Cavern

[juls64]

Well its official. Hubby and I will do Cavern in October. We will do classroom here and 1 day at Pearl Lake, then we will finish it up later in the month at Roubidoux in Missouri. This summer has been so crazy with family activities, we haven't been able to commit to anything diving-wise. Its nice to have a plan in place, at last. Also, I haven't been diving in Missouri before, so I am excited about that.

I read on another thread how Atlaua and DeepDiverBob did their Cavern in Florida. Any advice or comments?

We are working with the same instructor we had for wreck class so we know what to expect in that regard. He does a good job.

Julie

[nauifins73]

Good luck - I still think I will do my cavern/cave dives vicarously through you guys so keep us filled in on your dives and trainning :).

[Atlaua]

I read on another thread how Atlaua and DeepDiverBob did their Cavern in Florida. Any advice or comments?


Make sure you both get a long hose! When I did my cavern my "buddy" (I have some much more colorfull phrases for him) didn't get one and I was the one to suffer for it. On the last dive I pretty much told the instructor I wasn't doing any more OOA drills with him unless he put a long hose on.

Don't expect to actually see the cavern :). That's one thing I really noticed when I finished the class. Even though I had done 4 cavern dives, I had not been able to enjoy the surroundings. I had been too busy with skills and had spent a significant portion of the dives with my eyes closed :). If you can schedule and extra fun dive in I'd recommend it.

Make sure you have your tank valve up where you can get to it easily. I don't think most instructors do this but mine basicly tied me up in cave line and had me get myself out. I spent a good 5 minutes trying to get the line unwrapped from my tank valve. I could feel what I needed to do, I just couldn't make my arm move quite far enough...

Hardest part of the course for me was trying to controll my bouyancy while ascending with my eyes closed. If I hadn't been holding on to a line I'm sure I would have bonked my head on the ceiling for that one...

James

[Atlaua]

Good luck - I still think I will do my cavern/cave dives vicarously through you guys so keep us filled in on your dives and trainning :).

Hit a cenote sometime Becky. No training required and none of the big issues you get in local caves, i.e. cold, silty, etc.

James

[juls64]

Make sure you both get a long hose! When I did my cavern my "buddy" (I have some much more colorfull phrases for him) didn't get one and I was the one to suffer for it. On the last dive I pretty much told the instructor I wasn't doing any more OOA drills with him unless he put a long hose on.

Don't expect to actually see the cavern :). That's one thing I really noticed when I finished the class. Even though I had done 4 cavern dives, I had not been able to enjoy the surroundings. I had been too busy with skills and had spent a significant portion of the dives with my eyes closed :). If you can schedule and extra fun dive in I'd recommend it.

Make sure you have your tank valve up where you can get to it easily. I don't think most instructors do this but mine basicly tied me up in cave line and had me get myself out. I spent a good 5 minutes trying to get the line unwrapped from my tank valve. I could feel what I needed to do, I just couldn't make my arm move quite far enough...

Hardest part of the course for me was trying to controll my bouyancy while ascending with my eyes closed. If I hadn't been holding on to a line I'm sure I would have bonked my head on the ceiling for that one...

James

Thanks for the "words of wisdom". Aah, the good old lights out drill. I remember doing that in wreck class. I think I was trying to go through an opening that didn't exist and boy did I hear about that for awhile!

As for the tank valve, I can reach mine, but untangling a line could be another story. I could see this instructor doing something like that though.

This is going to be fun!

Julie

[DeepDiverBob]

then we will finish it up later in the month at Roubidoux in Missouri.


Julie


You might have a hard time with that one. To meet the standards, I think you need to start out with 30 foot vis, and from what I understand, it doesnt take much to blow out the vis at RBD. I dont want to sound like an expert about that place, I have only been there once. That was one advantage of doing the Florida springs for Cavern, it would almost be impossible to get under 30 foot vis someplace like Ginnie or Blue Grotto.

7 foot hose is standard equipment. I am surprised anyone was allowed to do the class without the standard hose.

Good luck with the class. I hope you have a great time with it.

[Captain Caveman]

have fun, i realy like my cavern/cave dive. im going to do it again in jan when we go to mexico Playa del carmen. nice caves.

[juls64]

Well, we did two dives at Pearl Lake yesterday. There are 3 of us in the class so we worked as a 3 man buddy team. We did line drills on land then did the first dive. On this one we ran the line doing 3 tie offs. Everyone had problems and I was almost embarrassed after this dive. I had drysuit bouancy problems, problems with the reel, pretty much everything. It sucked.

The second dive I knew would be better. We did more tie offs and lights out drills. This went much better and I corrected a problem from the first dive that had caused my bouyancy issue and everything was pretty good. I finished the day knowing what I need to work on.

I used the 7' hose for the first time and that was no problem. I need to work on my configuration a little as far as where I clip off everything (lights, reel, etc). Also I need to practice using the reel a little more and I will do that around the house. I am looking forward to RBD in 2 weeks. I will be ready. We will try to get out next weekend to practice a little more.

It was an interesting, educational and fun day!

Juls

[terrapinken]

James, who did your cavern class??

[Atlaua]

Actually it was a combo. But Steve Olfe was basicly running the show. IIRC his name is on my NACD card and Darren is on my PADI card.