descend.  Along the way the scattered remains of cargo litters the bottom.  A life raft comes into view along with booms for loading and unloading cargo.  These booms are horizontal in the water because, remember the ship in on its side making for a sometimes confusing view of things.  As the bow comes into view I see clearly that half the bow section is buried in mud, and unseen.  What is seen can only be described as cool.  An ax hanging on the wall, stairs, doors, and rails all leading to the captain’s quarters.  Looking inside the room, as I stand on my head, and all the air in my drysuit goes to my legs, I see the remains of captain’s personal effects and lots of silt.  I think for a moment that I could enter, but the silt and common sense restrains me and we continue our exploration of the bow. 

Changing directions we swim back to the stern inside the cargo holds.  The cargo hold area is actually a two deck system of hatches and rooms for storing cargo.  All the cargo, consisting of farm implements, lighting, tools, paint, seats, and all sorts of other items that are hard to identify, are sloped out the now open cargo hatches, leaving it easy to swim into these lower level cargo holds and see the bottom of the ship, even though it looks more like a wall now.  Bubbles, what the???  Oh, Ya, I forgot, we are ascending, and as you ascend on a rebreather you need to vent bubbles and add Oxygen.  Just kidding I didn’t forget I just added that part for the suspense.  My gauges are all looking good, and I have plenty of time left before I need to ascend. 

Working our way through the cargo holds, we come to the coal bunker, and take a look without going on to far.  The coal dust is really bad underwater and will hang in the water for longer that silt, because of this if you end up getting lost or turned around somewhere with coal dust you might never come out again.  Anyway we moved on to the engine room where we spent more time looking at the builder’s plack still on the wall.  If you’re lucky you might run into the engineer and have a nice little conversation about what he was doing the night his ship sank.  Of course you need to check your mix, because if an engineer who has spent the last 78 year underwater in the engine room starts talking you might end up spending more time on the wreck than you planned.  I check mine and sure enough everything is ok, and I can’t make the guy say anything.  The engine room it good size and looking from on top the triple expansion steam engine you can see the skylights that open up to let you in or out as the case may be.  My dive partner exits, and I follow him as he moves rear to the exposed emergency helm, that has some chains to keep would be thieves from extricating that beautiful wood helm from its final resting place. 

Time is pretty much gone so we head up swimming around the prop and rubber over the exposed hull and back to the line we descended on 47 minuets earlier.  With an average depth of 237 feet and as you might expect we have some long decompression ahead of us.  It’s always odd to me when I have to stop at a depth below recreational limits for my first decompression stop, and this time will be no different.  By the time I get to 170 feet I have to make a one minuet stop and these continue every ten feet until I exit the water.  Just over 2 hours or total dive time I climb onto the boat, and start shedding my gear. 
What a dive!!!  I can’t believe we were able to cover an entire wreck in one dive, at those depths, and see that we saw.  I love diving!

Deep Wreck
A dive to the Kamloops in 2005

[MAXFACTOR]

DRIFTER,  DEEPWRECK..... GREAT STORIES.  THANKS FOR SHARING THEM.  I CAN'T WAIT TO GET TRAINED FOR REBREATHER...    WHAT REBREATHER DO YOU USE? 
THANKS AGAIN.

MaxFactor