40 replies to this topic

[BabyDuck]

yep. blown out.

i was so excited to get in dive 50. my instructor emailed me today & said he didn't get to 50 for 2 years, so i guess i must be an addict. (hi, i'm marci & i'm a dive addict...)

friday going to the seafood festival and drinking some would have included more drinking if i'd known sat would be off, too. dammit, i was sober! waaah! still, it was a really fun time.

it was so nice meeting everyone, at least. i'll get to see dan again in feb, and i got to see michael when he gave me the stuff i left at the hotel - thanks Kamala and michael for that! everyone else - i'd love to try diving with you some other time. i'd love to go if anybody's cruising through the area anytime soon.

i also must say that kamala had lots of interesting stuff to do or you could kick back and do lots of not very much ie relax. but i wanted to go diving...<pout>

dinner with mama sat night was awfully good. she had steak & baked sweet potatoes & carrots & lima beans & nut cake. remember, y'all had been invited...

[BradfordNC]

the trip was realy cancelled because i couldn't make it, and no one wanted to dive without me

[Diverbrian]

The trip was not cancelled, just the diving. Actually, I am very disappointed that I did not get to dive. I came down with two sets of doubles, stages and in general "loaded for grizzly bear". In that parlance, I never even got to step in the woods to take a shot.

It was 1003 miles down there and 1033 back for roughly two days on the road.

Having said all of that:

I had a great time and will do the trip again next year (guaranteed) when hopefully I have a chance to dive. I met several new people and enjoyed my time down there. The dinner and birthday cake on Saturday night was terrific. The group discovered things to do when blown out or to take bubble watchers on the trip while we go diving.

It is simply too bad that the weather off shore would not cooperate with us, but that couldn't be helped. I won't name names, because all of you made the trip worth it. I hope to meet with all of you again. BTW, I do have photos, but I won't post them without the permission of the group.

Thanks everyone. I still took some terrific memories home with me!

[BradfordNC]

The trip was not cancelled, just the diving.

Brian,

my mistake. lol.
but seeing as how i live there, the boat ride out to the dive site is the trip for me. so to me when the dives get cancelled, the trip is cancelled.


realy sucks that you drove all that way and didn't get to dive.

seeing as how your used to cold water diving, come on down in December or January, the seas are usually a bit more favorable.

went out the end of this past Jan, and it the sea was as flat as a pond, and even got to see a whale on the way to the dive site.

[Diverbrian]

The trip was not cancelled, just the diving.

Brian,

my mistake. lol.
but seeing as how i live there, the boat ride out to the dive site is the trip for me. so to me when the dives get cancelled, the trip is cancelled.


realy sucks that you drove all that way and didn't get to dive.

seeing as how your used to cold water diving, come on down in December or January, the seas are usually a bit more favorable.

went out the end of this past Jan, and it the sea was as flat as a pond, and even got to see a whale on the way to the dive site.

It's all right. I get blown off here in the Great Lakes too. This is just the first time that I have had all of that time invested.

I'll keep what you said in mind. This would have been my first salt water in two years and Kamala (and others like you) have spent about a year coaxing me to give the diving down there a try in spite of the risk of the blow-outs. I'll keep in touch.

I had a talk with a couple of of the Northern Virginia divers and may be able to arrange a caravan or carpool from the Northern Virginia/ DC area which would cut my driving alone time down by about five or six hours each way.

I WILL dive at least one submarine down there before I am done. There are three to my knowledge, but getting boat rides out the U-701 and the Tarpon is a little more tricky than the U-352. I also left with some video to use in planning a long dive into the U-352. So, this was far from a waste.

[Latitude Adjustment]

Having seen the NOAA weather report I didn't think you would get any dives in but NC is always worth the shot. I didn't sign up for the SD trip because of a family picnic but I'm going to try for U-352 on the 22nd. or 23rd.

[Searanger]

Brian....I'm impressed you made it home already. You didn't leave until 1130am on Sunday morning. I guess you didn't sight see in Washington!!! We had Billy run us (Me, Kamala, Dan and Gene) over to Lookout Point (or whatever the island is called ...Neat to see wild horses) for a Beach afternoon picnic after you guys left. A disappointing diving weekend but at least we were in good company and overall salvaged the weekend. I was up at 430am again this morning (YUK!) The plane was a little early and was back in Toronto at 8am and sitting at my desk by 845am telling everyone the only sharks I saw were the land variety. It was great meeting everyone and look forward to diving with everyone in the near future.

Michael

Edited by Searanger, 03 October 2005 - 02:21 PM.

[Diverbrian]

Actually, I made a wrong turn onto I-295 after I dropped off Aeries at her car and wound up seeing more sides of Washington D.C. than I care to think about. I drove by the Washington Monument and the Pentagon and then downtown to 495 before I got back on track. I won't comment on the estimated profession of the ladies that I passed in the downtown area. I am just glad that I didn't break down there .

I watched poor Vinnie almost get sideswiped by a truck and trailer (I think that his heart is still beating, but I would have had to clean my shorts out.) on the way down.


I would have loved to stay with you guys, but seeing that the Sunday night traffic south of DC was slowed down, I don't care to think about what it would have been tonight.

Hope to try it again with close to the same gang!

[VADiver]

That damn truck driver was oblivious to everything around him. I should have paid the extra 12 dollars for the rental insurance and let him hit me, then I could have sued him and bought my scooter!

I hope we all can dive together sometime soon...and there is anotherU-boat off the coast of Block Island (NY) if thats closer to ya. It's cold and dark just like the Great Lakes...

Brad, when are you going to be on this side again?

[Ariesno1]

Actually, I made a wrong turn onto I-295 after I dropped off Aeries at her car and wound up seeing more sides of Washington D.C. than I care to think about.  I drove by the Washington Monument and the Pentagon and then downtown to 495 before I got back on track.  I won't comment on the estimated profession of the ladies that I passed in the downtown area.  I am just glad that I didn't break down there    .

I watched poor Vinnie almost get sideswiped by a truck and trailer (I think that his heart is still beating, but I would have had to clean my shorts out.) on the way down.


I would have loved to stay with you guys, but seeing that the Sunday night traffic south of DC was slowed down, I don't care to think about what it would have been tonight.

Hope to try it again with close to the same gang! 

Brian, sorry you did not make it back onto I 95 right away. It was a straight drive back from were you dropped me off.

Hmmm, remember, Vinnie was not the only one in his car. We would not be able to dive for a long time if that truck with trailer would have hit us. But thanks to Vinnie's fast reaction we did not get hit.

It was nice meeting all of you guys.

Doris

[Diverbrian]

That damn truck driver was oblivious to everything around him. I should have paid the extra 12 dollars for the rental insurance and let him hit me, then I could have sued him and bought my scooter!

I hope we all can dive together sometime soon...and there is anotherU-boat off the coast of Block Island (NY) if thats closer to ya. It's cold and dark just like the Great Lakes...

Brad, when are you going to be on this side again?

If I have to deal with salt in my gear, I would rather the water be warmer. The U-352 is great with me. Then, I don't need two layers of thermals in addition to dealing with salt water where I might or might not be able to see anything. If I am going to do cold and salt, we need to look at the Empress of Ireland .

That area has the worst of all worlds.... cold, low vis and corrosive environment.

The Great Lakes only has two out of the three . I believe that in the winter NC is still warmer than the Lakes, but the people that dive down there would know that better than I.

[VADiver]

Oh, and work sucked today...everyone kept asking about the trip and the U-boat. I had to explain to ten different people why the trip was blown out!

[Diverbrian]

Actually, I made a wrong turn onto I-295 after I dropped off Aeries at her car and wound up seeing more sides of Washington D.C. than I care to think about.  I drove by the Washington Monument and the Pentagon and then downtown to 495 before I got back on track.  I won't comment on the estimated profession of the ladies that I passed in the downtown area.  I am just glad that I didn't break down there    .

I watched poor Vinnie almost get sideswiped by a truck and trailer (I think that his heart is still beating, but I would have had to clean my shorts out.) on the way down.


I would have loved to stay with you guys, but seeing that the Sunday night traffic south of DC was slowed down, I don't care to think about what it would have been tonight.

Hope to try it again with close to the same gang! 

Brian, sorry you did not make it back onto I 95 right away. It was a straight drive back from were you dropped me off.

Hmmm, remember, Vinnie was not the only one in his car. We would not be able to dive for a long time if that truck with trailer would have hit us. But thanks to Vinnie's fast reaction we did not get hit.

It was nice meeting all of you guys.

Doris

I made it onto I-95 right away, but I turned towards DC later instead of taking it towards Baltimore which would have taken me to I-495. It was my fault, but I have never been to DC and had plenty of time. At least I can now say that I have seen the Washington monument .

Vinny did great on that incident. You would have been first in the line of fire if the trailer would have hit. That would have ruined everyone's day .

[BradfordNC]

I WILL dive at least one submarine down there before I am done. There are three to my knowledge, but getting boat rides out the U-701 and the Tarpon is a little more tricky than the U-352. I also left with some video to use in planning a long dive into the U-352.

ya missed one.

U-352, U-701, Tarpon, U-87

it took me 7 years to finally dive on a sub in NC.

being a buddyless diver, ya can only get to the sites the group votes on. and seems like every time the boat was going to a sub, the trip was blown out.

my first dive on the U-352 was on one of Kamala's trips, before she started Singledivers.

[WreckWench]

Hey gang...this was the BEST non-diving dive trip I've ever been on!!!

We had a great group...could have only been better if BradfordNC was on it and well perhaps YOU...but that is another story.

The best part for me was the gear clinic that Trace put on for us. He pulled all kinds of gear from his car, set up class on the dock and started helping people learn the 'ins and outs' of harness style bc's, vest style, hose placement, long hose options and the like. Then we looked at various divers gear and made suggestions that the diver could accept immediately, or just consider for the future.

It seems after diving for 12 years I had a number of opportunities for uh...suggestions...and yes I took a number of them and will consider more as I need to replace gear.

I am truly happy that Trace, Howard and several others offered to help our divers and many of them commented on how much they learned from these guys.

As the trip wound down, the group went from 16 to 8 to 6 to 3. Each time we lost a round of divers it was very sad but the fun of exploring new parts of NC with new and old friends made for a great weekend...even if we didn't get to dive. By the end of the trip...Dan, Gene and I were pretty much inseparable and I can certainly say that they were a great way to end the "BEST NON-DIVING DIVE TRIP" I've ever been on!!

So it seems my 10 year run of luck had to statistically catch up sometime to the normal blowout stats for NC Diving! However I've ALWAYS been so lucky and we checked...NC has not been blown out for over 16 years this same weekend in history. But again...that is why they call it the law of averages!

But now I'm good for another 10+ year stretch!