georoc01's blog: "Underwater Photography"

My 100th Dive 7/25-7/28 2008 Back in North Carolina, I booked my 96th Dive. SingleDivers.com was having the re-do of the Cozumel/Cenotes/Holbox trip, I was able to find some inexpensive airfare, so I came down for the weekend to do the Cozumel portion. We stayed at Casa Del Mar. I arrived on Friday, checked in at the dive shop (DelMarAquatics) and did a shore dive that afternoon with two of the women on the trip. The dive was suprisingly good. First we went and blew bubbles at the glass bottom boat. Then we followed the fish over to the snorkelers watching a couple get very territorial with each other. After the snorkelers left, we then hear this loud noise and in comes the Atlantis submarine. This is my third shore dive in the last couple of years and the marine life seems to be getting better each time. We ate at La Chorzo that night to celebrate the birthday of one of our divemasters, Fernando. I had a great fish filet, and they put a candle in the flan for Fernando's b'day and had the local musicians play happy birthday. Day 2 I did two dives, Dalila and Paradise Reef. Both good dives. GIven that most of the group arrived on this day, I dove with four of the women who arrived early. Nice warm water and abundant marine life. Saw turtles, nurse sharks on every dive this trip. We had 10 divers on their large boat with plenty of room to spread out. Day 3 was Dive 100. WW hired a videographer to celebrate the occasion. We dove Palancar Bricks as our first dive. One of my favorites with large coral formations and plenty of swim throughs. We did a number of activities underwater, including each lady on the dive giving me a kiss underwater to comensurate the event. Dive 101 was at Cedral Wall. In addition to the Turtles competing with the Angelfish for food (it was looking like the angels were basically waiting for the turtle to do the work and then the fish would grab it once it was loose in the water). We also saw a moray eel in the open stand off against an angelfish wouldn't let it pass. Not sure what was into the angelfish on this dive. Also had a shark swimming out in the open watching the eel. Having spent a few times in Cozumel, I decided to take a boat ride over to Playa Del Carmen. Scouted out some dive shops and hotels for doing some Cenote diving on our next trip down here. While brief, another nice trip to Cozumel. With SingleDivers.com scheduling another trip over Halloween, it may be just in time for another visit. Thanks to Kamala and everyone else for making my 100th dive special. It was a good time!

DEMP Class 6/26/08 Time for a little alphabet soup. My local dive shop offers an option as part of their rescue program. They call it the ultimate rescue diver. It consists of three courses, EFR (Emergency First Responder or CPR), the PADI Rescue Class, and then the DAN DEMP class. Having completed the first two, I did the DEMP class this week. DEMP, or Diving Emergency Management Provider as tought by my shop is actually a collection of five classes bundled together. O2 provider, Advanced O2 provider, AED, First Aid for Hazardous Marine Life and On-site Neurological assessment. It is taught over two nights. The class began with a review of CPR. Most of us had just done the EFR class, so this went fairly rapidly. Then we moved into the Automated External Defibrillators(AED), integrating that into the CPR process. After that, we moved into the Oxygen Provider portion of the class. A detailed breakdown of the equipment, as we had to have a knowledge of each component. In fact, as part of this portion of the class, they had us assemble and dissassemble the O2 unit blindfolded, calling out each piece as we did it. We covered three types of masks and integration with CPR in the case of an emergency. Advanced O2 adds in the MTV-100 and the bag mask to the mix. Then we covered hazardous marine life. This covered creatures that could sting, bite as well as care for contact with nasties such as fire coral. We practiced first aid for wounds as well as how to handle neutralizing the poison in the case of stings. We also covered allergies their treatment. The last section regarded Neurological Assessment. The concept is to get down as much as you can as soon as someone starts feeling ill so that once the diver seeks medical attention the doctor has a baseline to start from. DAN also bundles these classes together too. They call it the Diving Emergency Specialist. http://www.diversalertnetwork.org/training/courses/des/index.asp As a stand alone program, I don't know if it was worth it. But as a supplement to the EFR and Rescue classes, it reinforced and enhanced the training received in those two, essentially giving us more tools in our toolkit when dealing with diving emergencies. What is interesting is that, like EFR, these courses expire after 24 months and you need to take the entire class set again to renew. I hope they come up with some type of refresher program that would allow you to do all of these programs in a single class, rather than having to take all of it again.

Dive Trip Report Cozumel - June 13-16th Flew down on a trip booked through apple vacations. Sun Country Charter out of Dallas-Ft. Worth. My dive buddy, BB & I were on a flight at 10:00 am that got us into Cozumel about 12:30. Headed straight over to Hotel Cozumel. Got checked in, Then went over to the Dive Paradise Dive shop, checked in there and rented a couple of tanks for a checkout dive. Cost is $6 for tank & weights. So we were wet by about 2:00pm. From the pier, you can swim out and they have a Mayan Pyramid just to the left of the pier, about 30 feet out from shore in 15 feet of water. We then took a check out the current and headed south. Not alot to see. BB saw a sting ray that I completely missed. And there were plenty of fish. We turned around about the lighthouse and headed back. Swimming around the pier I saw a nice looking crab and a nudibranch. Mostly dead coral and sand. But we had our weights dialed in for the weekend. Friday night we headed into town and had dinner at The Mission. I had the Mission shrimp which was butterfly shrimp grilled and cooked with onion rings and then bacon. It was very good. On the way back we stopped by Magaritaville and BB really liked the swings. We had a couple of drinks there and then headed back to bed. The 22oz Magaritas can hit you quick! On Saturday we were late getting started. Our boat had broke down so they sent a slower substitute in the Ares. We then had trouble finding divers at the Wyndham pier (they were at the wood pier and we stopped at the Sand Dollar pier). We dove with Jose’ who is the choice of my dive shop in Denver, A1 Scuba. Our first dive was Santa Rosa wall. Lots of swim throughs. We saw Dolphins from the boat after the dives on our way back to the shop. Then it was downtown for souveneir shopping. BB is a big starbucks fan and thus had to get a Cozumel Starbucks mug. They didn’t have any out and as soon as the guy opened a box of them they were gone in minutes. Apparently a popular collectors item. Another stop at Magaritaville on the way back for some pix on the swing. And to feed what I think are Blue Tangs that live off the shore. They brought out a bunch of tortillas and the fish love them, jumping out of the water. BB got a swimmer to come over and got the fish to jump into her to grab the tortilla. Fun stuff. Then it was dinner at Hotel Cozumel and watching the black light show. It was decent for a hotel show. Free drinks as part of the All inclusive didn’t hurt. On Sunday I did two dives. Punta Tunich and the C-53. Current was ripping so these were really superman dives. Tons of marine life makes Punta Tunich one of my favorite dives. It was my first time diving the wreck. We did do some light penetration as swimming around the bottom was virtually impossible. Huge number of sardines live up top in the wreck and some large groupers obviously love this as a feeding ground. It was an interesting dive that I wouldn’t mind doing again. Sunday night we had dinner at Jeannie’s Waffle House. I had a nice fish fillet. It was very good. Fed some more fish. Then headed back to the hotel for dessert and had music trivia contest for the night’s entertainment. It was a quick trip, but some nice dives. Nothing like 85 degree water to make diving very comfortable. Look forward to the next one!

I completed my rescue diver training this past weekend. The first step was finishing the pre-reqs. This involved taking Emergency First Responder. Its the American Heart Association class, and teaches, primary care, CPR, Oxygen use, and secondary assesment. Then we started the pool portion of the Rescue Diver Class. We had classroom sessions that involved five knowledge reviews covering different ermegency situations that occur while diving. Then in the pool we covered different rescues, and how to handle the situations covered in the book. The finale was a 50 question test. My open waters were at Chatfield Reservoir through A1 Scuba. I was suprised at the water temp, which was a balmy 65 degrees. My buddy was a 6' 2" police deputy, but there were 5 of us and we rotated being victims. The biggest challenge was searching for the missing diver in zero vis. The missing diver had silted up the water so bad that I was barely able to see the compass on my wrist. Plus there was an open water class that was doing their dives in the general area too which didn't help the situation. I also was a assisting a rescue diver who emptied his BC out of air before handing it to me with 20 lbs of intergrated weights. So I sunk like a stone until I could get some air in my bc and figure out what happened, without my reg in my mouth with my hands full. But the saves went well, we didn't lose anyone. We even had Denver Fire and Rescue show up, as they were doing practice work too. It was definitely a worthwhile class and would recommend it.

Dive Trip Bonaire 2008 May 10-17th Single Divers.Com Accommodations We stayed at the Divi Flamingo. Nice hotel just south of town. It’s easily within walking distance of local restaurants and shopping. We had an Oceanside room with balcony that provided awesome sunsets. Staff was great. Two negatives: intermittent hot water. Never knew when you took a shower whether hot water would be available or not. Second was an air conditioning leak left the floor of our room wet the last couple of days of the trip. http://www.diviflamingo.com/DiviFlamingo/ Meals Had breakfast and lunch at Divi Flamingo. Served buffet style, had eggs and style and pancakes available for breakfast. Lunch always had hots, hamburgers and fish available in addition to a main dish that varied. We had a nice bbq one night as a group meal. We also at a Chibi Chibi one night for dinner. We also ate dinners at La Luna, La Salsa, Swim with the Fishes and Casablanca. All but Casablanca I would repeat. While we didn't have dinner at Mona Lisa, we did have dessert as they were serving an outstanding Mango Cheesecake. Dive Operations I did 18 dives on this trip. 15 were boat dives through Divi Flamingo. SingleDivers had three boats for the week. I was on boat #3, Sunrise. Our Divemasters, Orlando and Enrique were outstanding. We dove the following sites Bachelor’s Beach 18 Palms Just a Nice Dive Boka Spelunk Windsock The Cliff Callabas Reef Mi Dushi Knife Jerry’s Sponges Hilma Hooker Alice in Wonderland North Belnam Petrie’s Pillar Small Wall Tori’s Reef http://www.geographia.com/bonaire/bondiv04.htm The marine life in Bonaire is amazing. And the consistency from dive site to dive site is very impressive as well. In comparison to Australia, I'd put two of the sites we dove in the Great Barrier Reef superior to these. My next 15 would probably come from this trip. Before this trip, I had never seen a sea horse. Probably saw a dozen on this trip. Including one at Alice in Wonderland where we saw it swim and stop to eat! Lots of turtles, eels, rays, all sorts of fish, including frog fish, scorpion fish and many others. Did see one nurse shark. In addition to the boat dives, we dove the house reef at Divi. We did a check out dive and a night dive there. It was nice to just pull your gear out of your locker, grab a tank on the dock, do a giant stride off the pier, swim about 15 feet and you were at the reef. Another night dive we did was the Town Pier. In this case, Orlando picked us up at the gate behind the dive shop and drove us the few blocks over to the pier. This dive was surreal. Only 17 feet, but all of the columns have been painted multiple colors over the years and the marine life has adopted to its surroundings. Bright clams and different colors of coral in yellows, reds, purples and oranges come out under there. Lots of eels, & snakes add an eerie feeling to the whole dive. Very creepy & very cool. We also did a dive with Larry's Wild Side diving. On the windward side of the island, they take you out to see big stuff, like golden eagle rays, huge turtles, etc. The downside was you were diving in the surge. Rocking and rolling through the entire dive, I was getting sea sick during the safety stop. Getting back on the boat into 10 foot swells was an adventure too. It was a cool dive. I'd recommend it, but doubt I would repeat. Too much cool stuff on the leeward side. Other We had performances by Michael Morse, the Scuba Diving Cowboy. His first CD is being released in July and he played for us multiple nights at Divi. Great songs and great entertainment. He is playing on future trips, and his CD should be excellent. Captain Don came and gave a talk of history of diving on the island. He has written short stories that relate back to the naming of many of the dive sites around Bonaire. Here is a website link to his stories.. http://captaindon.booksyarnsfairytales.com/ The Donkey Sanctuary was worth the stop. I give the woman who runs it quite a bit of credit, basically raising 400 burros on her own. Before the sanctuary opened, they had hundreds of car accidents with the wild donkeys. Last year there were 4. Seasigns – Diver Deb Norris taught this class. I have never had such an entertaining class in my life. I doubt any of us will ever forget how to swear in sign language at least. But it did improve our ability to communicate underwater which was the goal. I do recommend this class, even if you don’t have as entertaining an instructor as deb. Thanks! http://www.seasigns.com/

This trip was booked through Apple Vacations. Accommodations were at Hotel Cozumel. Dive Operator - Dive Paradise Dive Paradise has at least three dive operations that we would stop at. One was up just south of town, Another was at our hotel Cozumel and another further south just north of the International Pier. We were on their slow boats. Renegado Day 1, Calypso Day 2 and Tonga Day 3. The quality of the boats increased each day with Tonga being the nicest and fastest of the 3. Day 1 we had 7 divers with two dive masters, one who was a private DM for a junior diver. Day 2 had 8 divers on board with a single diver master. Day 3 we had 14 divers with three dive masters and an instructor. One was again the private DM for the junior diver (who also had a private videographer too). The instructor had two divers working on their Advanced Open Water. Then the rest of us were split into two groups. At Hotel Cozumel, they had lockers just off the pier, with fresh water rinse tanks. Had to get the key at the front desk. Day 1 of diving. This day we picked up a couple of cruise ship divers up at the Hotel Barracuda just south of Punta LaCosta. And we did the same dive sites that I did the first time I dove in Cozumel off a cruise ship through Dive House. Dive Master was Louis on the Renagado Dive 1 Paseo De Cedral Swim through Saw large moray eel Dive 2 Tormentos Saw more marine life in general on this dive than remembered a year ago. Of course, that was my 8th dive, this was my 60th so I think in general as a diver I spend more time seeing stuff and having to worry about my dive skills. One big nurse shark (8-9') sleeping. One big hermit crab (12"?) Day 2 of diving - Dive Master was Gabi on the Calypso, and we had a videographer that taped our dives. Ended up purchasing the video for $85. He charges $120 for a private video session. The group wanted to see lots of marine life and we were rewarded Dive 1 Dalila Saw a large trunkfish as we descended. Two sharks, One swimming, one under rock. Saw a large grouper, trumpet and drumfish. Dive 2 Yucab Wall Saw Turtles, grouper, Octopus, lobsters, cleaner shrimp. Day 3 Dive master Victor Dive 1 - Palancar Gardens Dive started at 80' and worked our way up the reef until we ascended at 20'. Saw an Eagle Ray, barracuda and large turtle along the side of the reef wall. Dive 2 - Cedral Wall Saw a scorpion fish for the first time. Victor was great on this dive as we darted around the reef to see turtles and sharks as well as some large groupers As far as Hotel Cozumel - room was large, clean and had a safe that was free of charge. With the AI, the food was good, buffet style. Large pool in the middle. The only negative was as an interior room we could always hear the PA whether it was the games during the day, or the shows from 8-10pm nightly. It’s a relatively short walk to downtown. We did have dinner twice in town, Casa Denis, which was a good restaurant having local fare. I had the Mayan Chicken and the shrimp cerviche. The other night was La Conchita De La Caribe, which had a variety of seafood options. One of us had the garlic conch, another breaded octopus and shrimp Diablo. All the meals were excellent. All in all, six great dives, beautiful weather and good food made for a nice break from the Colorado Winter. Look forward to my next return!

There was an article that researchers along the atlantic seaboard say that loggerhead turtles returning to nest are down 37% Commercial fishing is the main culprit with turtles getting caught up in the nets. They are asking for more help from the federal government to get them listed as endangered and impose sanctions. I hope they can be saved, so that I don't have to go to Mexico or the Grand Caymans to see a turtle underwater.

Well, I have been notified I have a recall of my regulator. Apparently there have been using potentially defective seals in the 1st stage. Not a good situation. http://www.oceanicworldwide.com/dxretrofit/oceanic/ I had mine fixed last week. Now I need to find the time to dive it prior to my trip to Australia in December!

Last night I took a class in underwater Photgraphy. It was taught by the owners of Island Photographers of Cozumel. www.photocozumel.com Holly and Armando are amazing. They really know there stuff. We spent the first two hours learning about all of the settings of our camera and what the optimal settings for shooting pix underwater. Until now, basically what I would do is take my camera underwater and shoot as many shots as I could. If I was lucky 1 or 2 would be decent. What we then did last night was shoot pictures on a simulated reef in the pool at my local dive shop. I have downloaded the pix and will load them soon. Really looking forward to my next dive trip to try this out further!