Diving at Gilboa
I'm back from a fantastic dive trip to Gilboa Quarry. I went down to Ohio with a bunch of people from the dive shop for a weekend of hanging out and diving. When we got there Friday night we hung out in the on-site apartment we had rented. Gilboa has an awesome facility and the apartment is outstanding. The people that went down are an outstanding bunch and we had a great time. Friday night we ended up till about 3:00 in the morning... morning seemed to come very quickly.
We got something of a late start to the diving day but ultimately made it down to the docks. Gilboa has a set of six docks which are connected by a long deck with handy benches for all your equipment. The site is all about diving and it definitely shows. My first dive was with Roger, and instructor who is just starting to work with my LDS and Brandon, the 12 year old son of a couple that was there. The three of us went down to a max depth of 56 feet and were down a total of 49 minutes. The fish were fantastic we swam with dozens of huge carp, rainbow trout, bass, and others I couldn't identify. We swam around the quarry and saw a submerged bus, several boats, tubes, and a Grumman airplane. Roger actually took us through the plane which is a relatively short 20 foot swim through the cargo area. There's a hole cut through the ceiling in the middle just in case you need to bail out (of course no parachute is required as this is not a perfectly good airplane).
A couple days before heading down I had Ryan at Equinox hook me up with 5ft hose for my primary reg and a bungee necklace and short hose for my octo. The cover on my octo was also replaced with a black one so that my buddy won't be tempted to grab for it. With the new setup I donate my primary reg to an out of air diver and keep my octo which is hanging a couple inches below my chin. The whole thing works very well (I know because Roger and I practiced an OOA drill) and allows an OOA diver to breathe off my reg but still have a reasonable amount of distance from me. All my new gear worked perfectly and I was very happy with it. The research paid off as I had a very streamlined, well organized rig which worked very well for me. As I watched a bunch of other people with dangling octos and consoles that were banging into things I was thrilled with my choices.
Over the weekend I fit in three more dives.
Dive 2: 35ft for 35 minutes
Dive 3: 53ft for 43 minutes
Dive 4: 83ft for 20 (almost 21) minutes
Dive four was just Roger and I and was my first experience diving past the 60 foot mark. Although I haven't technically taken the deep dive specialty, Roger actually teaches it so I was comfortable going down there with him. He was watching me and signalling to me frequently to make sure I wasn't narced. We weren't down there very long and the average depth for the dive was actually only 37 feet.
The weekend was a huge success. I met a bunch of new, fun, interesting people that I'm looking forward to hanging out with again. In fact, there's actually a group going to Bonne Terre the three days after Thanksgiving and I'm seriously considering going with them. I'll also be heading down to Florida to visit Dave and Susan very soon. It looks like I'll be heading down around either December 17th or January 7th. It'll be great to see them again and to try ocean diving for the first time!
We got something of a late start to the diving day but ultimately made it down to the docks. Gilboa has a set of six docks which are connected by a long deck with handy benches for all your equipment. The site is all about diving and it definitely shows. My first dive was with Roger, and instructor who is just starting to work with my LDS and Brandon, the 12 year old son of a couple that was there. The three of us went down to a max depth of 56 feet and were down a total of 49 minutes. The fish were fantastic we swam with dozens of huge carp, rainbow trout, bass, and others I couldn't identify. We swam around the quarry and saw a submerged bus, several boats, tubes, and a Grumman airplane. Roger actually took us through the plane which is a relatively short 20 foot swim through the cargo area. There's a hole cut through the ceiling in the middle just in case you need to bail out (of course no parachute is required as this is not a perfectly good airplane).
A couple days before heading down I had Ryan at Equinox hook me up with 5ft hose for my primary reg and a bungee necklace and short hose for my octo. The cover on my octo was also replaced with a black one so that my buddy won't be tempted to grab for it. With the new setup I donate my primary reg to an out of air diver and keep my octo which is hanging a couple inches below my chin. The whole thing works very well (I know because Roger and I practiced an OOA drill) and allows an OOA diver to breathe off my reg but still have a reasonable amount of distance from me. All my new gear worked perfectly and I was very happy with it. The research paid off as I had a very streamlined, well organized rig which worked very well for me. As I watched a bunch of other people with dangling octos and consoles that were banging into things I was thrilled with my choices.
Over the weekend I fit in three more dives.
Dive 2: 35ft for 35 minutes
Dive 3: 53ft for 43 minutes
Dive 4: 83ft for 20 (almost 21) minutes
Dive four was just Roger and I and was my first experience diving past the 60 foot mark. Although I haven't technically taken the deep dive specialty, Roger actually teaches it so I was comfortable going down there with him. He was watching me and signalling to me frequently to make sure I wasn't narced. We weren't down there very long and the average depth for the dive was actually only 37 feet.
The weekend was a huge success. I met a bunch of new, fun, interesting people that I'm looking forward to hanging out with again. In fact, there's actually a group going to Bonne Terre the three days after Thanksgiving and I'm seriously considering going with them. I'll also be heading down to Florida to visit Dave and Susan very soon. It looks like I'll be heading down around either December 17th or January 7th. It'll be great to see them again and to try ocean diving for the first time!
posted by KzooJason at 9:10 PM
2 Comments:
Can you hear the jealousy oozing out of my pores? Sounds like a great set of dives! How did the wetsuit hold up again whatever really cold temerature you encountered.
I've also been missing Breckenridge today...
It was about 55 degrees in the water and the 7/5 wetsuit held up well. The only time I was cold was once I was out of the water and in the wind. The first day was sunny and in the mid 60s... very comfortable. The second day was cloudy, windy, and a bit cooler... not as comfy. I was happy to confirm that my wetsuit is comfortable enough to dive in November though. It opens up many possibilities.
It's supposed to snow here in the next couple days. It may be time to go skiing soon. Then it'll be time to think about Colorado!
Post a Comment
<< Home