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| Courtesy of Ginnie Springs Outdoors |
Thursday, July 22nd Went in through the Ear this time, Eileen led. I took it slowly to be kinder to my poor ears. We regrouped on the little shelf near the Grim Reaper sign then proceeded into the cave. Eileen tied off at Park Bench and we proceeded down the tunnel to the Bone Room. At the dogleg in the Bone Room, Eileen tied off and we swam down to the White Room. I can see why it got its name; the silt/sand on the floor is very white and there is a little breakdown pile of while rocks in the middle of the room. It’s just a big round domed dead end, but it was very cool because it was the first time I've been in it. I must have been pretty relaxed on this dive because Eileen turned the dive before I hit my 1/3 limit. She was setting a brisk pace going in and at one point I signaled for her to slow up a bit and let me catch up.
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| Route to White Room. Map by Steve Berman (1998) |
At the Key Hole on the way in she waited for me while I swam around to the right; the path that is easier on my poor ears. There were other divers going through the Key Hole and I just waited to let them pass and watched for Eileen to come through and resume the lead.
On the way back I paused after the Key Hole, looking for Lips swim under passage. I signaled to Eileen that I wanted to go under the Lips and she OK'd the entrance. "Are you sure?", I thought as I proceeded cautiously into the hole. I knew it was only about 4 - 5 feet of tunnel, so I started looking right as I swam through and, sure enough, I spotted our landmark -- the 5lb weights hanging from the gold line. Cool!
We opted to exit via Devil's Eye. There were several guidelines running into it and a few divers making their way into the cave. Exiting divers always have the right-of-way, so I proceeded out and tried not to get tangled up in their guidelines. As soon as I could see by the ambient light, I turned off and stowed my primary light and slowly worked my way up to the cave entrance, using one of the non-traditional routes. I got cold on this dive, probably because I didn't have a good enough breakfast. But it was a lovely dive!
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| Beyond this point there are no accidents, only deaths | |
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Dive #2. Went in through the Ear again. I led and we regrouped on the shelf near the Grim Reaper sign at the edge of the cavern zone. I think my air consumption is not as good when I'm leading. Maybe it's just the additional task of being the trail blazer that increases my respirations. I know I didn't do as well as I should have on this one. Again, the swim around at the Key Hole for me on account of my poor ears, and a nice run up the gold line to the Rollercoaster jump, noting the other jumps along the way (Park Bench, Hill 400, Expressway Tunnel). I hit my planned turn pressure at the Rollercoaster jump (actually I had miscalculated and my turn pressure should have been 2300). We did the Lips swim under again. For most of the way out I swam with my primary light shining straight up at the ceiling. I enjoyed watching Eileen's silhouette in the passage and me staying in the shadows.
What a lovely dive! And I was warm this time.
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| Route to Rollercoaster jump. Map by Steve Berman (1998). |
Gas (psi)
Start = 3400
Turn plan = 2400
Turn actual = 2400
End = 1800
Depth
Turn = 92 ft
Time
Turn = 22 minutes
End = 46 minutes
Friday, July 23rd
Dive #1. Great dive to Maple Leaf. Eileen led in through the Ear. I was calm and relaxed on this dive and even took the opportunity to look around more, something I don't do much of on the penetration phase of the dive. I'm usually so focused on just getting as far as I can before I have to turn the dive. It only took about 200 psi to go from Rollercoaster to Maple Leaf and I was still 100 psi from my planned turn pressure when we hit Maple Leaf. It is odd to think that we were three football field lengths from the cave entrance. If there was an emergency, we'd have to swim more than 900 feet before we could get to a place where we could surface. This is why cave divers carry in loads of redundant gear and why we get so much specialized training. I appreciate even more my training and my great dive buddy, Eileen. This was my first time getting this far up the gold line!
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| Route to MapleLeaf. Map by Steve Berman (1998). |
Again, I swam around the Key Hole on the way in and on the way back we did the Lips swim under. I think this is quickly becoming a standard part of every dive plan now. It's heaps of fun and helps make the dive even more interesting than it already is.
A wonderful dive. This system is so beautiful!
Gas (psi)
Start = 3500
Turn plan = 2400
Turn actual = 2500
End = 1800??
Time @ turn = 22 (22 minutes to swim/pull/glide 900 feet!)
Depth @ turn = 90ft
Dive #2. My first big dive in sidemount. We did the Ginnie Ballroom cavern and spent a lot of time going through a nice little restriction off to the left of the main guideline. I was so frustrated at first because I could not get the tanks attached to the rails and my submersible pressure gauges (SPGs) were sticking out in either side like a couple of insect antennae. But I did manage, even though I was listing slightly the entire dive (I later discovered it was because the bungee on one side of the wing was not properly connected). I felt much better about the rig than I thought I would feel. And I'll feel a whole lot better once I make a few modifications.
Saw quite a few fresh water eels swimming around inside the cavern. Very cool.
Friday, July 24th
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| Route to ParkBench. Map by Steve Berman (1998) |
Dive #1. Wow! What a difference "just going for it" makes! My first cave dive in sidemount! I was a little nervous because there is no one set right way of doing things with sidemount -- unlike with backmount. So the apprehension about the unknown was causing me some discomfort. But Eileen was very positive and wouldn't let me get discouraged. At first I only wanted to go in the Eye and down to the Grim Reaper sign, but if I felt OK then I would go into the Gallery. If okay at the Gallery, I would go through the Lips, etc. The Park Bench was as far as we were going to take this dive, regardless.
I led in and felt really good at the Grim Reaper, then spider-crawled sideways through the Gallery and discovered it was much easier than the traditional way we pull and glide wearing backmount. We got to the Lips and I checked my pressure, switched regs, and signaled OK to Eileen and let's proceed. I'm sure she was grinning so much her mask was flooding.
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| The Lips is two bedding planes we swim between. |
On to the Lips! We encountered a cave class between the Lips and Keyhole and watched them for a while before moving on around them. I did my little swim around the Keyhole, as usual, and waited for Eileen on the other side of the Keyhole. No problem there, so onward to the Park Bench. At this point I was still well before my planned turn pressure of 2400, but thumbed the dive because we had achieved our objective. After enthusiastic "high fives" we turned and headed back.
This time Eileen took the Lips swim around and I waited on the cave-side gold line for her to signal she'd picked up the gold line on the exit side. I could see the lights through the Keyhole from the cave class still going strong in that area, but no direct light from Eileen. So I proceeded up through the Keyhole and started looking for another sidemount diver amongst the half dozen or so divers in the vicinity. She was close by the Keyhole switching her necklace from one reg to another and looking for me to come up through the Keyhole swim around.
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| Park Bench formation. First marked jump. |
We regrouped and resumed our places on the gold line, watching the cave class for a few more minutes until they cleared off, then we took our, now standard, Lips swim under route. Going through the rest of the Lips I deliberately chose the places with the lower ceiling -- places where I didn't think I could get through in backmount. It was very pleasant to get through so easily in sidemount.
Configurations that worked well:
1. Light canister mounted below butt plate under crotch strap with quick links. I didn't even notice the canister the entire dive! This is the Jill Heinerth method. Very comfortable.
2. SPGs on inside HP port. Very easy to read and not in the way.
3. Swivel on short hose second stage.
4. Run light cord under waistband and chest strap. Decreases the likelihood of getting caught on something.
5. Wide bands on tanks. Did a good job keeping excess hose length under control. Easy to re-stow the hose after I’d pull it out.
6. Using yellow reg and hose for left tank. Longer hose helpful as opposed to the short hose I use when rigged for backmount.
7. REMs and arrows on top right shoulder D-ring.
8. Not using small yellow LED light on LP inflator hose.
9. Instead of cave line to tie on bolt snaps, use small zip tie and tank valve O-ring. Much faster and you don't have to burn your fingers melting the ends of the cave line. Can be easily pulled off in case of an entanglement. No need to whip out the Z-knife. Yet it's very secure and sturdy.
Configurations that still need some work:
1. Longer lanyard on rail clip. I'm still having too much trouble clipping the tanks to the rails.
2. Shorter necklace so I can reach the reg just by bending my head down and grabbing the mouthpiece with my mouth.
3. Shorter long hose. 5' instead of 7’ ought to do it.
4. For reel attachment point: Move butt D-ring down on butt plate to just above cross over strap. I could reach them where the D-ring was on this dive, but it was not as easy as it should be.
5. Orient tank harness so hand wheels are pointing outward, instead of inward.
6. Get shock cord keepers for backup lights (remove epaulets?) on each shoulder.
7. Get smaller/more streamlined backup lights. Other cave divers were making fun of my bulky UK lights.
8. Z-knife on computer wrist strap or more securely on chest strap.
9. Adjust cam straps so velcro is facing away from me. My leg kept rubbing up against strap and the velcro would stick to my wetsuit instead of the cam strap.
An excellent confidence-building first sidemount cave dive. I do believe I'm going to really like sidemounting a lot more than backmounting.
I forgot to set the Vyper to EAN32. It was reading air. The Aladin computer was set to the correct gas (EAN32) and did not show a deco obligation. So I incurred an unearned 10 minutes of decompression by the time we got to our safety stop. Oops. So we waited and I spent part of the extra time practicing my spider crawling along the sides of the walls. I wouldn't have bothered to satisfy the deco if this had been the last dive of the trip. But we are making one more this evening, and I didn't want to lock out my only backup computer because I'd blown a deco stop.
Dive #2. Back into the backmount rig for one last dive of the trip. The dive plan was to explore the Catacombs and try to find route that links the exit side (nearest the cave entrance) to the cave side gold line in the Gallery. There are no permanent lines in the Catacombs and we had only a general idea of where we were going. It was quite exhilarating as we felt like cave explorers diving a virgin system.
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| Route through Catacombs. Map by Steve Berman (1998) |
Eileen led in the Eye because she has the Salvo reel with 300' of line, just in case this ended up being a really involved labyrinth. She got a bit stalled in a silty restriction, but like a bloodhound on the trail of a rabbit, she picked up the scent and after paying out about 150' of line, found the gold line and tied off. She didn't even have to backtrack once! What amazing navigation! After some dancing around and high fives, we continued through the Gallery deeper into the cave for just a bit so Eileen could fix the Catacombs Gallery exit. There are three. We emerged onto the gold line into the Gallery from the first exit (nearest the cave exit, but still in the Gallery).Our route through the Catacombs is the line between the two red dots.
We turned the dive at the Lips and switched positions when we got back to her Salvo reel so I could reel up and she could sight see ahead of me on the way back through the Catacombs. This place just begs for more exploration and I can't wait to return and oblige. There are many more twisty-turny passages than shown on this map. This is also an easy sidemount dive. The Catacombs are really very beautiful. Small and potentially very silty for the careless diver, but very interesting to explore.
I am looking forward to feeling as comfortable and natural in sidemount as I do now in backmount.
Next cave dive trip is Mexico in September!
