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I browse Scubaboard a lot, and
this one particular thread was started where a longtime member of the board was
about to come to Canada, all the way from South Carolina, on business.
While he couldn't dive, he extended an invitation to the members of our local
group, teh Ontario Fresh Water Freaks, to join him for a beer or two. The
thread grew and grew until it had become an all-out party and social event.
SeaJay is so cool! He was
telling stories of his times as a deco 'guinea pig' for DAN, as well as (of
course) diving stories. Turns out he's DIR as well, a fact that gave me
lots of questions to ask. He thinks I should come down to Florida sometime
for diving - in fact it's close enough to drive given a day or two. (In
fact that suggestion has given me and a dive buddy some ideas.......)
The gathering was fun - a lot of beer, pub food etc was had by all. There
were probably eight or nine Freaks there (I didn't actually count). Tom R
from NTD had sent along a NTD shirt for SeaJay (which I presented to him) and I
also gave him a can of Tim Hortons to take back - he was very touched on both
counts, he hadn't expected to be made to feel so welcome. He kept
remarking that we Canadians are just so friendly.
His brother had come along as well and when the party started to wind down
around midnight, his brother Matt wanted to go downtown and hit the bars. Since
I had been drinking only diet coke that evening in preparation for the next
day's diving I volunteered to drive them. So we headed downtown - three
people unfamiliar with Toronto's downtown! LOL We found a parking
garage for the truck and set out on foot looking for a jazz bar that had been
mentioned to us. After walking a few blocks against a rather bitter
cold wind, Matt decided he was no longer fussy and we would go into the very
first bar we came across.
Shortly thereafter we came to Jeremiah Bullfrog's, and spent our time there.
SeaJay and I talked diving the whole time and Matt talked to everyone else about
anything BUT diving. At closing time, we headed back to the truck, piled
into it, and I drove Matt back to their hotel then SeaJay and I went to
cobaltbabe's house, where I was staying for the night, so I could show off to
him my new gear. I put the backplate and wing on to show him the fit and
he had some suggestions for me. (He laughed about my truck spare key,
attached to a bolt snap with cave line. He said, "...you even tied it
properly!") As it was by then 4:30 in the morning and they had a
flight to catch the next morning, I dropped him off back at his hotel.
The next morning, Saturday, I went down to visit the proposed dive site, Humber
Bay Park West. I was about two hours early as I had allowed too much time
for travelling across Toronto. But that was okay. It was a calm and
relatively warm day, being only about -6°C with almost no wind. The water
was still. I retired to a local coffee shop to have lunch. I was
just finishing up lunch when my freediving buddy Aaron walked in - we had
planned to meet up on site so it was a bit of a surprise for both of us to run
into each other at the coffee shop. Without further ado we headed to the
site.
We were supposed to dive with a
third freediver, Jurgen, but when he arrived he noticed that he had forgotten
some pieces of gear at home so he said to go ahead and have a dive without him,
and that he'd return later in the afternoon. That was fine with us and we
dressed in our suits and geared up.
I was wearing a new to me, used, one-piece 7mm suit that fits like it's painted
on. I bought it specifically for freediving since it's so streamlined and
includes no zippers, and I was looking forward to trying it
out. In addition, my previous difficulties while freediving all centered
around equalizing my ears - the usual Valsalva maneuver, the infamous
"pinch and blow", doesn't work for me while I'm in an inverted, fins
up head down position. So all week I had been practicing a different
technique called the Frenzel maneuver and I was also very eager to see how it
would work for me in the water.
We set out into the Bay - there were tiny ice crystals floating on the water
surface. It was cool and fresh. Normally when diving scuba I pour
hot water down my suit before jumping in the water but in this case I wanted the
dive reflex (brought on my immersion in cold water) to kick in.
We went out to the end of a spit of land and Aaron pointed out to me some
concrete culverts laying on the bottom at about 30'. Visibility was great
that day as we could see the bottom. Aaron made several dives with me
spotting, while I practiced clearing my ears using the Frenzel at the surface.
Finally I felt ready to take my turn and with a couple of deep breaths I
descended.
Usually when I dived before, I would get down around 10-12', be unable to clear
my ears, so I would level off, swim for a few seconds, then surface. This time I
got down to 12' or so, cleared my ears easily, paused only for a moment and
continued down! I cleared my ears twice more with just the air in my mouth
and throat. Finally I looked up to the surface, decided I had gone deep
enough for my first dive (I'm a bit out of practice as I hadn't been freediving
since October) and headed back to the surface. Once on the
surface I looked at my depth gauge and the max depth needle was pinned to 18'!
I started laughing and cheering - never had I been able to descend to 18' so
easily before!
I was cheering and laughing and going "Woo hoo!!" for several minutes
after that. It was easy to get down to 18', easier than I had expected!
That's not my "personal best" - the deepest I've ever freedived has
been to 22' in Lock 28, but it was without fully clearing my ears, too.
The ear thing is a major breakthrough for me.
However, my right wrist was aching. In fact it was very painful.
This problem is caused anytime I wear anything constricting on it - I've done it
to myself before. However, I was unable to make an "ok" with
that hand. I moved my gauges lower on the arm to relieve some of the
pressure but it wasn't helping. So, reluctantly, I called the dive.
Aaron was most understanding and in complete agreement. So after coming
ashore (Aaron had to help me off with my fins as I couldn't grasp anything with
my hand) and warming up in the vehicles we headed back to the coffee shop.
While there Aaron phoned Jurgen and found out that due to the snow that had
begun falling he had decided not to make the 1-hour drive back for a dive.
So instead I phoned Warren (who had contacted me by PM earlier in the week and
said he might be interested in a dive) and he said sure, he'd be willing. So we
arranged a time to meet up and after a while (and another phone call to confirm
exactly where to meet us) he showed up.
By this time it was getting dark and the wind had come up a bit. We fixed
our light sticks to ourselves (Aaron and I had green, and Warren got to wear
red), suited up, and prepared to get in the water. Warren, however, either
accidentally or on purpose, hit the purge button on one of his second stages and
it instantly went into full freeflow. He lost no time in shutting off the
tank and was able to preserve his gas that way. I checked him over, helped
him fix a twisted shoulder strap and buckle, and he looked my rig over too.
We got in the water - there's a gradual beach entry but it was covered by round
rocks and the rocks were covered by a film of ice. It made getting in that
much more interesting. While wading in I freed my second stages and let
them soak in the water for a bit - then got out deep enough to put my fins on (I
had new fins to try - the cutest little Jetfins you've ever seen!). Then I
attempted to get my octo regulator back into the rubber snorkel-keeper I had
attached to my right D-ring, but I couldn't stretch it far enough with my
wetsuit gloves on, to fit around the mouthpiece. I could get a finger into
the snorkel keeper, but couldn't stretch it out far enough to fit over the
mouthpiece. After a few minutes Warren came over to see what was wrong but
he couldn't help either. At that point I decided I'd just carry it in my
hand. So we started our descent - Warren surfaced almost immediately and
asked me to turn his tank on now. After that we
completed our descent and started looking around at... not much.
Viz was good, but there was just plain nothing to see. There were some
mussel-covered rocks, then nothing but ripply sand. There was not even any
garbage to look at! So we cruised around for a bit, me getting used to my
fins. Aaron came down to "visit" us a few times - he was having
a ball. a couple of times he drifted in a nearly sitting position, right
in front of us, for what seemed a long time (I know from experience he can dive
for over a minute per dive) before very slowly and gently drifting up, out of
fin-blast range of the bottom, before turning on the power. He's good at
not disturbing much silt.
After a while I started to get really bored. I was just following the sand
and rocks around, looking for ANYTHING to look at. I even tried a little
backfinning but started to throw my trim off again so I quit that. Finally
I signalled Warren that I was turning the dive. When I hovered I could
feel the water column shifting slightly up and down and I really didn't want to
imagine how rough and windy it could be getting.
We made our way back in a rather leisurely fashion. I got to play with the
rear dump valve on my wing as SeaJay had suggested. It works quite well
although I had to raise my fins and lower body higher than usual to coax
the air bubble into the aft portion of wing. After 2 tries I got it.
Now I just have to get used to locating the little string with my wetsuit gloves
on...
Getting out proved to be more fun. The waves crashing in along the
shoreline were 12-18" tall at most and I let myself get carried away.
With the flat rubber straps of my new fins it was taking me a little while to
work a wetsuit-gloved finger under them to get them off. Meanwhile I was
washing around in the surf for a bit. I laughed as it wasn't bothering me
especially. However getting ashore over the icy round rocks we managed by
leaning on each other and being very careful.
Naturally after this dive, we all retired to the coffee shop for some delicious
warm drinks, to fill out our log books and shoot the breeze about diving.
I mentioned the fact I've lost 18 lbs of body weight since spring (2003) and
Aaron told me about a study they once did using a 175 lb male subject, and that
person burned an average of 1200 calories an hour when immersed in 'cold'
water!!!!!! No bloody wonder I've been getting lighter! Yes I needed to
lose a bit of weight anyway, but plummeting 18 lbs in about 6 months without
trying is a bit of a shocker. I'm now down to 114 lbs at 5'2", so if
I can maintain it about here I'll be happy.
Aaron also had a freediving calendar for me - he ordered a few for his
freediving buddies - and I gave him an envelope of money to reimburse him for
the proper freediving fins he's ordered for me. Boy I can't wait til those
come in, and it will be another excuse to return to Humber Bay and freedive with
him again!
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