Eagles Nest (Upstream) 12/19/2004

Eagles Nest (Upstream) 12/19/04

Pictures: http://cavediver.net/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=761

The dive trip started out with the normal e-mail planning. A decision was made to go upstream to check out an area around the Super Room. TJ and Mike decided to dive with 10/50, 31 and oxygen. The time to meet was going to be decided when Mike returned from his job of flying around the country. A couple of days before Mike returned, Mike mentioned he was getting a cold, but he was able to ward it off. We got an e-mail message from Mike the night before the dive, which stated the cold had gotten worse and he had to bail out on the dive. So it just left TJ and me.

A decision was made to leave Orlando in separate vehicles at 6 AM on Sunday morning and we were going to meet at the Nest. The plan was to touch base a couple of times, beginning just before I left, so we would arrive at the Nest at about the same time. I called TJ at 6 AM to let him know I was ready to head out. I then checked with him when I was around Brooksville and he was running about 10 minutes behind me. I passed the Iron Ranger at about 8 AM and I saw lots of trucks from the hunters, who were already in the woods, on the way to the Nest.

The roads were rather dry and dusty. I was driving a little slower off-road to help try to preserve my front end alignment. The roads to the Nest were a little smoother today, since I replaced all my tires, because they were cupping on the outer edges due to alignment problems. It took about 30 minutes to get to the Nest and TJ was behind me just before I arrived. He mentioned something about gliding down the dirt roads. I guess this has something to do with all the roads he takes up in North Florida.

We were the first ones to arrive at the Nest and we took some pictures as we got our gear ready for the dive. It was really neat to see the mist rising off of the pond. The morning started out in the 40s and it was only going to warm-up to the 60s. TJ set his two deco bottles (10/50 and oxygen) down by the water. He was diving sidemount with 10/50 for his primary gas. He was taking pictures with a DC-310 Pro Set.

I set four bottles down by the water. Three were for bailout (15/40, 31 and oxygen) and one was filled with air for my dry suit. I was diving a closed circuit rebreather (Inspiration with all the electronics and the scrubber head replaced with a Hammerhead). The rebreather had a 20 cubic cylinder with oxygen and a 20 cubic cylinder with 14/43 trimix (diluent). My cameras consisted of a Canon EOS Digital Rebel for the land photos and a DC-310 Pro Set, with a 24 mm lens, for the underwater pictures.

TJ took the lead position for this dive. Our dive plan called for a 25 – 30 minute bottom time. We were going to swim until we reached the turn time or thirds. We entered the water and dropped our oxygen at 30’, on the line, by the log. The visibility in the pond was clear and the water temperature was in the mid 70s. We entered the chimney at about 30’ and headed down. The chimney is a tube which is about 10’ in diameter. We entered the Ball Room at about 70’ and followed the line to the top of the silt mound in about 130’ of water. The visibility was around 30’ - 40’. We left out 31% bottles at the bottom of the silt mound, at 3 minutes into the dive, and we headed for the upstream cave.

Our descent continued and we went under the ledge and into the cave at a depth of about 200’. TJ was swimming close to the line and I stayed above him, and a little behind, to avoid deco. The visibility in the cave was about 30’ – 40’. We kept following the line. The cave tunnel is fairly wide and we could see both sides. The walls are light in color.

TJ turned the dive at about 16 minutes due to time. We were around 600’ in when we turned. His maximum depth was 277’. On the way out he went off to the other side of the room and we could see each other across the wide room. It was easier to see how good the visibility was here, because of the separation, and we both thought it was 60’. He was checking out the breakdown, which consisted of large boulders. These aren’t the size of the DiPolder boulders, but they are still fairly large.

My VR3 gave me my first 2 minute deep stop at a depth of about 200’. TJ passed me a little, while I was doing my stop. I then continued a little more before I had my next 2 minute deep stop in about 187’. My next stop was in about 140’ of water. I was able to reach and attach my 31% stage bottle during this deep stop. We then continued our stops as we headed up the line. We saw the second team in the Ball Room, while we were doing our deco. One person had two Gavin’s and the other had one Gavin. Their dive plan was to check out the Lockwood Tunnel.

We continued up the line and I got my camera out to help pass the deco time. My maximum depth on this dive was 262’. I let TJ stay ahead of me on the line, so I could take advantage of some of the natural light, with the cave background and also it was easier to eliminate a lot of the bubbles he kept blowing into the water. This was my third dive with my underwater camera and I got a lot of pointers from Norm, Ray, Mike, Andrew, Ethan and TJ on how to improve my pictures. They provided some excellent advice and I was trying some experiments to see how I could improve my pictures.

Also, I want to thank Norm for turning me onto the MaHa Powerex batteries and chargers. They are excellent and provided all the power I needed. I ran out of clear water, before I ran out of battery power. I eliminated the pointer light on this dive. The color spectrum was the same as the flash and it produced hot spots in my pictures and red blobs of color with the 24 mm lens (thanks to Mike for these tips). The pointer light worked fine with film in my Nikonos V with a SB105 strobe.

I was working on the angle of the strobe, with respect to the lens (to get them out of the same plane), to eliminate some of the back scatter. The wide angle lens was also used to help eliminate additional back scatter (pointers from Ray, Ethan, Norm, TJ and Andrew). Another pointer that I was given, to eliminate backscatter, was to turn off the flash in the shallow water and to use the natural light. This tip produce very dark pictures, which required more digital software editing and I wound up junking almost all of them.

My experiment was to run some pictures with different lenses, but most of these were in the shallower water, which by now had lots of particulate. On subsequent dives, I plan to work on the internal flash setting of the camera to eliminate some hot spots on some of the pictures. I was able to edit most of them out, after the fact, using Photoshop Elements. Underwater cameras all have their own unique personalities and it takes constant work in order to get better pictures.

I took lots of pictures as we went through the chimney. It provided an excellent contrasting background and we had lots of deco time to take pictures. When we got out of the chimney the visibility had really decreased in the pond. I think some of it was due to percolation, but some of it was also due to the muck on the bottom of the pond. I turned off the strobe and took more pictures.

TJ left and went somewhere during the 20’ stop, so I was checking out some of the fish and other life around the bottom of the pond. I saw some Bluegill swimming around, like the picture which I took from the steps looking into the water. I took a couple of pictures without the external flash, but these photos turned out dark.

After a little while I noticed a little fish, which looked like a miniature lizard fish, on a rock in front of me. Shortly, another one appeared, and then their was about 5 of them on the same rock, which I had my hand on. They approached my hand to check it out and then they sat there checking me out. It was neat to see these small fish, which most people probably never see.

I increased my PO2 to about 1.5 from 60’ on up to the surface. This was accomplished by blowing out the trimix and adding more oxygen into my counter lungs. I cleared my decompression at 100 minutes into the dive. I checked with TJ and he had 32 more minutes of deco on his NiTek He. I stayed with him until his computer cleared. At about 132 minutes into the dive he gave me the thumbs up and we exited. I used a total of 2.5 cubic feet of air for my drysuit, 11.75 cubic feet of 14/43 trimix (which included wing inflation) and 9 cubic feet of oxygen.

After we exited the water three more vehicles showed up and it was nice to meet some more cave divers. They were talking about the new VR3 color software upgrade, the new Advanced Diver Magazine, the Cave Diver's Forum and Eagles Nest. We packed our gear, took a couple more pictures and headed to a Chinese Restaurant for lunch.

Cave Condition Report:
Eagles Nest – Chassahowitzka 12/19/2004
Dive Status: Low flow and an average of 30’ of visibility
Current Conditions: Basin had clear water and the cave had 30’ of visibility in most spots, with the visibility improving to 60’ around the Super Room.
Date of Observation: 12/19/2004
Time of Observation: 10:37 AM

Dive Information:
Goal: To explore an area around the Super Room and to take pictures.
Bottom Time: 25 minutes
Runtime: 136 minutes
Maximum Depth: 262’
Average Depth: 68’