We'll got myself over to the HSE Doctor yesterday for the yearly medical that all diving professionals need within the UK.
Good news is that I'm clear for another year.
Sunday 31 October 2010
Sunday 24 October 2010
Holborough Lake 24th October 2010
Went down to Holborough Lake, Snodland in Kent for a dive today. When I got up the weather was brilliant sunshine which is always a good start to the day. Along with sarah we were meeting Helen and Jon and a few others from DiveBuddy UK.
We got there a little late due to an accident on the A21. Anyway when we got there we was told that the visability was 10+ meteres, we walked on the jetty and we could see clearly down to the botton of the lake at around 8 meteres.
We all started kitting up I was using a twinset with a 140bar of 28% nitrox left over from a recent wreck dive, everyone else was using single 12liter cyclinders. On entering the water it was a nice 15 degree's C. We swam out to the plaform and used the descent line using it as a reference line, Jon and myself went down first followed by Helen and Sarah with the aim of completing Sarah's navigation part of her PADi Advanced Open Water Course.
Sarah managed to complete the resipicle part before she had some problem with the cold and her throat so it was out the water for her.
That left the rest of us, Helen, Jon and myself time for a nice swim around the lake. We descended and followed the ropes from one object to another the visability was still in the 10+ meters which made an ideal photo oppertunitity.
From the platform were we did the navigation from we headed over to the "Sweet Mystery" a large boat wreck, then onto the speed boat where Helen and Jon decided to get into it and try and drive it.
Then onto the large tracker tyres were we was greeted by six really large perch which seemed happy to have there photo's taken.
We carried on following the rope when the we started to ascend upto around 6 meters where on top of the mound was alot ot objects from a cannon, anchor and a ships compass, however the strangest object was a statue of a gargoil, Helen decided that it needed a kiss only to get a nice slimmy return kiss from it, good job she never used tongues. Over the mound still following the ropes we came to yet another platform then onto half a car burried in the side of the lake. You have to keep your eye's open as there is some unmarked objects, these include cannons, compasses, statues and old motorbikes.
The good news is that were going to return next sunday and have yet another look around the lake.
We got there a little late due to an accident on the A21. Anyway when we got there we was told that the visability was 10+ meteres, we walked on the jetty and we could see clearly down to the botton of the lake at around 8 meteres.
We all started kitting up I was using a twinset with a 140bar of 28% nitrox left over from a recent wreck dive, everyone else was using single 12liter cyclinders. On entering the water it was a nice 15 degree's C. We swam out to the plaform and used the descent line using it as a reference line, Jon and myself went down first followed by Helen and Sarah with the aim of completing Sarah's navigation part of her PADi Advanced Open Water Course.Sarah managed to complete the resipicle part before she had some problem with the cold and her throat so it was out the water for her.
That left the rest of us, Helen, Jon and myself time for a nice swim around the lake. We descended and followed the ropes from one object to another the visability was still in the 10+ meters which made an ideal photo oppertunitity.
From the platform were we did the navigation from we headed over to the "Sweet Mystery" a large boat wreck, then onto the speed boat where Helen and Jon decided to get into it and try and drive it.Then onto the large tracker tyres were we was greeted by six really large perch which seemed happy to have there photo's taken.
We carried on following the rope when the we started to ascend upto around 6 meters where on top of the mound was alot ot objects from a cannon, anchor and a ships compass, however the strangest object was a statue of a gargoil, Helen decided that it needed a kiss only to get a nice slimmy return kiss from it, good job she never used tongues. Over the mound still following the ropes we came to yet another platform then onto half a car burried in the side of the lake. You have to keep your eye's open as there is some unmarked objects, these include cannons, compasses, statues and old motorbikes.
The good news is that were going to return next sunday and have yet another look around the lake.
One thing to be aware of with Holborough Lake is there isn't any maps of what objects they have placed in the lake which makes every dive an adventure.
Friday 22 October 2010
London Diving Chamber 50m Dry dive
Well a few of us made it to the London Dive Chamber last night to complete a 40m dry dive, however after a couple of people not turning up this all changed to a 50m dive. Got to say thanks to the guys that didn't turn up the rest of us enjoyed it even more.
Having never been in a hyperbaric chamber before I thought it would be a good idea to go have a look at one, the good people of the London Diving Chamber http://londondivingchamber.co.uk/ offer this for a small fee
Anyway on the list was Lindsey, Chantelle, Angela, Elwyn, Vicki and myelf(Paul). We paid our money and got changed into our jim jams ready to get into the chamber. We was asked to complete a simple test on the surface which would be repeated at 50m to check how we was effected by narcosis. After a briefing about the chamber and also about the dive, we all climbed inside and the doors was shut behind us.
Even though this wasn't a real dive with regards to kitting up and getting wet this was going to be a first for alot of the group including myself down to 50m.As we started to descend the chamber started tp warm up and we was soon at 15m we had a quick check to make sure that everyone was OK and then it was down even deeper we was soon at 30m , and then it started Chantelle couldn't controll her laughing so we worked out that she was NARKED already and we was only just over half way down. We soon was at 40m and onwards to 50m. After about 5minutes we was down at 50m, we was given a sheet of paper which had some wording on in a set time we had to circle as many L's as possible.
Well this sent certain people over the edge, like Vicki's pen not working at 50m. We started to ascend with the first stop at 12m for 2 minutes then 9m for 6 minutes, followed by 6m for 28 minutes.
After getting to the surface we all completed our logbooks and checked our dive computers mine read 50.2m.
Result for the narcosis test well I scored 25 on the surface and 25 on the bottom.
Thursday 21 October 2010
PADi Night Diver Speciality Instructor Course
Last night completed the PADi Night Diver Speciality Instructur course at Holborough Lake, near Snodland Kent. The tempature was dropping rether quickly with the clear sky's I'd say it was down to 5-6 degrees by 7.00pm.
Ryby(http://www.blueoceandiving.co.uk/) our course director went through all the explaination of what needs to be achived by the students over the 3 dives. This included signals, talking about torches and also how to prepare for the night dive. e all kitted up and headed into the water, it was warmer in the water than out.
It had been aggreed that we would do 2 dives tonight with a short surface interval then onto dive 2. We all descended down to an 8m platform.
Dive 1: This dive was more of a navigation dive around the objects in the lake this was with the torches on the visability was upto 10m and the perch and the small pike were out looking for food
Dive2: We descended back to the platform then one by one we switched our torches out waited around 30-40 seconds for our eyes to adjust to the light, then Ryby led the way as we all went off for a swim with the torches off. even though we had no lights it was amazing how much you can see with very little light, we all managed to get back to the platform.
Well that was another PADi speciality Instructor course completed so onto Enriched Air next.
Ryby(http://www.blueoceandiving.co.uk/) our course director went through all the explaination of what needs to be achived by the students over the 3 dives. This included signals, talking about torches and also how to prepare for the night dive. e all kitted up and headed into the water, it was warmer in the water than out.
It had been aggreed that we would do 2 dives tonight with a short surface interval then onto dive 2. We all descended down to an 8m platform.
Dive 1: This dive was more of a navigation dive around the objects in the lake this was with the torches on the visability was upto 10m and the perch and the small pike were out looking for food
Dive2: We descended back to the platform then one by one we switched our torches out waited around 30-40 seconds for our eyes to adjust to the light, then Ryby led the way as we all went off for a swim with the torches off. even though we had no lights it was amazing how much you can see with very little light, we all managed to get back to the platform.
Well that was another PADi speciality Instructor course completed so onto Enriched Air next.
Tuesday 5 October 2010
Where Next ?
Well after completing my PADi Open Water Scuba Instructor Exam in about 10 days I'll be allowed to teach students for the first time.
The next thing I'm looking at is being able to teach some specialities.
The next thing I'm looking at is being able to teach some specialities.
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