The Misadventures of an Armchairdiver

Looking at the store right now it seems like a bad dream.  Only two weeks ago we had everything in its place and operations were normal.  A week ago, a little weather caused havoc and disrupted our little world.  But, we are luckier than a lot of people.

Yesterday I spoke with a gentleman from Surfside, a small town on the coast, and he said that his roof was gone and everything was wet but he was lucky – he still had a house.  Many of his neighbors were not so fortunate.  There were pilings (homes in this area are built on stilts) where houses used to sit and piles of debris that represented years of hard work sitting in the road.  These people had truly lost everything they had.

When you hear stories like these, I feel guilty about the depression I feel when looking at the store.  For our part, the majority of what we had is still there and only a little of it is totally lost.  And we have insurance to help replace what was lost.  More than anything, we are all fine. 

Our staff seemed to have weathered the storm and are coping with the changes the storm has brought.  Wade has no power and is maintaining his freezers and sanity with two generators.  Their hurricane plans called for the installation of two small window units to help keep the moisture down in their home for the month or two it takes to get power restored in their neighborhood.  Steve  still has no power and is using a generator to keep the food, beer, and wine cold while using fans to keep cool.  Vernon is getting more help from his Mother-in-Law since her home is in Galveston which is only open during daylight hours.  Fortunately, here home came through the storm in reasonably good condition.  Chuck finally got power back as did Mike. 

Barney suffered some damage at his home but found his boat safely tied in its slip.  For his part, procrastination paid off since their plans were to move the boat to the cannal behind their new home, but he had gotten around to adding the pylon he needed t secure it properly.  This probably kept his boat from being one of those that greets you on the highway on the way into Galveston.

Some of the staff are still feeling like vagabonds or summer campers.  They are still waiting for power to be restored.  According to the news, Centerpoint Energy has restored power to 66% of their customers (thankfully we are one of the ones with power both at the store and at home).

 The piles of drywall in front of the store have been removed.  The dehumidifiers were silenced yesterday and the few remaining fans noisily running throughout the morning were cut-off and pulled front he store.  The Steam Team, our flood recovery specialists, ended their siege of our space and removed the last vestiges of their encampment.  Our space has been pronounced “dry.”

 While the specialists were crawling around the office, Oceanic Ventures restarted business in full swing, with classes resuming last evening.  Ann and Ashton are still staged at the western office (our house) and I am manning the store while working with the building management and our insurance carrier to resolve the situation and revamp the piles back into an operational facility.  We have a lot of work to do but we also have a lot of support from our friends, staff and clients.  The hard part is deciding where to start and what needs to be done next.

 As I suggested in an email message, when things get too rough, remember your last dive trip and focus on the underwater beauty.  I for one have been spending a lot of time in Cayman and the Pacific.  These images continue to remind me of why I do what I do; and they serve as a catalyst to move on so I can continue to introduce others to the wonders that await them underwater.

Ike in the Gulf

As many of you probably know and may have experienced, we were visited by hurricane Ike in the early morning hours on Saturday. We were lucky in that the main force of the storm moved a little east of its original path which put us more on the dry side with slower winds and less rain. Still, we had at least 90 mile an hour winds and at least 10 inches of rain.

On the face of it, our house came through without allot of damage. Ann and I came through the storm fine. Luckily, our house received little damage and all of our trees survived the storm. It was a good thing Ashton and Jeremy helped Ann trim the tree. Some of our neighbors were not so lucky.

We have no power, the water pressure is low and there are leaves and small branches everywhere. The fish are swimming in green water with leaves floating on top and the street looks like a war zone.

The store did not fare as well. The storm lifted the corner of the roof on our building and broke it up allowing the water to enter the store. The sheetrock just outside the store fell down and the sheetrock in the store sagged with the weight of the water. Since friends called us to alert us, I came in and relieved the pressure by punching holes in the ceiling. Of course it was too late to abate some of the damage. The store is a total mess with all of the carpets, electronics and paperwork wet.

Houston too is a mess with blocked streets, trees down and over 90% of the residents without power. Driving is an adventure with lanes and entire streets blocked by 100 year old trees and traffic lights dangling from their wires. At the larger intersections, the fixed traffic poles are twisted with the lights facing in incorrect directions.

Things will be a little disjointed over the next month but we are up and running. I am thankful; no one we know of was hurt and the damage we received was minimal compared to others. Our friends are safe and while we have a lot of work to do, we are keeping a positive outlook, trying to remember that things usually turn out for the best. We have some exciting things happening but we have some challenges to work through as well.

It is now Saturday and Tek Week 2008 has drawn to a close.  It started out a little tumultuous with Hurricane Gustov causing havoc in the Carribbean.  But as the winds moved on into the Gulf, memories were being made in Grand Cayman.

Ray Turek getting ready

My cadre of students finished their courses.  Ray Turek completed his Normoxic Trimix course and may have been convinced that CCR was the only way to dive deeper because you could stay longer.  Of course, he’ll now have to explain the need to his wife and then decide on which unit is right for him.  He certainly got to see a variety of units here this week.  Kim Smith from KISS rebreathers was here as was Peter Den Hann from Silent Diving Systems the North American distributer of the Evolution and Inspiration rebreathers.  Paul Rainmaker, designer of the rEvo rebreather was here showing off his new rebreather.  Then there were the divers themselves sporting a number of units including the Sentinel from VR technologies, several Inspirations, Evolutions, Evolution Plus’, an Optima, a Titan or two, a Megalodon, a few KISS Classics, a KISS Sport, and some rEvo’s.

While Ray was completing his Normoxic course, Madison Lee and Mark Nawman were working on their Trimix Course.  They ended their training on Friday with a 300 foot dive near Dolphin Drop-Off in the west bay.  All three of them received preliminary certificates at the closing session on Friday evening.

Madison ready to Go

The training was a minor part of the week at least for me.  The best part was the diving.  Due to the winds from Gustov and Hanna, our diving was primarily off the West Bay portion of the island.  Of course, this is not a real problem since these walls are beautiful and the aquatic life is abundant.

Diving deep in Grand Cayman is a real treat because not only are the deep portions of the walls beautiful, but your decompression is spent on the walls as well.  This makes for a more entertaining stay and a more relaxed dive.

Coming up the coral canyons at Big tunnels treated us to more than 14 lobsters milling about and two chasing one another around the reef.  In Orange Canyon and at both Leslie’s Curl and Dolphin drop off we were treated to exhibitions by the ultimate free-divers – the turtles.  Rays and sharks greeted the divers on most dives and even the sharks made an appearance.

All in all it was a fun event and we had some great dives.  The staff at Cobalt Coast and DiveTech work hard to make these events special and they succeeded once again.

See the press release at http://www.caymannetnews.com/news-9858–1-1—.html

Tek Week Group

Hurricane Gustov made the start of Tech Week in Grand Cayman a little interesting.  We spent much of the week following the hurricane tracking maps and models on Weather Underground, www.wunderground.com, and talking to people down here.

Saturday morning found us going to the airport on faith that the Cayman government would open the island to non-residents by the time our flight left.  I had spoken to Nat Robb early Saturday morning who indicated that this storm was more of a non-event for them (not true for the sister islands however).  They had some wind and little rain.

Arie, the owner of Cobalt Coast, called me at 11:15 to tell me that the government on Grand Cayman had given the “all clear” and that visitors could now return to the island.  Of course Continental had not received the message as quickly – the gate agent infomed me that “they were the airline” and it was up to them.  However, the supervisors at Continental quickly cleared the flight for visitors with confirmed reservations (of course they wanted to see a printed confirmation…).  After getting a number from Arie (just in case someone needed to confirm it with him) we were on our way.

Things were a little out of sorts and most of the windows on the island were boarded up as were some of the windows at Cobalt Coast and Dive Tech.  The benches were pushed together and the dock was a little worse for wear.  The most surprising thing was to see all of the Dive Tech cylinders in front of Cobalt Coast—lots of cylinders.

This morning the staff showed up and things were pulled out, moved swept and by lunch time you would never have known there was a storm except for the pier which by the end of the day was ¾ repaired – the only thing that stopped Jay and his crew was the fact that they ran out of wood and it was Sunday so getting more was not possible.

Nancy and the staff, pulled the boats out of the mangroves, cleaned them up, re-equipped them and toured possible dive sites by 12:00.  By 1:00 we were diving on the North wall.  The water heading out was a little green and the visibility at the dive site was not more than 60’ but we had a nice enjoyable dive, with Ray Turek completing his skills for his Normoxic Trimix course and Madison Lee learning more about free diving or breath-hold diving from Simon.

At last count 16 people canceled mostly because getting here at a different time or on a different day made it impossible.  But, 33 participants still agreed to come and at least ½ of them were here by dinner time.

The seas should continue to lay down overnight and Nancy is predicting that shore diving off Cobalt will be available by tomorrow.  Tomorrow’s dive plan calls for a 200 foot dive for Madison and Ray. 

Dive Mom, Wade and Ashton have just returned from the last Gulf Coral Spawning trip aboard the M/V Spree.  They all had a great time and got in a lot of diving.  Here’s Captain Frank’s comments:

5 folks didn’t show for the 2008 coral spawn, which made the boat a little more comfortable for the 19 who assembled at the dock on Wednesday night for a lumpy ride out to the East bank. The plan was to go to the East bank first, dive 1 or 2 there, do a rig, then wander off to the West bank to stay away from the filming that was taking place at the East bank. Alas, all good plans tend to be shot down by the rules nature dictates. The current was ripping on the West bank and would for the entire spawning time.

We arrived at the East bank and tied to Buoy 6. After 2 dives, I determined that the conditions were a little rougher than I wanted to contend with a rig, so we moved to Buoy 6 for the duration of the week. Current was noticeable in the morning, water temp was 84 degrees, waves were the biggest 1-3’s I’ve ever seen (more like 2-5’s), air temp was in the 80’s to 90’s, visibility was pretty good at 100 feet, and there was evil stinging crap in the water. Those without wetsuits are tougher than I am.

The entire week we were treated to a manta ray that kept coming back. I’m sure this is the same ray that has been here most of the summer. She seems to be curious about divers, but does not come close enough to touch She was mostly feeding, with her cephalic fins unfurled, and doing barrel rolls under the boat. The divers got lots of photographs of a marbled grouper defending his (or her) hole in the coral, since 4 days were spent on one site, the divers got to know it very well. They found the tiny nudibranchs we have here, painted alysias, as well as Ann’s favorite character from Star Wars, Jah Jah Binks (also known as a red-lipped blenny), mustached jawfish, yellow-headed jawfish, sharks of unknown varieties, and a strange blue glow from under the Fling. The Fling had a feature film crew onboard, and their lights made the ocean glow with the coolest blue color ever.

The big show was supposed to be Friday night, but only a little spawning activity was seen. Saturday night, however, was the big show. Spawning was scheduled for 9 PM, I got in at *:45 to watch for the start and signal Melanie to jump divers. At 9:05, right on schedule, the brains started. Soon after, the male cavernosa (large boulder coral) had their thing on. I came up before Franksii (small boulder coral) did their thing, but the divers were all in for that.

All in all, it was a good spawn, not the best ever, but Manuel (who has done this 5 times) said it is the best he has ever seen. Everyone saw it happen, and the guys all remarked how soft their hair was.

Sunday morning we moved to Stetson Bank. Current was coming up the wall, visibility was 100+, and all the fish were out on grand parade. The divers spotted Sailfin blennies, ubiquitous undefined sharks, rays of many descriptions, mantis shrimp,  scorpion fish, deer cowries, and “dancing” angel fish. CP was surrounded by 5-7 sandbar sharks, a spotted eagle ray, southern stingrays, and a manta. The guests continued to rave about the coral spawn.

It’s sad to see our last coral spawn in the Flower Gardens go under our belts, but we’re looking forward to two of them next year in the Dry Tortugas.

Captain Frank

M/V Spree

Freeport, Texas

See you in the Dry Tortugas!