so we are officially certified. we went into the shop on thurs about the 17th and finished filling out papers et al. we can now legaly rent air. yay! while we were at the shop we saw art who was picking up gear for his weekend dive. it was kind of sad he wasn't able to join us on our boat dives, but he had this trip planned for a while. he was going to palau in november and after i was all healed from surgery and ready to go in he was going to join us on a few dives up in edmonds. some of you may have picked up my switch in tense to past. yes, it was a sad weekend. we found out monday night after rehearsal. art had died on his diving trip on saturday afternoon.
here's a copy of an email after matt spoke with another trombone person who also dives.
- - -
seems matt and i are of the few who actually knew art was wreck diving off nanaimo last weekend. the 3 of us saw each other at the dive shop last thurs while we were doing paperwork he was picking up gear. we had hoped he'd be able to go on the boat dive with us last sunday, but he had already committed to the bc trip. art was not a novice diver - he knew what he was doing, and the shop is really good about preaching 'check your gear', 'safety' and all the things that can cause you major problems if you don't do something even 1 time. they were diving a wreck that sits about 100ft below the surface. although we do not know how deep art was when he started his ascent. was he at 100ft or shallower? we'll have to wait for the computer in to his gear to find out. dave, who matt spoke with today, was on the dive with art. dave had already surfaced (not sure if he was already on the boat or not) when art surfaced and gave the signal 'hey, come get me now i'm in trouble!' to the boat.
on his way to the surface they know he missed his safety stop. - when diving below 20ft you ascend no faster than 30ft/minute to prevent decompression sickness. you *also* stop at 15ft depth for no less than 3 mins. we do not know how fast he surfaced - a 'rapid ascent' or a 'safe ascent', only that he knew he was in enough trouble he had to risk missing the 3min safety stop. actually a safe ascent implies the safety stop. but did he just ditch hs weights and surface (CESA) or did he just propell himself upwards with no safety stop? as the boat was headed over to get him they yelled to him to get his regulator into his mouth (air source) which he did. by the time the boat reached him and they pulled him aboard he was unconscious. but the regulator was in his mouth and there was no water that they could detect in his lungs. they started cpr but he never revived consciousness, and was pronounced dead at the hospital. we can probably rule out:1. ran out of air. 1-he would be with a buddy and could've done a safe ascent with buddy and 2-he would've been keeping an eye on his air reserves and knows when to start surfacing based on the readings.2. an equipment malfunction. 1-he would've been with a buddy...same answer as above3. a total 'rookie move' or lack of judgment on something he tried to do while diving. those who knew art know while he had a wonderful passion for adventurem he loved life and wouldn't risk his life on a stupid decision if there was a safe way of doing it. what makes sense - but of course we have to wait for autopsy to confirm:he didn't die immediately, and his airways were clear.
he needed to surface and get attention immediately. so up he goes, skipping his safety stop. any serious issues he may have received or caused to his self due to the ascent would be secondary to the main COD which is what made him surface in the 1st place.he probably had a heart attack, or some other physical 'badness' that freaked him out enough (ok who wouldn't be freaked out by a heart attack, especially 100ft down in the ocean?). or he could've suffered from a brain anurism which burst - he'd have had a momentary bit of confusion or some weirdness as the brain bled and put pressure between the brain and skull which could've been what got him to surface, and would also cause his comatose state before death.
either way, it hit hard. maybe in part because we had just seen him. maybe in part becuase we had plans in the near future. maybe in part becuase no one expected this to happen.
when i stopped by the shop the following friday to return the wrist seals isaac was there. he said he wanted to tell me but he couldn't. partly becuase store policy - you don't want to advertise that one of your clients died with your gear. i can understand that. i know he knew on monday when i had stopped into the store and returned the tanks and dipped the gear. maybe he knew on sunday before we even went out. maybe that's why he tried so hard to keep me from surfacing during our 1st dive.
so let's get onto happier topics. our boat dive.
we had to be in tacoma by 8.30am adn hve all our gear ready to load aboard. so that wasn't really so bad. it turned out to be a pretty nice day! we get there and find that dave, who was on our edmonds dive trip was with us adn isaac, and that 2 others had joined the group for the day. they have a lot more experience with diving but said htey'd tag along with us as they were unfamiliar with these waters. isaac had requested calm waters, so we learned after that meant a tradeoff for seeing life. meaning mostly likely no octopus or wolf eels. oh well. as it turns out it was a good call as i was still having a few bouyancy issues.
we travel north of tacoma about an hour to KVI Towers (or something like that) for our 1st dive. the dive master was great. she and the captain helped everyone on with their rigs and weights, helped us onto the boat's dive platform, and after the dives we'd line up 1 by 1 stick up our feet and she'd grab adn remove our fins. we thought we might have to have me remove my rig in the waer and hand it up since i had yet to climb a ladder in full weight. and n one would've been surprised seeing as i had so much trouble just walking with the stuff on teh beaches!
anyway, i need to back up.
we get to the dive site and take our turns doing the 'giant stride' entrance. i get in fine - jaquie (dive master) and captain george (i think) were informed this was matt and my 1st boat dive ever. the plan was to sink to about 60ft and swim around. i started down just fine. slowly at first it seemed like the surface wouldn't leave my sight. when i looked down i couldn't see anything. the water was pretty durn murky and it was kinda hard to see the others even! then all of a sudden there's the ocean floor. no problem with the ears or anything. when we looked at our computer we were at 60ft! wow that went fast! we swam around a little bit. saw a big orangy-red sea cucumber, lots of anemones, small fishies. no ling cod here though. crabs, flatfish, and lots of animals i couldn't begin to name. starfish, sea stars... you get the idea. anyway, we're swimming around, and i'm real happy - i'm actually 'floating' in teh water - almost able to 'hang' suspended at any point water - teh total idea behind neutral bouyancy! yay! isaac and matt saw so i know i wasn't imagining things. i look at my guage and i'm down to about 1/2 my air - already! man it went fast! i was really sucking it down. i knewi was breathing pretty quickly, and was trying to slow it down, but i wasn't having much luck with that at the time. anyway, i get isaac's attention and let him know my air, and we swim a little bit more, and then i start to feel it. i work (and i mean it was work) my way over and down to matt and try to signal that i'm about to float. a few more breaths of air and i start to float up. isaac's managed to come over and is trying to find otu what's happening - which didn't take long becuase for some reason matt and i dropped hands and up i start... isaac grabbed at my fin and held it a little, but there was no way around it. i was now 'bob'. up i went. the last depth i checked on my computer said 40 something feet. isaac said he was abut 30 something when he dropped my fin so he thinks i was in the low 30ft depth. so not great to surface from there with no safety stop. and i didn't think i went up that fast, but isaac told me later that i did indeed go up at a pretty quick rate. big surprise - i was the 1st of our party to surface. jaquie (jacky?) was a little surprised to see me and asked if everythign was ok. i gave her the 'ok' signal and made my way towards the boat. i checked my guage and saw i was actually down to about 700psi so i would've been on my way to the surface in 2 mintues or less anyway since i have to include that 3 minute safety stop. before i was on the boat matt surfaced. within 5 minutes everyone else was up too so while i was really pissed at myself becuase of how i surfaced, and that the rest didn't continue without me - which turned out to be moot after looking at the air reserves. but i was still pissed about becoming bob. after getting rid of my fins i work my way over to the ladder. i wanted to try and climb out before just ditching everything in the water. adn you know what, i did it! they had me sit on teh platform to remove my rig since it was so weighted down, so i took a little longer than the otehrs to get back aboard, but oh well.
as soon as we get out of our rigs and everythign's secured, captain heads the boat north again. during this run we ate our lunch - hot chicken noodle soup, that pilsbury pop the canister and make bread sticks stuff, as well as stuff for sandwiches. there was also hot tea, coffee, cocoa and cold water. the second dive site was across from west seattle not far off the coast of the next island over. called somethign like maury island barges. we anchored between a couple of pilings - called dolphins i've learned. although i don't quite get it. anyway, again i need to back up.
while we were having lunch everyone was great and trying to offer ideas on why i surface against my will. it took me a while to calm down and get over being upset. along the way jacky took isaac over and wondered if my BC was really expelling all the air - it was bunched up real tight near the bottom by bungies - maybe i'd start upwards, and when i get to that specific depth teh few bubbles of air trapped would expand just enough that i couldn't control the force of bouyancy and up i'd go. so he moved the bungies on both matt and my BC for the next dive.
we get to the next site and i'm the last in teh water. no problem. we start to descend, only i'm realizing i'm sinking way fast, and i can't keep up with my ears, i start to feel pressure, so i start to kick up to the surface. let's try that again. jacky wasstill at the side of the boat watchign us and made sure i was ok. i let her know yes, i was, i just needed tolearn teh correct compensation for hte bc now that i might actually be getting rid of all the air in it (as opposed to before where i thought i was getting all the air out becuase nothing else was comign out). so i tried again. i got about 15 ft down and while the rate was much better, my right ear wouldn't clear and i had troubles 'hanging' in place until i could clear it, so i started back up. we did this again. after that attempt jacky threw a line over the side of hte boat for me to use so i could hang onto that and not be struggling to go up or down while clearing my ears. by this time the others were about 30 feet out and 40 ft down. i knew theiry heading, and i startedmy descent. thisok me a bit to get to the ocean floor but i did it. i guess i was at about 48ft at the bottom of hte line. i had no light, and while i knew where i'd seen everyone last, if htey had moved a little bit, or if i was off just a little bit i'd miss them since the water was so murky. so i decided to stay close to teh boat and pilings. it was ok with me. i got to the bottom wich was important. without that i wouldn't have gotten the drysuit cert. anyway, on my way down when everyone else was already ahead of me, i saw a jellyfish. it was big and white and fluffy - not a moon jelly which are so common in aquariums, including ours here in seattle. it kind of looked like the one pictured on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_nettle but i'm not conviced that's it. no one else saw it. so that was kinda neat. i had my own little private moment. matt comes back over and gets my attention - he signalled he had to go up. i knew i had been down about 20 minutes and while i ws basically just 'hanging out' and actually not sucking down air too quicky, h is my buddy adn i could tell something was up, so i followed him to the surface, including the 3minute saftey stop. when we surface he tells me he was down to about 300psi. again i climbed aboard the boat 1st, and matt was close behind. while he was getting out of his gear the others shoed up and came over. talk about service, i was barely out of my rig when the cap'n shoved a staming hot mug of cocoa into my hands, and said the chocolate chip cookies were hot. boy did they hit the spot!
so i was thrilled with myself for my perserverence on teh 2nd dive, and while i was bummed to a point about not getting to swim around, i did the safe thing. overall it was a good day. when we got back to tacoma isaac, dave matt and i hit the pub for a brew and food.
*not totally conviced the sea nettle is what i saw, but i haven't found an img yet. maybe i'll see what the library has for 'field guides to teh pacific jellyfish' haha.
Monday, November 24, 2008
10/4/08 scuba
today we went out to alki in west seattle for a dive. simon had a group of people, brian was there with a group of people, and leif was there for vlad, matt and me. the goal was to figure out the bouyancy issues and then swim around a little bit and have fun.
knowing what i had last time was way too much, we started me out with 30# of weights (+3# of ankle weights). we paddled out to the bouy on our backs, and managed with help to get all the air out of my drysuit - which everyone agrees is really a little large for me, but the next size down has boots that are too small! i was able to descend with very little problems after that. so the main consensus is that with a larger suit i have extra fabric = no good, and i have more pockets for air to get trapped and keep me floating = no good. we get down fine, no issues with ears, and swim around for a little bit. about 25 minutes or so into the dive we're starting to work our way up the ocean floor (yeah, we're in a sound, but technically it's the pacific ocean) and i started to float. i stopped and exhaled big, but was still drifting up a little. so i try to reach over to dump air (i had put some into my suit to keep me warm) but was unable to reach easily, and the more i tried to reach and dump and squish the air out of the suit, the faster i started to ascend. after going about 1/2 way to the surface i just stopped, shrugged my shoulders and said 'ok, i'm going up so let's go up. don't fight it.' so up i go. leif, matt and vlad follow soon after. we discuss what might have happened, what i might have been able to do with it etc, then decide to go back down, swim underwater back to the bouy, and then climb the bouy line and paddle back to shore. well, i get about 10 feet down, my right ear wn't clear, and i get his real vertigo feeling. so back up i go, but it doesn't go away, so i chose to surface. after giving it a few mintues and the dizzyness passed i tried again. same thing! dam! so not wanting to fight that, and knowing that if i continue to have those problems and force myself to depth it could be bad, i decided to just give it up and paddle back to shore.
we took a little over an hours break and had a mocha, sat in the rain, discussed stuff, and planned for hte next dive.
this time we paddled out to some pilings leftover from something before sinking. no problem with my ears or vertigo that time. i get to the floor just fine. and this time, man i had a hard time getting up off the floor to swim around! i'd go a couple kicks, then sink back down to catch my breath. leif kept asking if i was ok. i did have a weird little thing. i was a little colder the 2nd dive. you know how when you have ice cream sometimes 1 tooth just shoots out in pain from the cold? i had that happen! so weird! no idea how or why, but oh well. it dissipated on its own, but it was weird. after about 20 minutes i knew i wouldn't have much longer before becoming really cold, so i let him know i needed to start back to the surface soon. this dive, while exhausting, was really cool.
we saw a lot of crabs, a sea slug, some nudibranches, more fish, lots of starfish, and sea anemones were all over the pilings.
after we had everything packed up simon, leif, the 3 of us and some of hte other students went down to teh tavern for berr and burgers. it hit teh spot but i could've eaten more!
we figured part of my lack of getting off the floor was becuase i was already pretty tired out from the 1st dive. so the more we practice the better i'll get in strength and stamina.
simon wants us to go out tomorrow to edmonds' underwater park with them and do basically the same thing as we did today. not sure if we'll make it. 1 - there's a chance we'll have a power outage due to teh windstorm we have happening right now, and the alram won't wake us up. and 2 - matt pulled somethign in his back today adn dependign on how it feels he won't want to carry his rig.
so we'll see what happens.
on a totally unrelated subject: 4 more days until my birthday. i'll be 42.
knowing what i had last time was way too much, we started me out with 30# of weights (+3# of ankle weights). we paddled out to the bouy on our backs, and managed with help to get all the air out of my drysuit - which everyone agrees is really a little large for me, but the next size down has boots that are too small! i was able to descend with very little problems after that. so the main consensus is that with a larger suit i have extra fabric = no good, and i have more pockets for air to get trapped and keep me floating = no good. we get down fine, no issues with ears, and swim around for a little bit. about 25 minutes or so into the dive we're starting to work our way up the ocean floor (yeah, we're in a sound, but technically it's the pacific ocean) and i started to float. i stopped and exhaled big, but was still drifting up a little. so i try to reach over to dump air (i had put some into my suit to keep me warm) but was unable to reach easily, and the more i tried to reach and dump and squish the air out of the suit, the faster i started to ascend. after going about 1/2 way to the surface i just stopped, shrugged my shoulders and said 'ok, i'm going up so let's go up. don't fight it.' so up i go. leif, matt and vlad follow soon after. we discuss what might have happened, what i might have been able to do with it etc, then decide to go back down, swim underwater back to the bouy, and then climb the bouy line and paddle back to shore. well, i get about 10 feet down, my right ear wn't clear, and i get his real vertigo feeling. so back up i go, but it doesn't go away, so i chose to surface. after giving it a few mintues and the dizzyness passed i tried again. same thing! dam! so not wanting to fight that, and knowing that if i continue to have those problems and force myself to depth it could be bad, i decided to just give it up and paddle back to shore.
we took a little over an hours break and had a mocha, sat in the rain, discussed stuff, and planned for hte next dive.
this time we paddled out to some pilings leftover from something before sinking. no problem with my ears or vertigo that time. i get to the floor just fine. and this time, man i had a hard time getting up off the floor to swim around! i'd go a couple kicks, then sink back down to catch my breath. leif kept asking if i was ok. i did have a weird little thing. i was a little colder the 2nd dive. you know how when you have ice cream sometimes 1 tooth just shoots out in pain from the cold? i had that happen! so weird! no idea how or why, but oh well. it dissipated on its own, but it was weird. after about 20 minutes i knew i wouldn't have much longer before becoming really cold, so i let him know i needed to start back to the surface soon. this dive, while exhausting, was really cool.
we saw a lot of crabs, a sea slug, some nudibranches, more fish, lots of starfish, and sea anemones were all over the pilings.
after we had everything packed up simon, leif, the 3 of us and some of hte other students went down to teh tavern for berr and burgers. it hit teh spot but i could've eaten more!
we figured part of my lack of getting off the floor was becuase i was already pretty tired out from the 1st dive. so the more we practice the better i'll get in strength and stamina.
simon wants us to go out tomorrow to edmonds' underwater park with them and do basically the same thing as we did today. not sure if we'll make it. 1 - there's a chance we'll have a power outage due to teh windstorm we have happening right now, and the alram won't wake us up. and 2 - matt pulled somethign in his back today adn dependign on how it feels he won't want to carry his rig.
so we'll see what happens.
on a totally unrelated subject: 4 more days until my birthday. i'll be 42.
9/7/08 scuba
i'm a little bummed. i talked to simon on thursday afternoon. it pretty much went as i thought it would, but that doesn't mean i wouldn't be a little disappointed.
basically he's leading the boat dive, so it's not like he can spend unknown quantities of time with matt or myself trying to work on bouyancy. it was a full boat, which means 8 - 10 people. so we put off getting certified yet again. the plan is to go back to alki at some point in september - probably a weekday with 1 or 2 of guys from the shop who've done a lot more teaching and diving than simon and see what ideas they have, or knowledge they can impart for the situation.
we figured out on sunday i was carring 39 lbs of weights, and the cylinder (full) weighs between 35-40 lbs. so i had between 75-80 lbs of weight on my back, and i only weigh 105!
what we'll do is go out 1 at a time (or like matt'll paddle around on the surface while the guys work with me, they'll weight me with about 20-25 lbs ( i dive with 12 lbs in teh pool) and just work until i can get down to the bottom and stay down there. then i can paddle around while htey do the same with matt.
it's like 3pm now, probably about the time we'd be getting back on the boat getting ready to return to the shore after a day of diving. but we're not there.
basically he's leading the boat dive, so it's not like he can spend unknown quantities of time with matt or myself trying to work on bouyancy. it was a full boat, which means 8 - 10 people. so we put off getting certified yet again. the plan is to go back to alki at some point in september - probably a weekday with 1 or 2 of guys from the shop who've done a lot more teaching and diving than simon and see what ideas they have, or knowledge they can impart for the situation.
we figured out on sunday i was carring 39 lbs of weights, and the cylinder (full) weighs between 35-40 lbs. so i had between 75-80 lbs of weight on my back, and i only weigh 105!
what we'll do is go out 1 at a time (or like matt'll paddle around on the surface while the guys work with me, they'll weight me with about 20-25 lbs ( i dive with 12 lbs in teh pool) and just work until i can get down to the bottom and stay down there. then i can paddle around while htey do the same with matt.
it's like 3pm now, probably about the time we'd be getting back on the boat getting ready to return to the shore after a day of diving. but we're not there.
9/2/08 scuba
well we had our last pool class a couple weeks ago. we were at an outdoor pool as our normal place was undergoing a drain and clean (i'm guessing) for 3 weeks. i tell you the wildlife in that pool was amazing! i can honestly say i don't want to know what most of it was! anyway, that was the night we had ot do inversions. turns out there was 1 more skill we hadn't covered - removing and replacing our gear at depth.
we each did the inversion 3 times. it really wasn't as bad as i thought it might be. it was a little scary going into the handstand mode. and to be honest i'm not sure if i did it 'exactly right' as the textbook would demonstrate, but what i did worked and the instructor - we had a sub - wasn't upset. i ended up feet down/head up anyway. and as matt says - if you go inverted at 100 feet, just ascend in taht position! LOL. really, no, you don't want to do that!
as for removing the gear, it was kind of a joke. i mean we got through it to know how and what we need to do, but david was stepping on my fin as well as holding me down all the while helping me with the gear becuase there's no way i could lift it on my own, and i just didn't want to stay 'grounded'. matt had the same troubles so i didn't feel so bad. i knew i'd be wanting to float but didn't realize matt would have as much troubles with that as he did.
after that we surfaced and discussed since you can't talk underwater, and since we were both exhausted we decided to call it a night.
this past weekend on saturday we met at 8 am at alki beach in west seattle. it's a nice little rocky beach spot with great views of downtown seattle. in the pool i was carrying an aluminium cylinder and 18 lbs of weight with the drysuit. moving to salt water i had 27 lbs and then we added 3 more. plus i had a steel cylinder. much heavier than the aluminium ones. i could barely get myself down to the water it was so heavy. i was practically bent at a 90 degree angle to keep balanced from falling over backwards! then i got cold. the water was about 55f, and that's about what it was on land, too.
our 1st dive that day we actually just snorkeled out to the bouy and did a mask clearing. ok, no big deal. our 2nd dive that day was an actual dive. we went down to about 20ft in depth for about 20 minutes. about 1/2 way through this dive i started to get really cold. i was shivering. we did regulator clearing and alternate air source as well as 2 of hte mask clearing drills. simon and gary(?) were great in helping me out of the water - matt was having difficulties with something himself... i was shivering so much that after matt had all the gear up top simon actually told him to go across to the coffee shop and get me a mocha. that really helped. turns out oart of hte reason i was so cold was becuase my right wrist seal wasn't sealing - and so water had leaked into the suit. my right arm was totally soaking wet! suck!
we decided to call it a day and meet back there again on sunday morning, which was fine with all of us. so back to the shop we go to refill cylinders, rinse gear etc.
while we were at the shop we picked up a pair of drygloves for the 2 of us. that totally helped my hands. they were almost blue i was so cold that morning!
sunday we meet up out there again. matt found a spot where we could sit down and load up our gear adn not have to walk as far. unfortunately we also wore a different undergarment layer - polar fleece. so, right off the batt - add more weight. i started out with 33 lbs that day. not counting the steel cylinder! and when i tried to sink it didn't happen, so add another 3#! geez! it's bad enough that i can't fasten my bc around my waist on my own when i'm wearing a drysuit - it's actually a large so while the height is fine, the around is bulkier, and i can't fasten the stupid thing. i feel like a little child being all dressed up by their parent. anyway, we did our 1st dive about the same 20 ft for 20 mins. we did our drills, and i had a much harder time staying down at the bottom than i had in the pool. and i hadn't even put much air if any into the drysuit at that point! anyway, we did mask clear #2 drill and i had a little trouble getting it to clear the 1st time, and gut response of the body i wanted to pop up to the surface. i fought my way out of it, calmed down (realized hey, i have air so breathe!) and managed to get it cleared.
[if i had to guess i'd say thecylinder i was using weighed somewhere around 30-35 bls.]
we do 1 air sharing ascent and as we descend for the next drill i just can't get my ears to clear. neither would behave, and the pressure was pain enough that i knew i couldn't sink further without issues. so back up to the surface i go and just float around while they finished. i was really frustrated, and i know simon and isaac realized that, but it happens. i could've not said anything and gone ahead down, but that's putting myself at risk of serious injury, so better to abort and try again later than to push it now. we had some surface time between dives. our next dive was about 29 ft for 20 mins. we went up and down 2 or 3 times with no ear problems, which i was happy about. the drygloves made a huge difference, and there was no leak in my suit to get me wet.
we had to do the air share drill agian (swapping positions) since i wasn't able to do the 2nd one earlier, then we had to do mask clear #3. OMG! i didnt' like this in the pool, and i knew i wouldn't like it in the open water, but you gotta do it. i get the mask off, manage to control my breathing, and get the mask on again and cleared with a little difficulty but no panic. before i started i did gesture that simon would have to hold me down so i wouldn't pop up. not sure if he actually understood or not, ad i'm not sure if he did actually have a hold on me, but we got through that drill. did the air share ok, then had to do the CESA. that's an emergency ascent where you prepare to drop weights if needed and try to surface in only 1 breath. got through that ok. and then we went and just swam around a little bit at the bottom and saw fishies. there were lots of flatfish - i had said sole, but probably flounder becuase these were way too small to eat, crab, some other fishies, lots of kelp and plankton, and a few starfish. oh we also saw some sort of pipefish.
overall i was really not happy with my dives on sunday. i had lots of problems. i never got both knees on the ground, and seemed to keep wanting to surface. but i can't add more weight! i mean, i was carrying over 50 lbs on my back as it was! simon weighs about twice me and he dives with 20 lbs he says. maybe it was 25, but still! he did have a thinner undergarment, but hey, they can't add that much bouyancy, can they? everytime i let go of matt's hand i kept wanting to pop up. it was really frustrating. and i felt so out of control which didn't help. there were times i was crying in my mask about how i didn't like this and i wanted to surface adn nothing was working. matt knew i was having some problems but until after we were done and talking about it he admitted he hadn't realized exactly what was going on or he would've tried to help. now he knows, so he said he'll try and watch and help if it happens again. i admit while we were swimming around it was really cool. but i need to figure out how to maneuver wtih the weight better, and how to eliminate some of hte weight! i think part of my fighting body positions was related to all teh weight on my back. i surfaced a little earlier than planned becuase that's what my body wanted to do. i thought i'd just go ahead, then descend again after resting a few minutes. but simon and matt surfaced with me. i was so upset at that point i was crying. luckily the mask hid everything. when simon asked what was wrong i just slapped the water and said i was being a child. i told him about the surfacign issue - he was like 'well let's think about it, as we were swimmign the direction we were headed, we were actually ascending very slowly. and when you ascend you need to reduce the air in your suit because you do become more bouyant. ok, i get that, but i had opened the valve on my suit all the way earlier and had so little air in it to start with, it amazes me how much i just want ot float. man, get me out into open water and tell me i have to hang out in the water for several hours no problem. i'm just a floater. never hated it before, but it's really not a desired thing in diving.
so next sunday we have a boat dive. it's the last thing we need for certification. but before we get on that boat we need to figure out something for weighting. there's no way i can do a giant stride entry with what i had on last sunday. on this entry you are supposed to look straight ahead, otherwise the body tends to 'fall' instead of 'step' into the water. besides you get back onto the boat with gear on, and i don't know how i'm going to climb the boat's ladder if i can't stand up on my own! i'm hoping that since drills, if any, will be minimal, that i'll be able to just swim around, more as a fun dive, and stuff like that, and get used to being in open water. also the water at alki is so murky. there's a lot of activity in that area, and the bottom's really sandy so every move down that low stirred up nothing but silt.
afterwards, later in the month we'll go up to edwards' underwater park and dive up there for fun, we hope.
while i totally didn't like this past weekend, i did get through it. everytime i was asked if i was ready to try again i said yes. i haven't given up.
we each did the inversion 3 times. it really wasn't as bad as i thought it might be. it was a little scary going into the handstand mode. and to be honest i'm not sure if i did it 'exactly right' as the textbook would demonstrate, but what i did worked and the instructor - we had a sub - wasn't upset. i ended up feet down/head up anyway. and as matt says - if you go inverted at 100 feet, just ascend in taht position! LOL. really, no, you don't want to do that!
as for removing the gear, it was kind of a joke. i mean we got through it to know how and what we need to do, but david was stepping on my fin as well as holding me down all the while helping me with the gear becuase there's no way i could lift it on my own, and i just didn't want to stay 'grounded'. matt had the same troubles so i didn't feel so bad. i knew i'd be wanting to float but didn't realize matt would have as much troubles with that as he did.
after that we surfaced and discussed since you can't talk underwater, and since we were both exhausted we decided to call it a night.
this past weekend on saturday we met at 8 am at alki beach in west seattle. it's a nice little rocky beach spot with great views of downtown seattle. in the pool i was carrying an aluminium cylinder and 18 lbs of weight with the drysuit. moving to salt water i had 27 lbs and then we added 3 more. plus i had a steel cylinder. much heavier than the aluminium ones. i could barely get myself down to the water it was so heavy. i was practically bent at a 90 degree angle to keep balanced from falling over backwards! then i got cold. the water was about 55f, and that's about what it was on land, too.
our 1st dive that day we actually just snorkeled out to the bouy and did a mask clearing. ok, no big deal. our 2nd dive that day was an actual dive. we went down to about 20ft in depth for about 20 minutes. about 1/2 way through this dive i started to get really cold. i was shivering. we did regulator clearing and alternate air source as well as 2 of hte mask clearing drills. simon and gary(?) were great in helping me out of the water - matt was having difficulties with something himself... i was shivering so much that after matt had all the gear up top simon actually told him to go across to the coffee shop and get me a mocha. that really helped. turns out oart of hte reason i was so cold was becuase my right wrist seal wasn't sealing - and so water had leaked into the suit. my right arm was totally soaking wet! suck!
we decided to call it a day and meet back there again on sunday morning, which was fine with all of us. so back to the shop we go to refill cylinders, rinse gear etc.
while we were at the shop we picked up a pair of drygloves for the 2 of us. that totally helped my hands. they were almost blue i was so cold that morning!
sunday we meet up out there again. matt found a spot where we could sit down and load up our gear adn not have to walk as far. unfortunately we also wore a different undergarment layer - polar fleece. so, right off the batt - add more weight. i started out with 33 lbs that day. not counting the steel cylinder! and when i tried to sink it didn't happen, so add another 3#! geez! it's bad enough that i can't fasten my bc around my waist on my own when i'm wearing a drysuit - it's actually a large so while the height is fine, the around is bulkier, and i can't fasten the stupid thing. i feel like a little child being all dressed up by their parent. anyway, we did our 1st dive about the same 20 ft for 20 mins. we did our drills, and i had a much harder time staying down at the bottom than i had in the pool. and i hadn't even put much air if any into the drysuit at that point! anyway, we did mask clear #2 drill and i had a little trouble getting it to clear the 1st time, and gut response of the body i wanted to pop up to the surface. i fought my way out of it, calmed down (realized hey, i have air so breathe!) and managed to get it cleared.
[if i had to guess i'd say thecylinder i was using weighed somewhere around 30-35 bls.]
we do 1 air sharing ascent and as we descend for the next drill i just can't get my ears to clear. neither would behave, and the pressure was pain enough that i knew i couldn't sink further without issues. so back up to the surface i go and just float around while they finished. i was really frustrated, and i know simon and isaac realized that, but it happens. i could've not said anything and gone ahead down, but that's putting myself at risk of serious injury, so better to abort and try again later than to push it now. we had some surface time between dives. our next dive was about 29 ft for 20 mins. we went up and down 2 or 3 times with no ear problems, which i was happy about. the drygloves made a huge difference, and there was no leak in my suit to get me wet.
we had to do the air share drill agian (swapping positions) since i wasn't able to do the 2nd one earlier, then we had to do mask clear #3. OMG! i didnt' like this in the pool, and i knew i wouldn't like it in the open water, but you gotta do it. i get the mask off, manage to control my breathing, and get the mask on again and cleared with a little difficulty but no panic. before i started i did gesture that simon would have to hold me down so i wouldn't pop up. not sure if he actually understood or not, ad i'm not sure if he did actually have a hold on me, but we got through that drill. did the air share ok, then had to do the CESA. that's an emergency ascent where you prepare to drop weights if needed and try to surface in only 1 breath. got through that ok. and then we went and just swam around a little bit at the bottom and saw fishies. there were lots of flatfish - i had said sole, but probably flounder becuase these were way too small to eat, crab, some other fishies, lots of kelp and plankton, and a few starfish. oh we also saw some sort of pipefish.
overall i was really not happy with my dives on sunday. i had lots of problems. i never got both knees on the ground, and seemed to keep wanting to surface. but i can't add more weight! i mean, i was carrying over 50 lbs on my back as it was! simon weighs about twice me and he dives with 20 lbs he says. maybe it was 25, but still! he did have a thinner undergarment, but hey, they can't add that much bouyancy, can they? everytime i let go of matt's hand i kept wanting to pop up. it was really frustrating. and i felt so out of control which didn't help. there were times i was crying in my mask about how i didn't like this and i wanted to surface adn nothing was working. matt knew i was having some problems but until after we were done and talking about it he admitted he hadn't realized exactly what was going on or he would've tried to help. now he knows, so he said he'll try and watch and help if it happens again. i admit while we were swimming around it was really cool. but i need to figure out how to maneuver wtih the weight better, and how to eliminate some of hte weight! i think part of my fighting body positions was related to all teh weight on my back. i surfaced a little earlier than planned becuase that's what my body wanted to do. i thought i'd just go ahead, then descend again after resting a few minutes. but simon and matt surfaced with me. i was so upset at that point i was crying. luckily the mask hid everything. when simon asked what was wrong i just slapped the water and said i was being a child. i told him about the surfacign issue - he was like 'well let's think about it, as we were swimmign the direction we were headed, we were actually ascending very slowly. and when you ascend you need to reduce the air in your suit because you do become more bouyant. ok, i get that, but i had opened the valve on my suit all the way earlier and had so little air in it to start with, it amazes me how much i just want ot float. man, get me out into open water and tell me i have to hang out in the water for several hours no problem. i'm just a floater. never hated it before, but it's really not a desired thing in diving.
so next sunday we have a boat dive. it's the last thing we need for certification. but before we get on that boat we need to figure out something for weighting. there's no way i can do a giant stride entry with what i had on last sunday. on this entry you are supposed to look straight ahead, otherwise the body tends to 'fall' instead of 'step' into the water. besides you get back onto the boat with gear on, and i don't know how i'm going to climb the boat's ladder if i can't stand up on my own! i'm hoping that since drills, if any, will be minimal, that i'll be able to just swim around, more as a fun dive, and stuff like that, and get used to being in open water. also the water at alki is so murky. there's a lot of activity in that area, and the bottom's really sandy so every move down that low stirred up nothing but silt.
afterwards, later in the month we'll go up to edwards' underwater park and dive up there for fun, we hope.
while i totally didn't like this past weekend, i did get through it. everytime i was asked if i was ready to try again i said yes. i haven't given up.
7/26/08 scuba
well bummer. turns out simon had car trouble and couldn't get into town (he lives out in northbend i think) for our lesson. that means we couldn't do our open water dives this weekend. that means we can't do our open water dives until the end of august.
there's a slim chance we might be able to pull them off before then, but it is very slim.
while i was still feeling a little aprehensive about our lesson, just like all the others, i was looking forward to it. i knew what i wanted to accomplish and i had a plan.
oh well. this means we get 3-4 more practice sessions. they won't be wasted. i'll use 1 for wetsuit and another i'll use for drysuit - to practice and i WILL achieve neutral bouyancy before the end of those nights!
there's a slim chance we might be able to pull them off before then, but it is very slim.
while i was still feeling a little aprehensive about our lesson, just like all the others, i was looking forward to it. i knew what i wanted to accomplish and i had a plan.
oh well. this means we get 3-4 more practice sessions. they won't be wasted. i'll use 1 for wetsuit and another i'll use for drysuit - to practice and i WILL achieve neutral bouyancy before the end of those nights!
7/24/08 scuba
tueday night was our 1st night for drysuit practice. i'm glad we started a day early.
the class portion went fine, although i was a little nervous and not looking forward to the fact that we had to take a test and i had barely spent any time with the text. but i passed - only missed 1.
so drysuits fit a little loose and as soon as they get wet they glom(?) up to your body like when you use one of those space bags. you know, you use the vacuum to remove hte air and it gets tight and crinkly up next to the clothes? a lot like that. a little uncomfortable it was, but not too bad - until we started trying to work!
we didnt' have socks so 1 of my big problems was my feet. 50% of my issue was the boots turned out to be a little small so when the suit contracted in the water it squeezed my already sore toes and caused some major pain and the other 50% of my feet was i couldn't get my legs to move with ankle weights on them! once we removed the weights i was at least able to move around.
we did have a little bouyancy issue. ended up with 10#8 lbs of weight. think i want to try a little less tonight and see if now i have an idea of what i'm doing if i really need all of the weight i started with or not. i did have a problem with my neutral bouyancy skill. i can 'drop' on the exhale, but i don't really 'rise' on inhale very well. same issue in the wetsuit - i hadn't really mastered the skill.
all we did last tuesday was swim around in the shallow end and we did finally get to the deep end for a few minutes. but i did have issues. most of it was the feet. tonight we'll be taking socks, as well as something undergarment wise to wear under hte suit other than just the swimsuit. it'll make the drysuit more comfy cause it won't stick to the skin - the underwear layer acts as a barrier for that. but last tues we didn't have it so we had to deal. i really had a hard time enjoying the experience. at one point i stood up and was just crying. i don't remember starting to cry. i don't remember thinking 'i got to get out of here' it wasn't really a panic, it was just 'i don't like this' and that my feet hurt so bad i didn't want to move my legs anymore. simon was really good. matt was too far away to see how upset i was. he let me have my minute and calm down, and adjusted the weights a little bit and it helped. after swimming around a few more times he asked if i wanted to try the deep end and we started over there. i had gotten over the edge of the dropoff and was turning around to hang onto the wall to descend, and i started rolling over. i tried to right myself but just kept wanting to roll. next i know i'm at the surface. at least i'm laughing this time when simon comes up and asks me what's happening. between giggles i was like 'i don't know, i was going to ask you what i did wrong!' we can only guess that i had a bit of air trapped into 1 arm of my suit and it was enough to throw me off and i haven't learned well enough to 'shake it off and right myself' yet.
overall i wasn't too unhappy with the night. i was proud i managed to get to the bottom of the deep end. however when we wanted to ascend i couldn't get off the bottom and i had this 'uh, i don't know what i'm supposed to do here' moment. i was supposed to add a little air into my suit - get tht neutral buoyancy thing happening that i wasn't quite getting earlier.
anyway, tonight is night #2. we need to get through the skills for drysuits tonight. if we succeed and i feel ok then simon wants us to do our open water dives starting this weekend. if that happens i'll probably suggest the folks go to the museums on saturday on their own. sunday - well, we'll talk about that later.
anyway, i'm a little nervous about 1 of skills. we have to go inverted. get ourselves into a handstand position, simon will get us 'hanging' in teh water, and we're supposed to sweep our arms and get ourselves into a standing position. i think i'm nervous becuase i've never been able to do a flipturn or somersault in the swimming pool ever, as well as the fact i haven't mastered the neutral buoyancy issue yet. but i'm ready to tackle it!
the class portion went fine, although i was a little nervous and not looking forward to the fact that we had to take a test and i had barely spent any time with the text. but i passed - only missed 1.
so drysuits fit a little loose and as soon as they get wet they
we didnt' have socks so 1 of my big problems was my feet. 50% of my issue was the boots turned out to be a little small so when the suit contracted in the water it squeezed my already sore toes and caused some major pain and the other 50% of my feet was i couldn't get my legs to move with ankle weights on them! once we removed the weights i was at least able to move around.
we did have a little bouyancy issue. ended up with 10#8 lbs of weight. think i want to try a little less tonight and see if now i have an idea of what i'm doing if i really need all of the weight i started with or not. i did have a problem with my neutral bouyancy skill. i can 'drop' on the exhale, but i don't really 'rise' on inhale very well. same issue in the wetsuit - i hadn't really mastered the skill.
all we did last tuesday was swim around in the shallow end and we did finally get to the deep end for a few minutes. but i did have issues. most of it was the feet. tonight we'll be taking socks, as well as something undergarment wise to wear under hte suit other than just the swimsuit. it'll make the drysuit more comfy cause it won't stick to the skin - the underwear layer acts as a barrier for that. but last tues we didn't have it so we had to deal. i really had a hard time enjoying the experience. at one point i stood up and was just crying. i don't remember starting to cry. i don't remember thinking 'i got to get out of here' it wasn't really a panic, it was just 'i don't like this' and that my feet hurt so bad i didn't want to move my legs anymore. simon was really good. matt was too far away to see how upset i was. he let me have my minute and calm down, and adjusted the weights a little bit and it helped. after swimming around a few more times he asked if i wanted to try the deep end and we started over there. i had gotten over the edge of the dropoff and was turning around to hang onto the wall to descend, and i started rolling over. i tried to right myself but just kept wanting to roll. next i know i'm at the surface. at least i'm laughing this time when simon comes up and asks me what's happening. between giggles i was like 'i don't know, i was going to ask you what i did wrong!' we can only guess that i had a bit of air trapped into 1 arm of my suit and it was enough to throw me off and i haven't learned well enough to 'shake it off and right myself' yet.
overall i wasn't too unhappy with the night. i was proud i managed to get to the bottom of the deep end. however when we wanted to ascend i couldn't get off the bottom and i had this 'uh, i don't know what i'm supposed to do here' moment. i was supposed to add a little air into my suit - get tht neutral buoyancy thing happening that i wasn't quite getting earlier.
anyway, tonight is night #2. we need to get through the skills for drysuits tonight. if we succeed and i feel ok then simon wants us to do our open water dives starting this weekend. if that happens i'll probably suggest the folks go to the museums on saturday on their own. sunday - well, we'll talk about that later.
anyway, i'm a little nervous about 1 of skills. we have to go inverted. get ourselves into a handstand position, simon will get us 'hanging' in teh water, and we're supposed to sweep our arms and get ourselves into a standing position. i think i'm nervous becuase i've never been able to do a flipturn or somersault in the swimming pool ever, as well as the fact i haven't mastered the neutral buoyancy issue yet. but i'm ready to tackle it!
7/20/08 scuba
3 stories to get caught up on. have to admit i haven't had much opportunity this week nor have i have the strength. matt's mom was in town for a visit the past 2 weeks, left today, and my parents show up for an 8-day stay on tuesday.
last tues's class was pretty good. got to the bottom of the pool right off the bat but something just didn't feel right, so i surfaced and checked and did it again. we had a guest again that night - don't remember her name. anyway, we went through all the drills again. matt ran his air down to 500 about 20 mins or so before the end of class so he got to 'leave early'. simon and i went and layed down on thepool floor and worked on my becoming neutrally bouyant. i almost got it.
the plan is to meet this tues, get a few more bits of gear, and get to the pool to work out any bouyoncy issues with the drysuits, as well as just swim around the shallow end with them - more if we're lucky.
before then we have to watch a dvd and read some if not all of a book.
last tues's class was pretty good. got to the bottom of the pool right off the bat but something just didn't feel right, so i surfaced and checked and did it again. we had a guest again that night - don't remember her name. anyway, we went through all the drills again. matt ran his air down to 500 about 20 mins or so before the end of class so he got to 'leave early'. simon and i went and layed down on thepool floor and worked on my becoming neutrally bouyant. i almost got it.
the plan is to meet this tues, get a few more bits of gear, and get to the pool to work out any bouyoncy issues with the drysuits, as well as just swim around the shallow end with them - more if we're lucky.
before then we have to watch a dvd and read some if not all of a book.
7/13/08 scuba
we've had 2 lessons in the pool since i last managed to write.
2 weeks ago we met up with simon and his wife hillary joined us again. she pretty much just swam around and went up and down while we did our thing. in the shallow pool we went over the air-sharing drill and a few other things, then we went over to the deep end. actually, we started with a giant stride into the deep end, then swam to the shallow, then back to the deep. i got down to the bottom of the pool and we swam around, then worked some drills. simon wanted us to walk through the drill in the shallow once, to show us the final bit, so up we swim. we didn't actually ascend to the surface and then over, but went up into the shallow at an angle. i hit the wall before i was shallow enough to get over the step into the shallow, so the little extra push i did gave me a wee bit of vertigo. it was just a quick spi of 'whoa, that wasn't fun' and then it was over. we walked through it and then descended back to the depths. after everythign simon said i was a little slow on the descent, but it was good i was able to get down to the bottom. anyway, matt was the guinea pig who runs out of air and i get to save him. anyway, the drill's going well. he swims over 'in a panic' i give him my regulator after taking my spare, we hang onto each other and start to ascend. we get to the surface and the room starts spinning. and it doesn't stop. and then everything goes quiet. not sure if i closed my eyes or if everything also went black for a fraction of a second. it seemed like a couple minutes to me but in reality it probably wasn't. anyway, when the room kept spinning and i felt like i wasn't in control of anything anymore - and i didn't have my BC inflated since we had just ascended, i started to paw at matt. i tried to say 'get me to the shallow' but that just wasn't happening. simon realized something was up and swapped my secondary for my primary air supply which helped a little bit (it's harder to get air from the secondary). they helped me over to the shallow where i could stand up on my own and then i was able to tell them what happened. i got a few minutes to recover, and then we tried to descend again but i was not able to clear my ears this time.
last week we had bill, the sub, again. we met at the store and talked over what we were going to be doing in the pool. he offered a few suggestions for ear clearing to me. we get everything over to the pool and get the gear on and do a giant stride into the pool. i've done it 3 times now, and it still seems a little scary! but i can do it just fine. even in the shallow i've noticed it's a little scary 'dropping down' under water. i think it's a psychological thing about how it's not natural to breathe underwater. once i'm under i'm fine. but that initial 'get your head under the water' bit still trips me up a little. bill had brought a buoy where simon hadn't so i got ot hang onto the line as i descended this time. it was a little slow getting down compared to the guys, but i got down there faster than the week before i think. we swam around, did a few drills, tried to find my neutral bouyancy and the next thing i know i'm surfacing! oh well. bill follows me up thinking there's somethign wrong. i'm laughing and tell him i hadn't intended to surface, but it's good in teh fact that it gives me practice going up and down. think i just put a little too much air in the BC to get me off the ground. so back down we go, swim around, do some drills, then come back up slowly. actually bill wanted us to swim upwards watching our guage and keeping the bars at zero or 1 on teh ascent rate meter. i was doing great until about 1/2 way when i had to turn a corner or hit a wall then my meter just shot up to like the 'slow down!' area. bill even was waving at me to slow down. i really don't know what happened, but i managed to stop ascending, get a little lower again, and then tried again. when i hit the wall this time i jsut held on for a minute, then turned around and continued swiming up. it was great! 3 times and no vertigo! then we go back down to try the air-share drill. this time i'm out of air. we're doing a controled ascent and doing fine. i look up and can see the surface getting closer. then it hits. the pool starts spinning and doesn't stop. and it doesn't stop. everything goes quiet and again, maybe i closed my eyes but everything went black for a second as well. i manage to keep it together, but i was not liking it. after the drill i was able to report the strong vertigo, and bill said we id climb a little faster than we had ascended previously. so that slight difference might be all i need to not be too well. the good thing is i was ablet o descend again after this. i think i got down and up 5 times total within 90 minutes of class. i was really proud of myself. matt said bill told him it was like 'night and day' this night compared to the 1st night he taught us.
next week is pool night as well. then the following week i believe is tues=dry suit training 1 and thurs=dry suit training 2. thurs is the normal day, but becuase we expect i'll have some bouyancy issues, and since i seem to take a little longer to adapt to my environs, he wants to start on tues, get the weights figured and have me work out most of the kinks, and hten thurs we can really concentrate on the drills and stuff.
2 weeks ago we met up with simon and his wife hillary joined us again. she pretty much just swam around and went up and down while we did our thing. in the shallow pool we went over the air-sharing drill and a few other things, then we went over to the deep end. actually, we started with a giant stride into the deep end, then swam to the shallow, then back to the deep. i got down to the bottom of the pool and we swam around, then worked some drills. simon wanted us to walk through the drill in the shallow once, to show us the final bit, so up we swim. we didn't actually ascend to the surface and then over, but went up into the shallow at an angle. i hit the wall before i was shallow enough to get over the step into the shallow, so the little extra push i did gave me a wee bit of vertigo. it was just a quick spi of 'whoa, that wasn't fun' and then it was over. we walked through it and then descended back to the depths. after everythign simon said i was a little slow on the descent, but it was good i was able to get down to the bottom. anyway, matt was the guinea pig who runs out of air and i get to save him. anyway, the drill's going well. he swims over 'in a panic' i give him my regulator after taking my spare, we hang onto each other and start to ascend. we get to the surface and the room starts spinning. and it doesn't stop. and then everything goes quiet. not sure if i closed my eyes or if everything also went black for a fraction of a second. it seemed like a couple minutes to me but in reality it probably wasn't. anyway, when the room kept spinning and i felt like i wasn't in control of anything anymore - and i didn't have my BC inflated since we had just ascended, i started to paw at matt. i tried to say 'get me to the shallow' but that just wasn't happening. simon realized something was up and swapped my secondary for my primary air supply which helped a little bit (it's harder to get air from the secondary). they helped me over to the shallow where i could stand up on my own and then i was able to tell them what happened. i got a few minutes to recover, and then we tried to descend again but i was not able to clear my ears this time.
last week we had bill, the sub, again. we met at the store and talked over what we were going to be doing in the pool. he offered a few suggestions for ear clearing to me. we get everything over to the pool and get the gear on and do a giant stride into the pool. i've done it 3 times now, and it still seems a little scary! but i can do it just fine. even in the shallow i've noticed it's a little scary 'dropping down' under water. i think it's a psychological thing about how it's not natural to breathe underwater. once i'm under i'm fine. but that initial 'get your head under the water' bit still trips me up a little. bill had brought a buoy where simon hadn't so i got ot hang onto the line as i descended this time. it was a little slow getting down compared to the guys, but i got down there faster than the week before i think. we swam around, did a few drills, tried to find my neutral bouyancy and the next thing i know i'm surfacing! oh well. bill follows me up thinking there's somethign wrong. i'm laughing and tell him i hadn't intended to surface, but it's good in teh fact that it gives me practice going up and down. think i just put a little too much air in the BC to get me off the ground. so back down we go, swim around, do some drills, then come back up slowly. actually bill wanted us to swim upwards watching our guage and keeping the bars at zero or 1 on teh ascent rate meter. i was doing great until about 1/2 way when i had to turn a corner or hit a wall then my meter just shot up to like the 'slow down!' area. bill even was waving at me to slow down. i really don't know what happened, but i managed to stop ascending, get a little lower again, and then tried again. when i hit the wall this time i jsut held on for a minute, then turned around and continued swiming up. it was great! 3 times and no vertigo! then we go back down to try the air-share drill. this time i'm out of air. we're doing a controled ascent and doing fine. i look up and can see the surface getting closer. then it hits. the pool starts spinning and doesn't stop. and it doesn't stop. everything goes quiet and again, maybe i closed my eyes but everything went black for a second as well. i manage to keep it together, but i was not liking it. after the drill i was able to report the strong vertigo, and bill said we id climb a little faster than we had ascended previously. so that slight difference might be all i need to not be too well. the good thing is i was ablet o descend again after this. i think i got down and up 5 times total within 90 minutes of class. i was really proud of myself. matt said bill told him it was like 'night and day' this night compared to the 1st night he taught us.
next week is pool night as well. then the following week i believe is tues=dry suit training 1 and thurs=dry suit training 2. thurs is the normal day, but becuase we expect i'll have some bouyancy issues, and since i seem to take a little longer to adapt to my environs, he wants to start on tues, get the weights figured and have me work out most of the kinks, and hten thurs we can really concentrate on the drills and stuff.
6/24/08 scuba
we have the night off this week. i did so well last week simon rewarded us. in reality, even if we were scheduled to dive tonight in the pool i'd be cancelling it. i'm fighting (and thinking i might as well just submit) to an allergy attack. at least it held off until today to be the worst (concert last night), but man, i don't see how anyone could consider diving or swimming when feeling like this! i never would. but apparantly there are those who would, coz teh diving doc drilled it into me i wasn't to go close to the water if i felt like this!
so no new story on scuba this week. not sure the dates for our open water dives.
so no new story on scuba this week. not sure the dates for our open water dives.
6/20/08 scuba
well last week went much better. so much so in fact, that we've been given this next tuesday off!
i'm adjusting slowly - about 1/2 the speed of matt. you know the troubles i had 2 weeks ago with the sub. as bad as that week went, last tuesday was fantastic!
i never popped up to the surface, even when i swallowed a bunch of pool water. i managed to get to the bottom of the deep end. i went through all the drills - regulator, alternate air source, and mask clearing in both the shallow and deep ends. i swam around all over, and we had a toy. simon had brought a torpedo toy. looks like a nerf toy, but it's heavy so it actually sinks. his wife also joined us, and the 4 of us 'played toss' underwater - both in shallow and deep ends. just before we get out, i guess we had 10-15 minutes left, simon tells us we have to sink (shallow end), take off the mask, hand it to our buddy, and then swim 1 lap of the pool. basically it's to make sure that if our mask falls off underwater we're able to swim after it (hopefully it'll always float!) or at least be able to ascend without drowning or holding our breath. holding your breath is bad. it causes bubbles and bubbles are bad. i had to take a few minutes to psych myself up for it, its so painful to open my eyes underwater. matt did a great job. and he flew! i think i crawled! i knew i'd be able to breathe - simon had me takign the snorkel into the tub and sticking my face underwater without the mask and practice breathing. but i went real slow because i was running my hand along the lane tiles. keeping a finger in teh groutline between tiles and 'stucco' pool bottom i knew i was going straight and could keep my eyes closed. i did have to open them a little. just enough to see the color variation of the lane stripe and the space where that ends and the pool wall is so i could turn around. i was really proud of myself after last tuesday night. if the rest of hte sessions go like that P-shaw, piece of cake! but i'm not getting too over-confident. i expect there is a place where things just 'click' but i don't know how much left i have to learn or what they are, so i'm not going to get hubrous (sp??? huberous????) as soon as i do i'll be voted off the island! anyway, we did indeed push back the open water and dry suit training until next month. that's fine with me. as cold as it's been this month the sound is pretty cold!
i'm adjusting slowly - about 1/2 the speed of matt. you know the troubles i had 2 weeks ago with the sub. as bad as that week went, last tuesday was fantastic!
i never popped up to the surface, even when i swallowed a bunch of pool water. i managed to get to the bottom of the deep end. i went through all the drills - regulator, alternate air source, and mask clearing in both the shallow and deep ends. i swam around all over, and we had a toy. simon had brought a torpedo toy. looks like a nerf toy, but it's heavy so it actually sinks. his wife also joined us, and the 4 of us 'played toss' underwater - both in shallow and deep ends. just before we get out, i guess we had 10-15 minutes left, simon tells us we have to sink (shallow end), take off the mask, hand it to our buddy, and then swim 1 lap of the pool. basically it's to make sure that if our mask falls off underwater we're able to swim after it (hopefully it'll always float!) or at least be able to ascend without drowning or holding our breath. holding your breath is bad. it causes bubbles and bubbles are bad. i had to take a few minutes to psych myself up for it, its so painful to open my eyes underwater. matt did a great job. and he flew! i think i crawled! i knew i'd be able to breathe - simon had me takign the snorkel into the tub and sticking my face underwater without the mask and practice breathing. but i went real slow because i was running my hand along the lane tiles. keeping a finger in teh groutline between tiles and 'stucco' pool bottom i knew i was going straight and could keep my eyes closed. i did have to open them a little. just enough to see the color variation of the lane stripe and the space where that ends and the pool wall is so i could turn around. i was really proud of myself after last tuesday night. if the rest of hte sessions go like that P-shaw, piece of cake! but i'm not getting too over-confident. i expect there is a place where things just 'click' but i don't know how much left i have to learn or what they are, so i'm not going to get hubrous (sp??? huberous????) as soon as i do i'll be voted off the island! anyway, we did indeed push back the open water and dry suit training until next month. that's fine with me. as cold as it's been this month the sound is pretty cold!
6/11/08 scuba
"Courage is the mastery of fear"
i saw that in a movie i watched today. yes, today. went to sleep around 1.30/2am, woke up at 3.30am and haven't been back to sleep yet. part of it is my left ear is still clogged. part of it is this dang sleep thing, and part of it is i felt a little nauseus.
we had week 3 of scuba class last night. substitute teacher. classroom went pretty well. i kept wanting to add in a 'safety factor' into the dive tables for some reason. but as far as errors go, the one i was making would save a life as opposed to actually drowning someone due to me miscalculating the amount of bottom time (amount of time spent on a dive) they have.
i had a moment there in the pool last night where i was just all of a sudden overcome with sensory overload. that's the best way to describe it. i just felt this wave of overwhelmingness (if that wasn't a word it is now) and had to surface and take a minute. felt really silly, but i tell you, letting a few tears escape and a few deep breaths and it can do wonders for the psyche.
let's see if anyone's reading this...small tangent, sorta related sorta not. i guess we'll see if anyone leaves a msg on my message board, eh? as you know we're taking scuba so we can see more/do more in palau, which is definitely on for jan-feb 2009. matt and i have been talking about few other trips between now and our New Zealand bike trip in 2011. 1 is the trans-america trail on the tandem, if we can find someone willing to drive the truck for our support vehicle. 2 is the mongol rally. but what has me excited is 3-yesterday matt signed us up and paid registration fees for us to do the rickshaw run. 2 weeks of driving across india (yes, the country of india) and nepal in a 3-wheeled tuk-tuk. www.theadventurists.com. we were thinking of doing the summer run in june 2009, but this week they sent out a newsletter tellign of the addition of an easter run, and the moving of june back to sept. so next feb we're in palau, and for easter we'll be driving across india! planning on taking the route thru nepal and visit kathmandu for 1, see the giant stuppa, over and cross the ganges (hopefully this time i won't get strep!) on to agra for the taj mahal, then upwards towards delhi and on up to the north somewhere where the finish line is yet to be determined.
anyway, i was really proud of myself last night. i managed to kneel on the floor of the deep end of the pool. we actually started there as well. learned how to take the 'giant stride' entrance into the pool. as soon as we feel we won't be infringing on class time we'll take a camera with us and get some pics of us all decked out in gear and underwater. we have 1 more classroom/pool session before drysuit training and open water classes start. i made the decision last night that we're going to push them back a month.
i was proud of myself last night because i did it. i was a little nervous (ok, small panic attack when i couldn't hang onto the step between the shallow and deep but still couldn't quite touch the bottom of the pool, but B___ can't remember his name was there and reached out a hand to help steady me. meanwhile matt's just swimming all around the deep like a fish. :-) yay for him. but i did get down there! had to ascend a little once for my ears, but was able to equalize the pressure pretty good. did have a few moments a few times where i wasn't sure about my ears as we spent what seemed to me like hours down there. i'm still having bouyancy issues. as long as i'm swimming i seem to be able to maintain 'altitude'. just checking. 'depth' is more accurate. anyway, sorry, maybe the lack of sleep and no coffee or breakfast yet this am is getting to me. where was i? oh yeah, i tend to follow my head. when i look 'up' to see in front of me my body follows. so i was pretty constantly adjusting to stay down. if i emptied my bc i was too heavy, if i added i was too light. i never did find quite the right balance last night. that, and the fact that i had to struggle to stay put when kneeling, and the fact that i don't know how many times i said to myself ' i just want to surface and get out' last night tells me i'm not ready for open water. i told matt last night before we even got out of the pool that i wanted another night like last night before learning anything new. he says it's ok.
also not entirely sure my physiology will allow me to dive comfortably yet. while i did get down to the floor of the deep end, the fact that i do have problems clearing my ears can stop me from descending. if i'm stuffed up with sinus stuff i'm not going to dive. the last 24 hours before flying home (or to a destination) diving is off-limits. it's strongly encouraged to not dive 24 hours before flying for anyone due to all the pressure changes. even if you surface just fine, when the plane descends on approach you can get bent! and with lymphodema being uh what's the word. not caused by, aggravated by, pressure changes, i have that much more incentive to keep that rule strictly enforced! now i've been out of the pool 10 hours and my left ear is still plugged and i still feel a little queasy in the tummy... not sure how much of that is actual verses psychological. so we'll see.
i think i'll know after that if i'm still having the 'get me out of the pool' thoughts if i want to continue to dive. monetarily it kinda sucks. but there's also good. i've learned how to do something i never thought i would do. i put myself in a totally different element than i'm comfortable with and survived. (like what was cancer????) we'll still go to palau only do more snorkeling. i'm a stronger person for doing this. and all that. but as far as stuff we've purchased, the only gear we've bought which we can't return is the BC - mainly becuase it was custome made to fit our body and we 'spared no expense' and had them monogramed. why not, right? but i can use the BC as a snorkel vest, so that's not a total loss. and even though we've paid for the drysuit training and open water dives we can return them if we decide not to go through with them.
did i have fun last night?
no.
did i have more fun last night than i did last week?
no.
not this time.
i saw that in a movie i watched today. yes, today. went to sleep around 1.30/2am, woke up at 3.30am and haven't been back to sleep yet. part of it is my left ear is still clogged. part of it is this dang sleep thing, and part of it is i felt a little nauseus.
we had week 3 of scuba class last night. substitute teacher. classroom went pretty well. i kept wanting to add in a 'safety factor' into the dive tables for some reason. but as far as errors go, the one i was making would save a life as opposed to actually drowning someone due to me miscalculating the amount of bottom time (amount of time spent on a dive) they have.
i had a moment there in the pool last night where i was just all of a sudden overcome with sensory overload. that's the best way to describe it. i just felt this wave of overwhelmingness (if that wasn't a word it is now) and had to surface and take a minute. felt really silly, but i tell you, letting a few tears escape and a few deep breaths and it can do wonders for the psyche.
let's see if anyone's reading this...small tangent, sorta related sorta not. i guess we'll see if anyone leaves a msg on my message board, eh? as you know we're taking scuba so we can see more/do more in palau, which is definitely on for jan-feb 2009. matt and i have been talking about few other trips between now and our New Zealand bike trip in 2011. 1 is the trans-america trail on the tandem, if we can find someone willing to drive the truck for our support vehicle. 2 is the mongol rally. but what has me excited is 3-yesterday matt signed us up and paid registration fees for us to do the rickshaw run. 2 weeks of driving across india (yes, the country of india) and nepal in a 3-wheeled tuk-tuk. www.theadventurists.com. we were thinking of doing the summer run in june 2009, but this week they sent out a newsletter tellign of the addition of an easter run, and the moving of june back to sept. so next feb we're in palau, and for easter we'll be driving across india! planning on taking the route thru nepal and visit kathmandu for 1, see the giant stuppa, over and cross the ganges (hopefully this time i won't get strep!) on to agra for the taj mahal, then upwards towards delhi and on up to the north somewhere where the finish line is yet to be determined.
anyway, i was really proud of myself last night. i managed to kneel on the floor of the deep end of the pool. we actually started there as well. learned how to take the 'giant stride' entrance into the pool. as soon as we feel we won't be infringing on class time we'll take a camera with us and get some pics of us all decked out in gear and underwater. we have 1 more classroom/pool session before drysuit training and open water classes start. i made the decision last night that we're going to push them back a month.
i was proud of myself last night because i did it. i was a little nervous (ok, small panic attack when i couldn't hang onto the step between the shallow and deep but still couldn't quite touch the bottom of the pool, but B___ can't remember his name was there and reached out a hand to help steady me. meanwhile matt's just swimming all around the deep like a fish. :-) yay for him. but i did get down there! had to ascend a little once for my ears, but was able to equalize the pressure pretty good. did have a few moments a few times where i wasn't sure about my ears as we spent what seemed to me like hours down there. i'm still having bouyancy issues. as long as i'm swimming i seem to be able to maintain 'altitude'. just checking. 'depth' is more accurate. anyway, sorry, maybe the lack of sleep and no coffee or breakfast yet this am is getting to me. where was i? oh yeah, i tend to follow my head. when i look 'up' to see in front of me my body follows. so i was pretty constantly adjusting to stay down. if i emptied my bc i was too heavy, if i added i was too light. i never did find quite the right balance last night. that, and the fact that i had to struggle to stay put when kneeling, and the fact that i don't know how many times i said to myself ' i just want to surface and get out' last night tells me i'm not ready for open water. i told matt last night before we even got out of the pool that i wanted another night like last night before learning anything new. he says it's ok.
also not entirely sure my physiology will allow me to dive comfortably yet. while i did get down to the floor of the deep end, the fact that i do have problems clearing my ears can stop me from descending. if i'm stuffed up with sinus stuff i'm not going to dive. the last 24 hours before flying home (or to a destination) diving is off-limits. it's strongly encouraged to not dive 24 hours before flying for anyone due to all the pressure changes. even if you surface just fine, when the plane descends on approach you can get bent! and with lymphodema being uh what's the word. not caused by, aggravated by, pressure changes, i have that much more incentive to keep that rule strictly enforced! now i've been out of the pool 10 hours and my left ear is still plugged and i still feel a little queasy in the tummy... not sure how much of that is actual verses psychological. so we'll see.
i think i'll know after that if i'm still having the 'get me out of the pool' thoughts if i want to continue to dive. monetarily it kinda sucks. but there's also good. i've learned how to do something i never thought i would do. i put myself in a totally different element than i'm comfortable with and survived. (like what was cancer????) we'll still go to palau only do more snorkeling. i'm a stronger person for doing this. and all that. but as far as stuff we've purchased, the only gear we've bought which we can't return is the BC - mainly becuase it was custome made to fit our body and we 'spared no expense' and had them monogramed. why not, right? but i can use the BC as a snorkel vest, so that's not a total loss. and even though we've paid for the drysuit training and open water dives we can return them if we decide not to go through with them.
did i have fun last night?
no.
did i have more fun last night than i did last week?
no.
not this time.
6/10/08 scuba
2 more weeks of swimming pool and then we get to don drysuits!
tomorrow is week 3 and we have a substitute teacher.
so, did i have fun last week?
no.
did i have more fun last week than the first week?
yes.
last week was much better. we had gone in over the weekend to look at smaller cylinders and try to tighten down the BC as small as it'd get. it was still a little large, but it was much better. we also put a little more weight on me. i think i had 30 pounds of lead in my pockets!
so i was able to sit down on the bottom of the 4' depth and do the drills. yay! i still wanted to 'lean' some, but i realized if i put my knees slightly apart, and spread my feet out and 'plant them' on the floor of the pool i made myself into a tripod and was able to deal with stuff! yay!
i also just swam around the pool quite a bit. we had private instruction basically - isaac worked with matt and simon stayed with me.
we went thru all the drills again - clearing the regulator all 3 ways, swapping out the regulator and cleaing our secondary air all 3 ways. we even got to the 'i'm out of air!' drill which we walked thru on the surface and then again at 4' under.
i was actually very proud of myself. we did all 3 mask clearing, too. we had done the 1st 2 on the 1st week but my floating issues took too much time to get to the 3rd one. it's the one where you have to take off the mask, put it back on, then blow out the water. yes, for those of us who've never been able to open our eyes undersater this was pretty difficult. i had to talk to myself before doing it telling me it's ok. you can do it! but i did have a bit of panic when instead of breathing in thru the regulator i inhaled thru my nose! OUCH! i popped up to the surface pretty darn fast, i tell you. simon was laughing..."swallow some water????" the 2nd time i tried he held onto my BC so i couldn't just pop up. i did better but still managed to drink a lot of water and had to pop up top. all this did give me the opportunity to practice inflating my BC when i reach the surface, so it wasn't all bad. 3rd - 5th attempts i did successfully. that's why i was so proud of myself. still had a little water to drink but was just a sip in comparision to the 1st 2 tries.
in the advanced class i think they come up behind you and knock off your mask when you don't expect it. i'm SO not looking forward to that. yes, i get it - if you're at depth and the mask comes off you have to find it, put it on and clear it. well, i know i can do everything but find it. so. how does one make sure one doesn't lose a mask? attach it so it can't get away! i'm going to figure out how to tether it to my BC before we get into open water. hahahaha.
it's not cheating, it's misinterpreting the rules! (for all you south park junkies out there).
matt managed to get down to 12' by descending a rope line. he did good, i was proud of him. i had problems. simon had done this with matt and isaac was with me on the other side of the pool. not sure why now, anyway, we started to swim over to the deep end and i had to stop and adjust my mask or something that had me standing up in the pool. [i think i'll be better at not going to surface when we're deeper than what i can stand in.] i admitted to him that all of a sudden i had a wave of nervous anxiety wash over me all of a sudden with the thought of going over the edge of the floor. he assured me he'd be by my side all the way. i got to the rope no problem, and held on. deflated my BC a little bit, but as i started to descend my ears really felt the pressure. i stopped, tried to clear, which didn't work, but it didn't take long for the pressure to equalize anyway and went a little further where i had to stop again. and by a little further i mean 6-12 inches maybe. i can't imagine my head was more than 5 feet below surface. but i didn't look up so i've really no idea. i just no i still had over 1/2 the way to the floor to go. the ears were really feeling it and i was just not able to clear them! had we not talked about it in the classroom earlier i might've been fine. but i tried several ways several times and was just not successful. so i didn't get down to the bottom of the deep end. right now i think my ears and sinuses are what's going to be my guide to how deep i can go. tomorrow i want to try again, adn again. and if i cna't get to the bottom of the pool i'm not sure what we'll do.
anyway, i swam around the 'shallow' part of hte pool some more, cleared the mask again yadda yadda. when i 1st cleared the mask (mask clearing #3) simon gave me a standing O, and we did the little 'happy dance'. it was a joyous moment.
i still can't lift my BC when it's weighted down and has the sylinder attached. i was sitting on the pool deck and shifted it on. there was no way i was able to stand up with it on and not do damage. geez.
so yes, i had more fun than week 1 where we spent most our time floating and doing the 'dead fish roll', but i don't know if i'm "having fun yet".
tomorrow is week 3 and we have a substitute teacher.
so, did i have fun last week?
no.
did i have more fun last week than the first week?
yes.
last week was much better. we had gone in over the weekend to look at smaller cylinders and try to tighten down the BC as small as it'd get. it was still a little large, but it was much better. we also put a little more weight on me. i think i had 30 pounds of lead in my pockets!
so i was able to sit down on the bottom of the 4' depth and do the drills. yay! i still wanted to 'lean' some, but i realized if i put my knees slightly apart, and spread my feet out and 'plant them' on the floor of the pool i made myself into a tripod and was able to deal with stuff! yay!
i also just swam around the pool quite a bit. we had private instruction basically - isaac worked with matt and simon stayed with me.
we went thru all the drills again - clearing the regulator all 3 ways, swapping out the regulator and cleaing our secondary air all 3 ways. we even got to the 'i'm out of air!' drill which we walked thru on the surface and then again at 4' under.
i was actually very proud of myself. we did all 3 mask clearing, too. we had done the 1st 2 on the 1st week but my floating issues took too much time to get to the 3rd one. it's the one where you have to take off the mask, put it back on, then blow out the water. yes, for those of us who've never been able to open our eyes undersater this was pretty difficult. i had to talk to myself before doing it telling me it's ok. you can do it! but i did have a bit of panic when instead of breathing in thru the regulator i inhaled thru my nose! OUCH! i popped up to the surface pretty darn fast, i tell you. simon was laughing..."swallow some water????" the 2nd time i tried he held onto my BC so i couldn't just pop up. i did better but still managed to drink a lot of water and had to pop up top. all this did give me the opportunity to practice inflating my BC when i reach the surface, so it wasn't all bad. 3rd - 5th attempts i did successfully. that's why i was so proud of myself. still had a little water to drink but was just a sip in comparision to the 1st 2 tries.
in the advanced class i think they come up behind you and knock off your mask when you don't expect it. i'm SO not looking forward to that. yes, i get it - if you're at depth and the mask comes off you have to find it, put it on and clear it. well, i know i can do everything but find it. so. how does one make sure one doesn't lose a mask? attach it so it can't get away! i'm going to figure out how to tether it to my BC before we get into open water. hahahaha.
it's not cheating, it's misinterpreting the rules! (for all you south park junkies out there).
matt managed to get down to 12' by descending a rope line. he did good, i was proud of him. i had problems. simon had done this with matt and isaac was with me on the other side of the pool. not sure why now, anyway, we started to swim over to the deep end and i had to stop and adjust my mask or something that had me standing up in the pool. [i think i'll be better at not going to surface when we're deeper than what i can stand in.] i admitted to him that all of a sudden i had a wave of nervous anxiety wash over me all of a sudden with the thought of going over the edge of the floor. he assured me he'd be by my side all the way. i got to the rope no problem, and held on. deflated my BC a little bit, but as i started to descend my ears really felt the pressure. i stopped, tried to clear, which didn't work, but it didn't take long for the pressure to equalize anyway and went a little further where i had to stop again. and by a little further i mean 6-12 inches maybe. i can't imagine my head was more than 5 feet below surface. but i didn't look up so i've really no idea. i just no i still had over 1/2 the way to the floor to go. the ears were really feeling it and i was just not able to clear them! had we not talked about it in the classroom earlier i might've been fine. but i tried several ways several times and was just not successful. so i didn't get down to the bottom of the deep end. right now i think my ears and sinuses are what's going to be my guide to how deep i can go. tomorrow i want to try again, adn again. and if i cna't get to the bottom of the pool i'm not sure what we'll do.
anyway, i swam around the 'shallow' part of hte pool some more, cleared the mask again yadda yadda. when i 1st cleared the mask (mask clearing #3) simon gave me a standing O, and we did the little 'happy dance'. it was a joyous moment.
i still can't lift my BC when it's weighted down and has the sylinder attached. i was sitting on the pool deck and shifted it on. there was no way i was able to stand up with it on and not do damage. geez.
so yes, i had more fun than week 1 where we spent most our time floating and doing the 'dead fish roll', but i don't know if i'm "having fun yet".
5/28/08 scuba
last night was our 1st class in scuba.
did i enjoy it? the jury's still out. matt says he did and is very happy i was there with him.
turns out there are 2 people in a more advanced class than us that were there last night, adn we didn't know they were into diving.
anyway, last night, and the next 2 tuesday nights we have 2 hours in the classroom, and then 2 hours in the swimming pool.
then a written test day
then we have 1 day of intro to open water or somethign like that and
3 open water boat or shore dives.
i remembered a lot of what i read, but unfortunately not the questions he was asking. oh well. our instructor is kinda cool. he's from scotland and has done lots of diving in the very cold north sea. BRRR.
i have to admit while i was looking forward to trying scuba i was pretty darn scared. i've snorkeled a few times, but i've never been very good at being able to stay underwater. i warned whats-his-name-it-starts-with-an-S that i have a bouyancy issue - it takes a lot to get me to sink. i was right. i think we spent a good 45 minutes thru the course of the night trying to get me weighted where i could stay under - and we didn't quite succeed, but we did figure out a few things to do different next week. the main thing is we're meeting up on friday - and we'll try to find a smaller BC - bouyancy compensator - or lifevest/weightbelt/pockets/tank holder thing.
we did learn how to connect all the stuff, as well as what to do after the dive with the gear. while we were trying to adjust my BC we heard a pop. turns out i blew an O-ring. actually i didn't do it, it just was time for that little rubber ring to go. it actually shredded. quite impressive.
we had to swim 6 laps in fins with snorkel and mask to prove we could get around in the water, and then had to tread water for 10 minutes to prove we could at least stay on the surface for a short time :-).
it was extremely hard to stay underwater. we were supposed to get down on the floor of the pool and sit or kneel. once i finally got on my knees and upright, it took 100% of my concentration to remain there! it was very hard to go through the procedures. at one point S had to actually hold me underwater so i could do the mask clear bit. i was actually kind of worried about that step. i remember doing that back when we took a snorkel class in high school. but it went fine. and when i managed to go through the 3 different ways to clear the regulator underwater i did them just fine! but everytime S asked if i was 'ok' it took me a second to ask myself 'am i ok?yes i am' and then signal back 'ok'. at one point matt accidentally bumped into me and man i did not like that at all!. i also found it very frustrating not being able to talk ..i'd have a question or something and i'd have to surface to ask, find out the answer, and then go to all the trouble of getting back underwater.
all in all i'd say i did pretty good. the other 2 gals there last night who are in the more advanced classes were very encouraging. one asked me how i liked it and i had to tell her 'honestly i have no idea'. she giggled but said she felt the same way after her 1st night. they both said things get easier the more you do it. which of course i know.
i was actaully pretty darn scared of the underwater part. but the thought of being able to see so many fish and cool things in their natural habitat is really what's driving me to continue with this. matt has said though, if i hate it it's ok. our friend who plays cello who was there last night came by after and said we looked pretty good. but i've no idea how much he was able to actually watch us seeing as he was deep (sorry) into his stress & rescue class!
near the end of pool time i started to feel light-headed. i'm lucky it happened when it did, becuase it ended our night, we didn't have to go back underwater. i tried to stay down, but i couldn't do it. i was just too 'off' feeling. i signaled i had to go up, and managed to reach for and grab the side of the pool. i think i might've scared S -gee i wish i could remember his - SIMON! i might've scared simon a little because i couldn't talk immediately, and almost the 1st thing out of my mouth after saying i fet a little dizzy was 'get this thing off me, i feel sick'. man did i. just a strong wave of nausea came over me. simon and matt wasted no time in undoing my BC - i was a basket case right then concentrating on standing up, not being sick, and stopping the room from spinning. actually all's ok. we know what the cause was:
we failed to get dinner - we thought there'd be time between selecting gear and the class, but it turns out we didn't. luckily i had brought a carb-bar with me and i ate that 1/2 way through the night. so nothing to eat since lunch. nerves played a big part of it. exertion. man there was plenty of that! a bit of hyperventilation with the canister of air... it was 11 when we got home and started heating pizza for me to eat! i also downed 3 bottles of water between exitign the water and akign up this am.
man my shoulders and neck hurt today! even though you're in water that canister is heavy! i can barely pick it up on land! forget lifting it into the water!
i'm still a little aprehensive about next week. matt and i have talked about seeing if we can hire him for an extra 'let us get all dressed up and just situnder the water' type of thing, to get a little more comfy with it. the nice thing is there are only 3 of us in the class, and the 3rd didn't show last night.
so there you are. i didn't freak out or wig out, but i did have a hard time with certain things.
i can honestly say if i had taken scuba way back when i was in high school like we had originally planned i probably would not have been able to do it. i'm 99% sure that i would've freaked out. simon said (haha) that i wasn't his worst student, so that made me feel a little better.
did i enjoy it? the jury's still out. matt says he did and is very happy i was there with him.
turns out there are 2 people in a more advanced class than us that were there last night, adn we didn't know they were into diving.
anyway, last night, and the next 2 tuesday nights we have 2 hours in the classroom, and then 2 hours in the swimming pool.
then a written test day
then we have 1 day of intro to open water or somethign like that and
3 open water boat or shore dives.
i remembered a lot of what i read, but unfortunately not the questions he was asking. oh well. our instructor is kinda cool. he's from scotland and has done lots of diving in the very cold north sea. BRRR.
i have to admit while i was looking forward to trying scuba i was pretty darn scared. i've snorkeled a few times, but i've never been very good at being able to stay underwater. i warned whats-his-name-it-starts-with-an-S that i have a bouyancy issue - it takes a lot to get me to sink. i was right. i think we spent a good 45 minutes thru the course of the night trying to get me weighted where i could stay under - and we didn't quite succeed, but we did figure out a few things to do different next week. the main thing is we're meeting up on friday - and we'll try to find a smaller BC - bouyancy compensator - or lifevest/weightbelt/pockets/tank holder thing.
we did learn how to connect all the stuff, as well as what to do after the dive with the gear. while we were trying to adjust my BC we heard a pop. turns out i blew an O-ring. actually i didn't do it, it just was time for that little rubber ring to go. it actually shredded. quite impressive.
we had to swim 6 laps in fins with snorkel and mask to prove we could get around in the water, and then had to tread water for 10 minutes to prove we could at least stay on the surface for a short time :-).
it was extremely hard to stay underwater. we were supposed to get down on the floor of the pool and sit or kneel. once i finally got on my knees and upright, it took 100% of my concentration to remain there! it was very hard to go through the procedures. at one point S had to actually hold me underwater so i could do the mask clear bit. i was actually kind of worried about that step. i remember doing that back when we took a snorkel class in high school. but it went fine. and when i managed to go through the 3 different ways to clear the regulator underwater i did them just fine! but everytime S asked if i was 'ok' it took me a second to ask myself 'am i ok?yes i am' and then signal back 'ok'. at one point matt accidentally bumped into me and man i did not like that at all!. i also found it very frustrating not being able to talk ..i'd have a question or something and i'd have to surface to ask, find out the answer, and then go to all the trouble of getting back underwater.
all in all i'd say i did pretty good. the other 2 gals there last night who are in the more advanced classes were very encouraging. one asked me how i liked it and i had to tell her 'honestly i have no idea'. she giggled but said she felt the same way after her 1st night. they both said things get easier the more you do it. which of course i know.
i was actaully pretty darn scared of the underwater part. but the thought of being able to see so many fish and cool things in their natural habitat is really what's driving me to continue with this. matt has said though, if i hate it it's ok. our friend who plays cello who was there last night came by after and said we looked pretty good. but i've no idea how much he was able to actually watch us seeing as he was deep (sorry) into his stress & rescue class!
near the end of pool time i started to feel light-headed. i'm lucky it happened when it did, becuase it ended our night, we didn't have to go back underwater. i tried to stay down, but i couldn't do it. i was just too 'off' feeling. i signaled i had to go up, and managed to reach for and grab the side of the pool. i think i might've scared S -gee i wish i could remember his - SIMON! i might've scared simon a little because i couldn't talk immediately, and almost the 1st thing out of my mouth after saying i fet a little dizzy was 'get this thing off me, i feel sick'. man did i. just a strong wave of nausea came over me. simon and matt wasted no time in undoing my BC - i was a basket case right then concentrating on standing up, not being sick, and stopping the room from spinning. actually all's ok. we know what the cause was:
we failed to get dinner - we thought there'd be time between selecting gear and the class, but it turns out we didn't. luckily i had brought a carb-bar with me and i ate that 1/2 way through the night. so nothing to eat since lunch. nerves played a big part of it. exertion. man there was plenty of that! a bit of hyperventilation with the canister of air... it was 11 when we got home and started heating pizza for me to eat! i also downed 3 bottles of water between exitign the water and akign up this am.
man my shoulders and neck hurt today! even though you're in water that canister is heavy! i can barely pick it up on land! forget lifting it into the water!
i'm still a little aprehensive about next week. matt and i have talked about seeing if we can hire him for an extra 'let us get all dressed up and just situnder the water' type of thing, to get a little more comfy with it. the nice thing is there are only 3 of us in the class, and the 3rd didn't show last night.
so there you are. i didn't freak out or wig out, but i did have a hard time with certain things.
i can honestly say if i had taken scuba way back when i was in high school like we had originally planned i probably would not have been able to do it. i'm 99% sure that i would've freaked out. simon said (haha) that i wasn't his worst student, so that made me feel a little better.
6/20/08 bike
what a glorious day! up into the 80s and sun sun sun! we actually took the camera with us today, but as i found out (and you will soon, too) the battery turned out to be dead. WAH!
no osprey, lots of geese and duck a couple herons, 3 huge eagles circling WAAAAAAYYYY up there. and 2 deer. we actually stoped to watch them until they took off.
we were on east lake sam. and the area they were in the grass was up to their shoulders. they were really young, too! a buck - had the cutest little horns! like those floopey antennae headbands... little 'balls' on top of 'sticks'. adn a doe - no horns at all. we were so close to them! had to be no more than 20 feet! you could see the fuzz from the young buck's horns they were so close! so beautiful!
today was a great day
no osprey, lots of geese and duck a couple herons, 3 huge eagles circling WAAAAAAYYYY up there. and 2 deer. we actually stoped to watch them until they took off.
we were on east lake sam. and the area they were in the grass was up to their shoulders. they were really young, too! a buck - had the cutest little horns! like those floopey antennae headbands... little 'balls' on top of 'sticks'. adn a doe - no horns at all. we were so close to them! had to be no more than 20 feet! you could see the fuzz from the young buck's horns they were so close! so beautiful!
today was a great day
5/28/08 bike
not last weekend - memorial day, but the weekend before that. we had 3 days of glorious upper 70 low 80s and sun. we went out 2 of hte days on the bike.
the 2nd day we chose to go up to marymoor and pick up the trail and ride out to kenmore, basically 12noon on the clock that is lake wa.
wildlife count:
couple herons
goslings
endangered chickens of bothell
an eagle
4, count them FOUR ospreys!
it was a really beautifu day. amazing. just the type of day that is why i moved up here.
the 2nd day we chose to go up to marymoor and pick up the trail and ride out to kenmore, basically 12noon on the clock that is lake wa.
wildlife count:
couple herons
goslings
endangered chickens of bothell
an eagle
4, count them FOUR ospreys!
it was a really beautifu day. amazing. just the type of day that is why i moved up here.
4/26/08 bike
today was gorgeous! last weekend it was 35, snowing, hail, sleet, you name it. today sun and 70. so we took the bike out. how could we not? it was a great ride. 3 eagles soaring overhead today. we went around the south end of lake wa. somewhere around 30-35 miles with moderate hills for about 1/2 the ride. now even though i feel totally wiped, but strangely refreshed...
4/14/08 bike
so this past weekend was our 1st official bike ride in seattle of the season. on friday we went around lake sammamish. 25 miles and i felt wiped afterwards. the day was mostly cloudy but in the 60s. then saturday we drove down to the green river trail and rode it all the way to the interurban and rode that down to auburn for lunch and then back. 99% flat, but was almost 50 miles. talk about out of shape! this was the 1st since we got back from hawai'i.
saturday was a good game day
3 heron, and at least a dozen raptors- 2 were pretty sure were hawks, 3 we know were adult eagles (white feathers) the others could've been hawks or young eagles.
saturday was a good game day
3 heron, and at least a dozen raptors- 2 were pretty sure were hawks, 3 we know were adult eagles (white feathers) the others could've been hawks or young eagles.
1/22/08 bike
35f, very few clouds, and it's butt-cold out there!
what do we do? we don the new cold-weather biking gear matt got us and take the tandem out! it's some real nice outfits. assos brand, the warmest jacket and tight/bib they make for both male and females. toasty!
2 hawks,
2 eagles
it's actually the 1st time we've had the tandem out since before christmas. man it almost kicked my butt today! and i've been riding at the club after my lebed class! ah well, hawaii will kick us into shape if we aren't by the time we get there!
what do we do? we don the new cold-weather biking gear matt got us and take the tandem out! it's some real nice outfits. assos brand, the warmest jacket and tight/bib they make for both male and females. toasty!
2 hawks,
2 eagles
it's actually the 1st time we've had the tandem out since before christmas. man it almost kicked my butt today! and i've been riding at the club after my lebed class! ah well, hawaii will kick us into shape if we aren't by the time we get there!
11/5/07 bike
wow. what a day! temps in the uppwe 40s and not a cloud in the sky! smashed our record for lake sam, too! 1hr 22mins. that's the 1st time i've been on the bike since the surgery.
wildlife count:
1 eagle
2 redtail hawks
wildlife count:
1 eagle
2 redtail hawks
7/17/07 bike
OK! we did it!
lots more details later, as well as photos...
meanwhile, here are a few pics from our training rides and matt putting the paketa together.
lots more details later, as well as photos...
meanwhile, here are a few pics from our training rides and matt putting the paketa together.
6/19/07 bike
So we didn't bike much this past weekend due to the kidney stone. gee, tell you something new, eh? we did go out on sunday for a short ride. i actually slept about 15-16 hours of each day friday and saturday. we started going around the south and east side of lake sam. overall we didn't get very far. it started to rain around 4. we made it to bothell and then back to the herb farm where were picking up the truck from dinner the night before. we stoped at rei on the way home. matt decided he wanted some rain gear. we picked up some buffs. never thought i'd say that phrase before! a few gearhead stuff for the bike, 200$ and 30 minutes later we're on the way home.
it was a good day overall. saw 1/2 dozen heron flying, wading, standing, 5 or 6 eagles - 1 teenager swooped around and came in for a landing on a treetop. another couple teenagers flew real low overhead, and we saw a huge adult flying low near the lake shore. outside of the pigeons, ducks, geese, bunnies and numerous leashed puppies, there was a deer along the road eating veg. it was a young buck in the same place we've seen the other deer. i actually remembered i had the camera with us and snapped a picture of it, but it's still in the camera since i haven't figured out how to download it to the pc. but once i do i'll post it up, along with any other pics i've taken to that date of our rides.
yesterday matt sent me a link to www.santanatandems.com. while we were at the pit stop in woodinville another tandem pulled up. it was a santana. they're one of the top tandem makers in teh country. we talked to them for a few minutes. anyway, they run some organized tandem bike tours, one is to hawaii for valentine's day. it's like 8 days on 3 islands - kona, and 2 other smaller ones. not the big island or maui. there's a trip to the top of this volcano (i think) before sunrise, you watch the sun come up, then get on your bike and coast down the longest paved downhill in the country or something like that. it's 10,000 feet or some gosh awful altitude. they also have landtours, some hiking, snorkling, swim with dolphins etc. you can participate in along the way. he's seriously thinking of booking us on. he called them to talk to them today in fact. he gave me a wonderful, huge surprise. while he was talking to them about hawaii their tuscany tour came up and she said she had had a couple cancel, so if we wanted the spots we could have them. so this september for 10 days or so we're going to tandem around tuscany, italy! i'm so psyched! hopefully i'll be done with all my 'procedures' but i guess there's a chance i'll still have a bit to go. either way, i'm not going to worry about it. anyway, after the STP i'll keep this cycling thread going, and will take lots of pictures while in italy adn post them.
it was a good day overall. saw 1/2 dozen heron flying, wading, standing, 5 or 6 eagles - 1 teenager swooped around and came in for a landing on a treetop. another couple teenagers flew real low overhead, and we saw a huge adult flying low near the lake shore. outside of the pigeons, ducks, geese, bunnies and numerous leashed puppies, there was a deer along the road eating veg. it was a young buck in the same place we've seen the other deer. i actually remembered i had the camera with us and snapped a picture of it, but it's still in the camera since i haven't figured out how to download it to the pc. but once i do i'll post it up, along with any other pics i've taken to that date of our rides.
yesterday matt sent me a link to www.santanatandems.com. while we were at the pit stop in woodinville another tandem pulled up. it was a santana. they're one of the top tandem makers in teh country. we talked to them for a few minutes. anyway, they run some organized tandem bike tours, one is to hawaii for valentine's day. it's like 8 days on 3 islands - kona, and 2 other smaller ones. not the big island or maui. there's a trip to the top of this volcano (i think) before sunrise, you watch the sun come up, then get on your bike and coast down the longest paved downhill in the country or something like that. it's 10,000 feet or some gosh awful altitude. they also have landtours, some hiking, snorkling, swim with dolphins etc. you can participate in along the way. he's seriously thinking of booking us on. he called them to talk to them today in fact. he gave me a wonderful, huge surprise. while he was talking to them about hawaii their tuscany tour came up and she said she had had a couple cancel, so if we wanted the spots we could have them. so this september for 10 days or so we're going to tandem around tuscany, italy! i'm so psyched! hopefully i'll be done with all my 'procedures'
6/15/07 bike
we had an interesting turn early this morning. since we've been taking the longer and longer rides and the weather's getting warmer we've been trying to figure out what i guess one would call the 'proper hydration %' etc. last wed's ride was cooler than some, and i noticed i didn't drink as much as i had the weekend previous. dehydration for those with a history of kidney stones isn't a good thing.
at 4:00 am this morning i woke matt. i had taken 4 ibu but was still pretty much writhing in pain. he got me a dilauded we had left from the mastectomy and it didn't seem to do anything. after 10 minutes (if that) we got dressed and went to the E.R. they started me on a bag of saline - the nurse said my skin looked a little dry. we got some more dilauded, some zoloft (i think that was it) for nausea, and something that starts with a 'T' which is basically an ibu medicine. a couple x-rays and a CAT scan later and it was confirmed. a 2-3mm stone wasn't far from my bladder. so i've ended up with an unexpected day of rest.
we're still planning on doing the flying wheels training ride tomorrow, but we may end up bailing at 30 miles instead of doing the full 65 we signed up for.
at 4:00 am this morning i woke matt. i had taken 4 ibu but was still pretty much writhing in pain. he got me a dilauded we had left from the mastectomy and it didn't seem to do anything. after 10 minutes (if that) we got dressed and went to the E.R. they started me on a bag of saline - the nurse said my skin looked a little dry. we got some more dilauded, some zoloft (i think that was it) for nausea, and something that starts with a 'T' which is basically an ibu medicine. a couple x-rays and a CAT scan later and it was confirmed. a 2-3mm stone wasn't far from my bladder. so i've ended up with an unexpected day of rest.
we're still planning on doing the flying wheels training ride tomorrow, but we may end up bailing at 30 miles instead of doing the full 65 we signed up for.
6/10/07 bike
Well if we weren't certain if i were crazy or not, i think after saturay the answer is an unequivicable 'yes'. we had a 3 hour dress rehearsal in the morning so it was about 2 by the time we actually were in the saddle. We drove down to marymoore and parked the truck, thinking we'd do the "65 mile flying wheels route" that we're participating in next saturday. Well we took the overview map with us, not the triptik, and let me say the map sucked! we never saw 'the fork in the road' to keep left and ended up heading north on the road we were supposed to be returning south on as a result. we end up cycling through this valley and past the nestle's farm/plant. next thing we know we're in carnation! we stopped and had a mocha and checked in 'with a local' to get directions to someplace on our map; hopefully on the FW route. And we did, but then we missed a turn, and then we missed another street - and it ain't as if we weren't looking! so we end up asking a guy who was out to collect his mail, and he said we were too far south and gave us directions up onto the sammamish plateau to a place we knew. he said it was a lovely ride but it was a hill. he was not exaggerating! that thing went on for miles! well ok, maybe not miles. but more than 1, and at a 9-10% grade, too! that's a pretty darn steep hill to be biking up! total miles were in the low 50s. as for wildlife it was a great day. several eagles, what we're going to call a heron (more on that soon), cows, horses, and a deer. if anyone recognizes this description and knows what kind of bird this is, please let us know. we think it was a heron. it's overall shape was a heron, only it seemed much larger than any i've seen. but then again it did fly out from between the 'forest' trees about 20 feet from us. it was black - or so dark it looked black. there was no color variance on the underside we noticed at all, and it had it's wings outstretched - just sailed right past us! other than that it had the same kind of feet, and beak, only it's beak was very vibrant color orangy-yellow, not muted like all the other herons i've seen around here. a google search by both of us and we came up will nill photos of anything close.
now you might be wondering why i've said i must be bonkers. yesterday was maybe a high of 60 degrees. There was no sun. none. nada. not even a cloud fault up there. and it rained. oh how it rained! matt's shoes got so wet they were still wet when he put them on today at 5 for our ride! he definitely got the worst of it, being in front as part of that. since i tend to get cold pretty fast i wore a goretek jacket under my raincoat, hood up under my helmet, full gloves, and rain pants and shoe covers (raincoats for shoes). when we got back to the truck i was at least able to peel off my outer layer of clothing and was dry (and warm). i'll bet before our next rainy ride matt goes to the store and gets some raingear!
i've included a few pics with this post. the 1st is the overall mapview of the flying wheels, and the 2nd is the route we took. i've also included a pic of the elevation graph from yesterday's ride.
we ordered one of those teeny light-weight digital cameras for the STP, and will hopefully have it before FW. I thought it'd be great to take some pics on the ride. And since we've been seeing so many eagles, herons and now deer, it'll be fun to take pics along our weekly rides, too.
so matt's been looking at new tandems for us for a bit now. ours is an aluminum frame from 1998. yes, it used to be a rental, ok? we got it cheap. there are several materials, lots of different accessories... i won't bore you with all the details. ok, it's probably more accurate (and honest) to say i can't remember all the stuff matt's told me about all the bikes. what i do know is that he decided to get one of the top tandem that's made. here's the link to the company. our tandem will actually look very similar to the picture on their page. our seats and handlebars will be different, but the shape and color is right. http://paketa.com/tandems.htm
today was very windy. i was up at 4.30 for a couple hours this morning. but there was quite a lot of blue up there. i had decided if i was still awake at 6 i was going to wake matt so we could get out on the bike early. who knows what wildlife we'd see at that time. well i did manage to go back to sleep, so we had to wait until tonight to ride. i am thankful the weather actually held. we saw a couple eagles soaring way up high on thermals both directions around the lake tonight. on the way back we rode past 3 deer not 50 feet away from hte side of the road. they are so beautiful. these were young deer and they were large. today we went 31.31 miles in 2:00:28.
pictures:
FW = this is the official route map. the top-most loop is for the 100 mile riders which matt and i are not doing.
FW2 = this is the elevation graph for that route. remove a bit from the middle for that top loop...
ourFW = this is what we did on sat
ourFW2 = this is our graph
now you might be wondering why i've said i must be bonkers. yesterday was maybe a high of 60 degrees. There was no sun. none. nada. not even a cloud fault up there. and it rained. oh how it rained! matt's shoes got so wet they were still wet when he put them on today at 5 for our ride! he definitely got the worst of it, being in front as part of that. since i tend to get cold pretty fast i wore a goretek jacket under my raincoat, hood up under my helmet, full gloves, and rain pants and shoe covers (raincoats for shoes). when we got back to the truck i was at least able to peel off my outer layer of clothing and was dry (and warm). i'll bet before our next rainy ride matt goes to the store and gets some raingear!
i've included a few pics with this post. the 1st is the overall mapview of the flying wheels, and the 2nd is the route we took. i've also included a pic of the elevation graph from yesterday's ride.
we ordered one of those teeny light-weight digital cameras for the STP, and will hopefully have it before FW. I thought it'd be great to take some pics on the ride. And since we've been seeing so many eagles, herons and now deer, it'll be fun to take pics along our weekly rides, too.
so matt's been looking at new tandems for us for a bit now. ours is an aluminum frame from 1998. yes, it used to be a rental, ok? we got it cheap. there are several materials, lots of different accessories... i won't bore you with all the details. ok, it's probably more accurate (and honest) to say i can't remember all the stuff matt's told me about all the bikes. what i do know is that he decided to get one of the top tandem that's made. here's the link to the company. our tandem will actually look very similar to the picture on their page. our seats and handlebars will be different, but the shape and color is right. http://paketa.com/tandems.htm
today was very windy. i was up at 4.30 for a couple hours this morning. but there was quite a lot of blue up there. i had decided if i was still awake at 6 i was going to wake matt so we could get out on the bike early. who knows what wildlife we'd see at that time. well i did manage to go back to sleep, so we had to wait until tonight to ride. i am thankful the weather actually held. we saw a couple eagles soaring way up high on thermals both directions around the lake tonight. on the way back we rode past 3 deer not 50 feet away from hte side of the road. they are so beautiful. these were young deer and they were large. today we went 31.31 miles in 2:00:28.
pictures:
FW = this is the official route map. the top-most loop is for the 100 mile riders which matt and i are not doing.
FW2 = this is the elevation graph for that route. remove a bit from the middle for that top loop...
ourFW = this is what we did on sat
ourFW2 = this is our graph
6/3/07 bike
Saturday was a great day. We rode 80 miles in distance. The down side is we're supposed to ride 80 miles on Sunday, too.
total time door to door: minutes over 8 hours
total bike time: 5hr 14 mins
pace: 15mph
on return from uVillage to Woodinville we averaged 19 mph!
we saw (y'all know the tune):
10 eagles - 1 which was swooping and dive-bombing is the best I can describe it.
3 herons - 1 coming in for a landing on the slough.
1 osprey
and
1 deer - less than 30 feet from us eating the veg. along the roadside.
There's a time & temp. board about an hour into the ride on the route we took this weekend. Yesterday we left at 10.45, today at 10.30. Yesterday the temp. read 77f and today it was up to 83f. Today was very hot. We had to be careful not to overheat. We started out ok, we were in the middle of lunch and only 4hrs out (total time, not bike time). That includes a longer pitstop at 1 park becuase I started to feel sick and needed water and salt. Our return was where we broke our pacing. We were going a little slower because of the heat, and we took longer at marymoor. - Gee you gotta love the friendly bikers up here! Then 1/2 way or so around the lake we stopped for a quick swig of water behind a parked car; which turned out to be broken down and the guy asked to use our cell phone. So that was 20 minutes or so while he tried to reach and converse with AAA. Try explaining to someone who's not familiar with that lake road where you've broken down! Actually the last 3 hours it did start to cool down. Clouds started moving in about 3ish, and the wind picked up. By 6 it was actually cloudy.
11 eagle - 3 adults and 1 juvenile we watched circle pretty close to us while we were at 1 of the parks. They were close enough you could see their eyes. They were so majestic.
4 heron
2 osprey - 1 in flight
1 hawk
I thought I'd be in a world of hurt, but aside from a bit of numbness in my ass-cheeks (hhmm, I wonder if cycling is where the phrase 'numb-nuts' came from...) legs feel pretty good, and I feel tired but surprisingly refreshed.
total time door to door: minutes over 8 hours
total bike time: 5hr 14 mins
pace: 15mph
on return from uVillage to Woodinville we averaged 19 mph!
we saw (y'all know the tune):
10 eagles - 1 which was swooping and dive-bombing is the best I can describe it.
3 herons - 1 coming in for a landing on the slough.
1 osprey
and
1 deer - less than 30 feet from us eating the veg. along the roadside.
There's a time & temp. board about an hour into the ride on the route we took this weekend. Yesterday we left at 10.45, today at 10.30. Yesterday the temp. read 77f and today it was up to 83f. Today was very hot. We had to be careful not to overheat. We started out ok, we were in the middle of lunch and only 4hrs out (total time, not bike time). That includes a longer pitstop at 1 park becuase I started to feel sick and needed water and salt. Our return was where we broke our pacing. We were going a little slower because of the heat, and we took longer at marymoor. - Gee you gotta love the friendly bikers up here! Then 1/2 way or so around the lake we stopped for a quick swig of water behind a parked car; which turned out to be broken down and the guy asked to use our cell phone. So that was 20 minutes or so while he tried to reach and converse with AAA. Try explaining to someone who's not familiar with that lake road where you've broken down! Actually the last 3 hours it did start to cool down. Clouds started moving in about 3ish, and the wind picked up. By 6 it was actually cloudy.
11 eagle - 3 adults and 1 juvenile we watched circle pretty close to us while we were at 1 of the parks. They were close enough you could see their eyes. They were so majestic.
4 heron
2 osprey - 1 in flight
1 hawk
I thought I'd be in a world of hurt, but aside from a bit of numbness in my ass-cheeks (hhmm, I wonder if cycling is where the phrase 'numb-nuts' came from...) legs feel pretty good, and I feel tired but surprisingly refreshed.
6/1/07 bike
We're definitely getting better at cycling. This past Wednesday was an 'easy day' according to the training schedule. We were only required to cycle 20 miles. So we decided to ride around Lake Sammamish instead of riding up to Bothell. Total miles ~23.
But what was amazing was we were able to continue smashing our previous bests. Not to mention we saw several herons and eagles on the ride. We have this handy-dandy little cycle computer that tells us our heart rate, calories burned, tracks elevation, rate of speed, will record via gps the route you just rode, as well as downloading nto it premade routes on the pc. It might do other stuff, but that's all I remember. Anyway, when I looked at my watch I knew we had done something great.
The 1st time we did that loop we stopped at the IHOP about 3/4 of the way around and filled up on waffles and bacon. I remember thinking "I'm dying!" my legs hurt so bad! It took us over 3 hours that first trip. Our norm now for that ride is between 2.5-3 hours. It has also become our 'we only have a short time to ride today' ride. Last Wed. we were home in 1 hour 50 minutes. Actual bike time was 1.5 hrs. our top speed was 23 mph. And we averaged 16.something mph when you factor in headwind and hills.
When we got home we were both hungry and tired, but we also felt very refreshed, envigorated maybe. It was a good day.
But what was amazing was we were able to continue smashing our previous bests. Not to mention we saw several herons and eagles on the ride. We have this handy-dandy little cycle computer that tells us our heart rate, calories burned, tracks elevation, rate of speed, will record via gps the route you just rode, as well as downloading nto it premade routes on the pc. It might do other stuff, but that's all I remember. Anyway, when I looked at my watch I knew we had done something great.
The 1st time we did that loop we stopped at the IHOP about 3/4 of the way around and filled up on waffles and bacon. I remember thinking "I'm dying!" my legs hurt so bad! It took us over 3 hours that first trip. Our norm now for that ride is between 2.5-3 hours. It has also become our 'we only have a short time to ride today' ride. Last Wed. we were home in 1 hour 50 minutes. Actual bike time was 1.5 hrs. our top speed was 23 mph. And we averaged 16.something mph when you factor in headwind and hills.
When we got home we were both hungry and tired, but we also felt very refreshed, envigorated maybe. It was a good day.
5/28/07 bike
Wow, what a beautiful day it was today!
Last Saturday we drove down to the Green River Trail adn cycled ~15 miles to Kent and then turned south on the Interurban Trail. This runs all the way to Sumner, or basically the King/Pierce county line. From there we hopped over to the Valley Hwy, which is part of the STP route, and rode through Puyallup to 'The Hill'.
'The Hill' is a 1 mile long hill at 7% grade. They say if you can conquer The Hill you can do the rest of the STP no problem. Turns out we burned up that hill! It's not as steep as the Factoria hill, nor the Bell-Red hill, both of which are slightly longer than the Puyallup Hill. It felt good knowing that 35 miles in we can smoke up that thing.
It was super nice that day. We saw 5 or 6 eagles, and we both got a little sunburned. we also smashed our speed record. We've been averaging 4+ hours on the bike when we were doing 50-60 mile rides. but this week we were on the bike just over 4.5 hours and rode 70 miles! The pace is picking up!
Sunday it rained. Yuk. At last Matt decides this is supposed to be fun so we won't have to go out and ride in the rain.
Today was just gorgeous again. It started out a little, well, a lot cloudy. There were a few threatening clouds up there when we started, but they blew over pretty quickly. We rode another 70 miles today, give or take a mile. The 'it's a good day' phrase became 'it's a great day' when we tallied the following sightings:
swan: 1
red-tailed hawk: 1 (ok, this might've been a young eagle but we're gonna call it a hawk)
herons: 5
eagles: 12
it just doesn't get any better than a sunny day, riding around the lake, watching eagles fly.
next week we're supposed to do back-to-back 80s. ugh.
Last Saturday we drove down to the Green River Trail adn cycled ~15 miles to Kent and then turned south on the Interurban Trail. This runs all the way to Sumner, or basically the King/Pierce county line. From there we hopped over to the Valley Hwy, which is part of the STP route, and rode through Puyallup to 'The Hill'.
'The Hill' is a 1 mile long hill at 7% grade. They say if you can conquer The Hill you can do the rest of the STP no problem. Turns out we burned up that hill! It's not as steep as the Factoria hill, nor the Bell-Red hill, both of which are slightly longer than the Puyallup Hill. It felt good knowing that 35 miles in we can smoke up that thing.
It was super nice that day. We saw 5 or 6 eagles, and we both got a little sunburned. we also smashed our speed record. We've been averaging 4+ hours on the bike when we were doing 50-60 mile rides. but this week we were on the bike just over 4.5 hours and rode 70 miles! The pace is picking up!
Sunday it rained. Yuk. At last Matt decides this is supposed to be fun so we won't have to go out and ride in the rain.
Today was just gorgeous again. It started out a little, well, a lot cloudy. There were a few threatening clouds up there when we started, but they blew over pretty quickly. We rode another 70 miles today, give or take a mile. The 'it's a good day' phrase became 'it's a great day' when we tallied the following sightings:
swan: 1
red-tailed hawk: 1 (ok, this might've been a young eagle but we're gonna call it a hawk)
herons: 5
eagles: 12
it just doesn't get any better than a sunny day, riding around the lake, watching eagles fly.
next week we're supposed to do back-to-back 80s. ugh.
5/15/07 bike
Last weekend we rode 133 miles. On Saturday we left the house, went around the south end of Lake WA and up the east side to Marymoor park. Then we hooked up with the Sammamish Trail north to the Burke-Gilman and rode to U.Village and back after lunch. Sunday we skipped the Lake Sam. part and went out to Ballard and back via the same trails. I have only 1 word to describe what that feels like: OW.
4/22/07 bike
Well, the recumbent came in about 6pm last night, Saturday. After dinner and a movie we went up and brought everything into the kitchen and mostly Matt put the bike together. There wasn’t much I could do, either in know-how or strength, so I worked on a puzzle in the dining room and was there for the odd 3rd hand needed kind of thing. I was in there looking for pieces to go together and I’d hear “HHmm, what’s this? I’ve no idea where it goes, it must be an extra part.” Or “Uh, I think that goes there…” I have to say, and Matt know this, it didn’t’ instill a sense of confidence in me that we wouldn’t find ourselves on our ass in the middle of the road the first attempt we tried the thing.
We had arranged to bike with the recumbent today with a friend and were really not sure if we’d even have the bike. So today we take it out to the street to give it a try before taking it out on the trail. Good thing, too. Mostly because we found that in putting the bike together for the 2 of us, we need to shorten the front chain. There were several neighbors outside talking to each other since it turned out to be a really nice day – it was earth day, you know! The middle child across the street was asking abut the bike, and why it was so low. I don’t think she’d ever seen one of these before. Jennifer came out and was like “OH COOL! I gotta get a picture of this!” and snapped one with her cell. I hope she emails it to us and I’ll post it in the blog photos link area, wherever that is, but it’s on the main page. A few others were getting ready to leave and wanted to watch, but we were like – don’t wait for us, we’d rather have the room of the road. It took us a few times to even get our feet up on the pedals. We realized we were in a high gear and it was very hard to get started so we had to get off the bike to spin the wheels to adjust that. Then the girl from across the street had a good idea. Since we were having troubles with momentum, she suggested we go a little way up the hill on our road, kind of like pushing a car to jump-start it. And it worked. We actually got feet on pedals, and went about 3 houses length when we lost the chain. Once we had it back on we turned the bike around and tried to go again, this time we didn’t go up the hill and we got it going! YAY! And we were headed right for a truck. Not only do you have a totally different physical position, the steering and shifting is totally different. Handlebars are below you, so Matt has to learn how to ‘drive’ again, and he will need to learn how to shift without really looking at the shifter since it’s almost under his seat! You’ll be happy to know we missed the truck, and got 3 or 4 houses again before we lost the chain again. It was at that moment we decided we’d have to bail on the recumbent bike ride until we could adjust the chain length. Oh well.
We had arranged to bike with the recumbent today with a friend and were really not sure if we’d even have the bike. So today we take it out to the street to give it a try before taking it out on the trail. Good thing, too. Mostly because we found that in putting the bike together for the 2 of us, we need to shorten the front chain. There were several neighbors outside talking to each other since it turned out to be a really nice day – it was earth day, you know! The middle child across the street was asking abut the bike, and why it was so low. I don’t think she’d ever seen one of these before. Jennifer came out and was like “OH COOL! I gotta get a picture of this!” and snapped one with her cell. I hope she emails it to us and I’ll post it in the blog photos link area, wherever that is, but it’s on the main page. A few others were getting ready to leave and wanted to watch, but we were like – don’t wait for us, we’d rather have the room of the road. It took us a few times to even get our feet up on the pedals. We realized we were in a high gear and it was very hard to get started so we had to get off the bike to spin the wheels to adjust that. Then the girl from across the street had a good idea. Since we were having troubles with momentum, she suggested we go a little way up the hill on our road, kind of like pushing a car to jump-start it. And it worked. We actually got feet on pedals, and went about 3 houses length when we lost the chain. Once we had it back on we turned the bike around and tried to go again, this time we didn’t go up the hill and we got it going! YAY! And we were headed right for a truck. Not only do you have a totally different physical position, the steering and shifting is totally different. Handlebars are below you, so Matt has to learn how to ‘drive’ again, and he will need to learn how to shift without really looking at the shifter since it’s almost under his seat! You’ll be happy to know we missed the truck, and got 3 or 4 houses again before we lost the chain again. It was at that moment we decided we’d have to bail on the recumbent bike ride until we could adjust the chain length. Oh well.
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