Originally Posted by Wizard
They took their bright yellow and fluorescent green fins off because they thought it would make them look silly and the tech divers would spot them immediately.
Of course it's stupidier than hell but funnier than hell too! LOFLMAO. Those guys are making it look easy too. Hahahahahaha!
I actually was at the tie-off log at the entrance when your team was exiting...
I had just exited from working with my reel in the cavern, and was hanging at the entrance waiting for my brother and his team to exit from their penetration through the eye... when these two came 'crabbing' past me. It appeared to be a middle-aged father and his +- 15 year old daughter... she was doing a pretty good crab imitation scooting along the bottom, while he looked more like "scooby-doo" trying to dog-paddle his way in. Neither of them had fins!! WEIGHT BELTS STRAPPED ON, but no fins... She didn't want to enter, but he pulled out his slate (which you can see in the pic) and wrote her a rather lengthy note, and obviously talked her in to it, because they both then crawled past me, over the ledge, underneath the sign and into the cavern down to the start of the 'temporary' permanent line. I had my HID pointed down toward the constriction as they passed me (waiting from my brothers team to exit), and I put my light up on the stop sign. They glanced at the sign and crawled feet first down the rock face into the cavern. At that point, I began to pull my light out and away from the cavern to darken it and 'encourage' them to back out.
At that point your team turned the corner and started moving up through the cavern, so I backed away from the entrance and suspended up about five feet off the floor, as you exited and finished deco below me. The two were crawling around as you guys moved through, went back down into the cavern as all of you exited, and I think we were all surprised to see them exit finally... as they began dog-paddling again through the middle of your team trying to ascend.
It was absolutely entertaining watching them trying to swim, but was also absolutely nauseating watching this guy not only put his daughter in such a ridiculously dangerous, deadly situation, but that he actually worked at it to talk her in to it, and she unfortunately followed him in. What if this bonehead had led her down and it turned out to be a siphon...
You guys happen to get a glance of the manatees??? What a day...
Ted
We didn't. They weren't around when we went in through the Ear, or if they were we couldn't see them. As we were packing up, I heard someone yell that there were two manatees down there, but I was packing up the camera which is a chore, and so I didn't bother to walk over. I figured with all the tubers, they would not have ventured too close to the run.
I saw one while I was coming out of the Eye Friday night. Probably 9 pm or so.
The shoals are there still, the winds howl loud, the rain beats down, the waves burst strong. Some night, in the chill darkness, someone will make a mistake: The sea will show him no mercy. John T. Cunningham
I've also noticed some rather interesting, albeit alternative, methods of propulsion used by OW divers in north Florida springs. For example, last July, while doing a drysuit leak check in Troy, I noticed 3 divers proceed single file towards the deepest part of the basin. Only one was wearing fins. One was hovering cross-legged ('indian-style') in a sitting position and swam by sculling his hands. Perhaps he's a zen diver and was meditating? The other appeared to be carrying a large rock and simply walked up-right, like a hard-hat diver, along the bottom. Since he was bare-footed, he proceeded gingerly, carefully placing each step. An obvious tenderfoot who has yet to master the skill? They stayed less than 10 mins, but blew the vis such that we called the dive.
BTW, I didn't find any leaks in my suit, though I now make sure my wetsuit diving buddy understands that my zipper needs to be COMPLETELY closed...
Dave
You know, looking at those pictures, I began to wonder if it was really manatees that Mike saw a while back....
Andrew Ainslie
Almost extinct cave diver
ah, the indian style....that's freakin hilarious.
i live 15 minutes from a "cave" called blue springs in orange city, fl. i say "cave" because its just a tube that ends at 120', but i love when the OW divers follow me past the sign at 60' they know they aren't suppose to pass to around 80-100 feet, and i just cup my HID...PITCH BLACK. they freak out and dart back to there ledge at 60'....good stuff
Give those guys a break! The first "official" way to dive in a cave was finless. About the first 10 years of cave diving was done finless, and "well weighted for bottom walking" (from the CDG manual). They didn't start using fins until after WW2, about the same time they started using demand regulators. They had the U.S. beat by nearly 20 years.
They actually did.... they were coming in 30 or 40 feet past the Ear, just short of the steps in front of the Eye and doing a U turn. They were getting pretty severly mauled by the kids swimming down and poking/pulling on them, but they pretty much ignored them and were like 700 lb Shop-Vacs sucking up the grass.
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I gotta get me one of those big 'ol rocks....
It always happens! My worst experience there was as an OW diver about a year ago when 4 OW divers took lights down to the bottom and knelt on the bottom after killing their lights and see who would leave first...ah, the indian style....that's freakin hilarious.
i live 15 minutes from a "cave" called blue springs in orange city, fl. i say "cave" because its just a tube that ends at 120', but i love when the OW divers follow me past the sign at 60' they know they aren't suppose to pass to around 80-100 feet, and i just cup my HID...PITCH BLACK. they freak out and dart back to there ledge at 60'....good stuff
Men of Principle since 1839.
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