Monday, August 31, 2009

Enjoying Enriched Air


On Sunday seven members, with a varied diving background, were certified into the realm of nitrox diving. We gathered early in the morning and promptly completed our classroom section learning of the many benefits and the few challenges of diving with enriched air. The classroom section left us looking forward to the two dives we were going to be doing using nitrox. The dives were completed at the Prescott underwater park in about 45 feet of water. We picked up our tanks at Divetech then headed for our dive site. I can say I was pleasantly surprised on the calm feeling of diving with nitrox and I was not the only one everyone was surprised on how much nicer we felt after diving. The weather was a little rainy but with all of us diving wet it really did not matter. It was a nice way to enjoy a day learning more about our sport and being able use the skills right away. All of the students would recommend air divers definitely talk to an instructor to see about nitrox.

Local Dive Centre backing 'Soldier On'...


Explorer Diving has announced that it will be running an event at the Highway 15 Quarry on Sunday, September 6th to benefit the Organisation Soldier On. Gates will open at 1030 and an admission fee of $5 will go directly to the charity. Proceeds from a barbecue, where basic fare will be available at reasonable cost, will also go directly to the Organisation.

To assist planning, if you intend to go along, please let them know by mailing them at Explorer Diving.

Non divers who might like to become divers should note that there will be an opportunity in the afternoon to undertake a try dive. Contact Explorer for more information.

Lets go for it anyway!

Sunday morning shore dive with Matt didn't quite attracted as many people than last week where nine divers showed up. This week, five persons gathered at the club at 0930h Matt was sick, so he wasn't able to dive, so we were down to four people. We got to the marine museum hoping for a more calm dive site, turned out that we lost Kim and Scott also because of poor dive conditions. It left Jesse and I. We looked at each other and said lets go for it anyway!

Turned out that it wasn't a bad dive, we played under the ramp, went to the wreck, Jesse practiced his drysuit skills and I went for more pictures. The visibility was low (15-20 feet) but surge wasn't getting us under water.

Enjoy the video of the gearing up (Good think I dive wet!) and the Ontario lake diver's best friend : the Goby



A dive without a camera is a wasted dive!
See you next dive!

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Foul-Weather Divers ???


One thing not to mutter out loud in a crowd is the following statement : " Whose crazy idea was this anyways ?..", especially when you realize that you were the one who had the bright idea in the first place...
Yesterday, albeit the gross weather conditions top side, no less than 6 of us "foul weather divers" braved the rain, wind, and occasional zodiac zipping over our heads to attempt repairs to the line out to the stacked hulls. Rumours were proven false that the line was serviceable. After multiple attempts to stake the line in the shallows, ...miserable rocky bottom..., we decided to carry on and install the stakes in the more deeper portion of the trek out to the hulls. To our demise, the line remains sectioned at one point on the shelf. The line can still be picked up on a 130 degree bearing from the entry point on shore, but more work is required from the parallel line on shore to the shelf drop-off into deeper water.
We installed more stakes on our way to the site, securing the line a bit lower next to the debris field. We swam around the site a bit, looking for some misplaced gear from another diver on a previous dive, and decided to turn the dive once air supply started to become a concern. Once back on the shelf, we relied on compass skills to return to our entry point. One thing to be aware of here, folks.. the current line coming back to shore on the shelf takes a 90 degree turn and will lead you in the direction of Portsmouth Harbor.. so make sure to use your compass on the way back... More work is definitely required, so stay tuned to this station for more updates...
Pictures above of the dive are as follows : Sheep Head seen twice in same area, Gaetan his usual smiling self, and Steve on the bow of one of the wrecks with a tank in tow..
P.S. No diver-eating, camera-biting long-nosed gars were seen during this dive...






Saturday, August 29, 2009

Playing at night with my camera




Matt and Marc-Etienne talked me into taking my camera along last night on our night dive in Navy Bay. I am glad I did. They gave me a lot of advice and helped to set up my camera. This was my first time ever taking pictures at night (I have only used it a few times during the day so I am still learning) and I got a couple of not so bad pictures. I still need a lot of practice and this has only encouraged me to start taking my camera again.

We arrived at our site at 7:30 and after a lot of playing around with Cameras (NOT MINE or Marc-Etienne's) we finally entered the water at 8:30. All kidding aside we had a great night and I would love to go back for more practice. This is a great site to practice on as there was no current and the bay is protected from the strong winds.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Nautical Archaeology Training Opportunity...

Save Ontario Shipwrecks has announced the availability of places on a NAS Level 1 course in Ottawa in late September. Anyone interested in this opportunity can obtain more details from Chris Holloway or download the registration form by clicking here. NAS Level 1 is an excellent introduction to both theoretical and practical aspects of avocational underwater archaeology.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Night + Shallow = Fun!

I will say something that will maybe offend the intense tech. divers that believe that you need to go deep to get a good dive. Last night proved that wrong. A max depth of 12 feet with an average depth of 6 feet, that's a good dive! Ask Suzanne, she was cheering and screaming after her first night experience.

Mike, Todd, Suzanne and I (and DIanne, but a "congestion" forced her to stay on the shore) met at the base marina by deadman's bay for a night dive. My primary g
oal in that dive was to get a warm sheltered environment to get as many fish as possible to go on a picture hunting night. Mike brought his camera also and we paired up wandering the marina's bottom on our quest to blind fishes with strobe light! During that time, Suzanne discovered the pleasure of night diving with Todd. Believe me, some fishes, must hate me now, my second strobe light finally works, so I got twice the light power to blind them! Poor little fishes

Here are few of my best shots. Enjoy!


A dive without a camera is a wasted dive!
See you next dive!

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

The concentration of the photographer...


Marc-Etienne's pictures are great - see them in the blog entry above - his mastery of his equipment is obvious, but seizing the right moment takes concentration. The pic shows him hovering over some unsuspecting underwater subject - wreathed in weeds..

Saturday, August 22, 2009

A 3 hour tour....

...that turned into 6 hours.
Boat diving is not a precise art. Many factors need to be considered when taking a boat trip to a site. Weather is the big one. Even though it looks great out the window, a good wind will throw all of your timings out the door and can even force a cancellation or at the very least a change in venue for your dive. Today was one of those days.
Lemme tell you I may have had a shower before I went on the boat but after the ride out to the Marsh this morning I did not need it. The water got a wee bit rough with a strong wind from the south west. We had some 5 foot swells and the water crashed over the boat in huge sprays. Needless to say us brave folks who like to dive wet didnt mind. However I will admit there was some shrinkage....man I was completly soaked.


Pictured above and beside me are 1 of the 3 guests we had from Toronto Hammerheads dive club out of ASU TO. When ever possible we like to help out folks from other clubs to discover our little fresh water paradise. Though we never intended them to get sea sick in the process.

Easily one of my favorite dives in the region the Marsh is as Adam put it a "Fairy Tale Wreck". This 3 masted schooner went down in around 80 feet of water with a full load of coal in her hold. At the bow of the ship a pristine bowspirt complete with lines and the stern is slightly damaged but still worth a look. The masts are all down and set at odd angles however one is in the middle of the boat on top of a smashed lifeboat for the sharp of eye. Thermocline was at 70 feet today with the algea cloud down to 20. You could easlily see half the ship when on the wreck at any one point in time.

The Glendora was our other choice for the day and apparently that of a few other charters. This is a great swimthrough dive as the hold is wide open and you can fit 3 divers side by each as they say on the rock. I never knew there was a gigantic stove in the middle of the ship though. Thats what the picture is. This was also a great time for the couples to get all romantic like and spend some quality quiet time under the waves. I am sure the serenity was appreciated by all.
Kevin and Joase`e (sp?):
Shaun and Lisa:
The rest of us:

Big thanks to NTD and Kingston Dive Charters for helping us get this charter in the water.
I think we made Harolds day with the soakers he gave us folks at the back of the boat.
More to come tommorow as we take the these city folk out for a sample of our shore diving sunday.

As allways keep blowing bubbles

Sunday, August 16, 2009

When the going gets hot even the tough go wet

Ok so thats not how its supposed to read but throw me a bone here ...

Summer is really here now for at least another week. Seems like the rain is going to stay away for a little while. What a great reason to get in the water. 2 dives this weekend by members of the DSC. On Saturday we did a commemorative dive at the Alexander Henry to celebrate its 50th anniversary. I hear the Kingston Brew Pub is making a beer called Icebreaker to go along with the festivites. Mmmmmmm beer ... oh right blog here...I wonder if it helps folks get dates too? (Insert laugh track here) Mike, Dianne, Adam Kevin, Marg, and I did come community work for POW (Preserve Our Wrecks Kingston). Marg, Kevin, and myself did demo dives, albeit at 2 different times.

The ship is in perma dock now and is used as a bed and breakfast, however the water below goes to 19 feet. Not much to see but some weeds a few small perch and bass. Though there are some cool crates on the port side of the ship, and if you look right under the ship there was a very cool layered algae cloud that looked kind of creepy. I found out quickly I was diving with the curator of the museum, which added to the fun.

Adam had us try out the full face mask system with comms system and we got to play with a remote camera system as well. The masks are neat and take some time to get used to and are nothing like those full helmet systems that commercial divers use. I think I need more practice with the comms as i was pretty much completely un-intelligble (then normal) to everyone up top.

Now for title of the blog today:

I never knew Mike, Kevin, Jim, or Marg had a wet suit, nor for that matter half the other members of the club. You see ever since I started diving with this crew not a single person other then Kim in September ever wore one. The only ones with them were the "newer divers" and the students. I just always thought they were afraid of the water. I guess it takes a scorchingly hot and sunny 35 degree Celcius day and a small bucket of sweat from putting on the gear to make them break out the old school stuff. I even managed to catch one of them without a hood! imagine the shock I had.

I pick on them because it's fun. I often warn divers that its better to be slightly cold then over warm. Today's dive is a perfect example. In the 20 foot water column it was 78F and even I took my 7mm hood off. I needed it because at 90 feet we had passed 3 thermoclines and lemme tell you my 2 mm hands were a slight tinge short of blue. However in the warm water it was too much. I can not tell you the amount of divers who I have seen never dive again after a heat stroke like effect from over dressing.

10 of us took part in the Sunday Club (tm patent pending). We had a long leisurely drive down the winding shoreline road to Nicholsons Point (just outside of Bath) for a dip in the also warm waters. This dive is good for both Open water and Advanced divers. The dive features a line that goes straight south and leads down 90 feet deep at a 10-15 foot drop off or ledge. Not a whole heck of a lot to see today but folks did talk about a couple of carp in the shallows and a few large mouth bass. No long nose gar either...
Oh and a couple of very odd looking fish with no hood....
pics or it never happened:
The Alex Henry on top:

Ben the curator with cool full face mask riggins:

The spooky algea:

Ben with the Remote camera:

The Ledge at 90 feet:

The Elusive Mikeosaurus Rex with no hood:

As Allways keep blowing bubbles!

Wildlife on the Wolfe...

The opportunity arose today to get out to the Wolfe Islander and enjoy the extraordinary wildlife that abounds there at this time of year. Disappointingly (perhaps the dive traffic is proving to be a little intimidating) there were only fleeting glimpses of the Freshwater Drum that have been haunting the after portions of the wreck recently. There were, however, abundant shoals of Bluegill Sunfish. I think that the video tells the story quite well...

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Not much better then a nice evening swim 2 nights in a row

Its catch up time. After the summer that mostly wasnt, we finally managed to get some fantastic warm weather and with that comes even better diving. I tell all my out of town friends that Ktown is arguably the mecca of freshwater diving, with its abundance of wrecks, and reasonalby decent water conditions. So any chance to snag a dive is a good chance in my book!

This week the club snaged two evening dives. One at the Wolfe and the other on Howe islandThe other great thing is when you get to introduce new people to the diving around here. Everyone says the same thing " I never knew how good it was untill I saw it with my own eyes" or words to that effect.
To quote Scott "the Wolfe is like moms apple pie, allways good even when youve had to much" Info about this dive is all over the blogosphere in Kingston so I wont bore you with the details. Save one: Diving this boat is like diving down south - there are so many fish on this thing you could feed a small town in "insert 3rd world nation here". A good sized gang of us snaged a quick trip on Proteus to this river reef. Owen (on his first ever boat trip wreck dive in Ktown) and I even had the pleasure of seeing a small school of 5 sheepshead (2ft long fresh water drums) on the stern of the ship. They allways seem to hang around there and tonight was a great display.
If there is one lesson learned though its this: allways check your gear bag to make sure you have everything before you leave to dock. I know of a certain diver (me) who completly forgot his wet suit ( or fins or mask or other accoutrements) once many moons ago and had to borrow someone elses. Last nights escapade was someone elses to chance to forget thier gloves and fortunatly it was a short drive back to the docks. Dive saved!
Thursday night 4 of us snaged a quickie dive on Howe Island. This is a simple slow drift dive that does demand some planning on entry and exit. You need to know how to take a bearing and follow it or you will get lost. The highlight of the dive is a small barge with a few bricks it was carrying to peek at. Basic plan is go in head for 39 ft and there is a line along that contour heading east that (at least tonight) was in good shape. Approximatly 10 min into the dive you will find the wreck. You can go deep to 90 feet if you follow a south westerly route and I am told there is a wagon wheel along the way. to get back to the lighthouse you need to take a north westerly route then you should end up near the tower you came in by. Thank god we had a Master Corperal navigating or we would of been screwed!

We had the extra bonus of taking along a new member Ken on his first ever ontario dive and his 9th dive ever. For him this was a great intro into diving in the area. We hope to see him more as his truck can take a small armies worth of gear. Take the time when heading over to enjoy the ferry ride but be aware the price has gone up to $4.50 now as of april 1st 2009
Pics or it didnt happen:
Howe Island: Kevin, Jim, the barge in the dark, Ken, and the entry way.
The Wolfe Islander II
I am still learning (after a year and change) how to play with the lighting at depth with a remote flash unit. Not many of my pics have really turned out so far. Oh well guess I need to dive and practice more!
a couple of Marc-Etienne shots:
the perch and a fresh water drum.


As allways keep blowing bubbles!

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Please do no adjust your Set we are experiencing technical difficulties

Yes I am 2 days late on the Sunday dive. I blame writers block, a busy schedual and the excuse bus... Sunday morning saw a small gang of us changed course from diving the cora post on Howe Island to deadmans bay due to incoming bad weather and the potential of racing boats over our heads.
The dive was a navigational refresher by complete accident. I was origionaly going to start this blog with what do you get when you give and officer a map and compass, but the 2 NCOs with him were just as guilty. I suppose the lesson learned here is dont just trust one person for the navigation everyone should be checking as well.
On the plus side becuase we got lost in 20 feet of water we managed to dive for over 71 minutes and we did eventualy find the wreck. I completly forget the name of the wreck, but the Prince Regent rings a bell, sits in shallow waters (approximatly 19 feet) that gets pretty much chewed up over the winter months due to ice. Water temp was in the high 60s low 70s. It was supposed to be a quick 8 min swim on a 210 bearing or from the sign post aim towards the red roofed Mortello (old school cannon fort) tower in the south end of the bay. It ended up as a 40 min search.
You would think I know this, alas "Mr Technical Difficulties" (tm Grondin industries pending) had his no longer produced Viper 2 crap out on him, giving a 4 foot dive reading in 15 feet of water. This season has been hell on my gear and other then Mask Fins Snorkel and my wet suit, I think its all had a hit at least once this year. What torques me most is the damn Viper 2 is brand new. Ah well what doesnt kill you, only makes you stranger.
pics this week yay!
the entry
the lone catfish I saw
Geatan cruising through the wreck

As allways keep blowing bubbles

Thursday, August 6, 2009

1 is a lonely number

One is a lonely number so they say. Being the only guy in a 7mm wet suit, diving with a single alluminum 80 with 5 folks geared up in "Halcyon" harnesses, all in trilam dry suits, 3 in doubles running 32 mix Nitrox, 2 in oversized (117, 130) very high pressure steel tanks and 1 using a camera the size of a meduim class dog, should make us regular divers kinda squeamish. I say they are all weak and afraid to dive the old fashioned way. Ok maybe not to thier faces...

You dive with the gear you have now, not the gear you want but the bank wont let you have. Good diving partners will always get to know the skill level and the gear of thier buddy for the dive and adjust accordingly. I was lucky to have such a great dive team to work with. Scott, Kim, Giles, Tom and Chris and I all shared some good laughs at each others expense over my appearant old school techniques. Did I ever mention I was given an intro to diving in a horse collar then told never use it again on my open water course?


Wed night 6 of us managed to sneak in a great dive on an old Northern Tech Diver favorite. Frankly the wind started to pick up and we really didnt have much choice in the end. Kingston in my humble opinion is the worlds best fresh water diving spot, and the Munson is one of the best examples of the quailty of wrecks the region has to offer. She sits 110 feet of water when the river is running freely (I once was deeper earlier in the season). The water temp was a balmy 60F which for us folks in wet suits is very tolerable, and the visibilty at depth was easily 30-40 feet. Tom mentioned on the boat ride back this one of those wrecks he finds something new every dive and frankly I believe him.

No pics tonight my camera and I are having a lovers spat over battery life.

As allways keep blowing bubbles!

Matt

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

One Day two Dives


What an awesome day. Sunny, little wind, what else to do. ``Scuba Dive`` The plan was to make 2 dive`s today, the first will be the Comet, the second will be the George A Marsh. These would be Rob`s and my first 2 Nitrox dives since our course with Mike. Rob and I decided on EANx 32 for both dives. We were able to benefit with the short surface interval as well as longer NDL`s. The Comet was unbelievable sight, the paddle wheels were amazing. Just an amazing dive, visibility below the thermalcline was about 50 feet. Just a great dive. After a 2 Km boat ride and a 91 min. surface interval, we descended on the George A Marsh. Another great dive, let alone another great look at the past. It is always a wonder to me, as to just what kind of a storm would put such a large sailing ship to her grave, here on lake Ontario. The George A Marsh is a dive site that I will visit many more times in the future. There was just not enough time, to take in all of her Dead eyes, Pulleys, much of her deck hardware let alone the items that weren`t seen on a first dive. Even diving with enriched air there still wasn`t enough dive time on a wreck. I guess the next step is to either go to steel 120`s or duel`s. The George A Marsh as well as the Comet are two wrecks well worth the boat ride out, and diving on. Todd. V.

Monday, August 3, 2009

Congratulations to two new divers..

Today, the Club saw two more divers join the ranks of the certified. Alex and Cody have been working away quietly to complete all the requirements of certification. They made two open water dives today; the first at Morton's Wharf, in fairly lumpy conditions and the second at Kingston Oasis (which is now the official title for Brule Road Quarry). The dives lasted 45 and 59 minutes respectively and gave the divers plenty of time to enjoy their surroundings and test their skills.

Brule Road is gaining popularity and it's well worth the $3 charged for admission to have the facilities that have now appeared available. The owner tells me that he plans to build a new home on the site and to improve the site still further. As a welcome - and easily accessible - alternative to a stormy Lake, it's a really welcome dive venue.