Todays Dive: Or Lack There Of

Today we got up early and went out to Onna Point for a dive with friends. First off to get to Onna Point requires quite a bit of 'off roading' and needless to say the March would not have made it. But our friends SUV's did just fine.

So once we got to the site we saw that the dive site was pretty rough but as several of us are becoming experienced divers we felt confidant we could get into the water and be fine. So we geared up and headed down to the beach.

On the reef walk out Gleason got stabbed in the arch of the foot by a sea urchin. So I stayed behind with him to make sure his foot was okay while everyone else went out for Dive 1. But no sooner did we reach the truck in which we intended to put cold water on his swelling foot do we realize they are all diving with they keys to the trucks in their pockets.

So back down to the beach again to put his foot in sea water. Once we get down to the bottom we find that his foot is okay, okay enough to dive on any way. So we gear up again and start heading out. We get up to my chest in the water and I saw I have to put my fins on because its getting to deep fro me to reach the bottom with the incoming waves.

So I let the strong current take me a bit and start getting my fins on. So does Matt. Then he lets go of one of his fins for just a moment, and it sails on past at the speed of sound. Not sure if he is used to letting his fins go next to him to float for a sec to put them on or if the current snatched it from him but it was gone.

So then Matt and I spend quite a bit of time looking for his fin with snorkel gear getting smashed around in the waves and dragged with the current. Unfortuntaly the fin was just gone. The tide was coming in and so it should have gone towards shore, but we just couldn't see it.

At this time MSgt Lewis and his wife are heading in because the water was too rough for her too. Though as the most inexperienced diver she handled everything like a pro. I was surprised because she is nervous about diving as is, and we took her out in water that was definitely on the side of hazardous.

So as we start to look for Matts fin on high ground we see Mix, Bartells and Jason bob to the surface and start to come in. Or try to. Somehow Jason and Bartells get caught in an eddy and can't seem to get out. (I am watching all this from the shore so I will give my impressions, read Jason's blog for his).

So I see Bartells looks to be showing the signs of a stressed diver, Jason is making head way getting in but Bartells is just getting father out. Jason turns around and goes back to Bartells and gets Bartells out and onto the reff, just when they both look like they have made it, off Jason goes with the current.

Now Jason is showing signs of being a stressed diver. I curse him out from shore for not using his reg and instead he sticks to his snorkel. Later I found out he was too stressed about loosing all his air and didn't want to find himself in a worse situation with out air. Jason is still not moving and Bartells has made it to shore.

So we head off to Get MSgt Lewis who has finished his rescue diver class to see if he can go help him. While we try to get Rich, Mix heads out to help Jason. Some how (I was not there for it) Jason and Mix get to shore just as we stop Rick from getting in the water to get him. Turns out like a good diver when Jason was stuck he calmed himself and stopped struggling for a bit to catch his breath and assess what was going on.

With everyone on shore we jokingly say 'Did you see Matts Fin' and they all say 'es' so Myself, Matt and Rich all head out to the shore to look for the fin. We can't find Matts but we do find a grey fin, a rather nice one at that. So we bring it back in and find out it was Mix's fin that he had lost trying to get out of the water up the rocks.

So once everyone was up and safe we all cooled off for a bit and gave out condolences to Matt for the loss of his fin (a rental). But I was rip roaring to dive, as I had still not been in deeper than my chest. Everyone else was still up for another dive with their other tank, just not here at Onna where things were getting worse.

So we headed to Maeda which is close by. Apparently everyone else and their mother went to Maeda today to dive too. So much so that the parking lot was full and had a long line to get in. We have been warned by friends that parking in the sugar can fields with a Y on your plate is a bad idea. Its a guaranteed ticket and at $150 a ticket... yeah.

Knowing how crowded Maeda is we assume if the sea wall is diveable, it too will be packed. So in a last ditch effort we head to devil's Cove to try to get in there. Way to rough to get in at the Cove side and the reef walk on the beach side is not only long but also very wavy, choppy and unpleasant.

So its home again home again, with no dive for me and like a 20 minute dive for Jason. We had planned to try to dive again this afternoon/evening but after napping hard core I am still dehydrated (driving around and walking in the sun all day) and a bit 'wiggly' after fighting the current so long looking for Matts mask.

But my new Dive logs did come in, so I am playing a bit with those. I am transferring all of my Okinawa Dives to the new dive logs and I hacked up my crappy PADI one to put in my old pages in place in the new binder. This way I can more easily analyze the Okinawa Dives and reference them.

Hopefully we can squeeze in an early dive tomorrow before Jason's 'no fly' time. What a crap shoot today, but I guess it was honestly a good experience at the same time. Good practice with bad conditions and the like. Well, except Matts fin, that is now awaiting some lucky diver to find it. That, thats just a crap shoot.