Pictures and Stories

I thought I'd like to share some pictures and stories of some of my past adventures with you.

White Water - Hiko, WV

This first picture came from a school trip to Hiko, WV. This picture was taken on the New River. Kettering has an outdoors club that makes an annual trip to make this run down the river. My Advice: If you are ever around Hiko, or looking for whitewater rafting, go with Songer White Water. It was clear that the Songer guides were more experienced and cared more than any of the other companies that we saw on the river. Our guides constantly gave us information about what was coming up next, and they explained quite a bit about the river during the downtime. It was actually quite normal to catch the patrons on other boats trying to snoop on to what our guides were saying while their guides just let them sit and be bored. Also, the Songer guides were able to get us through most of the really nasty class 5 rapids without wiping. This is in contrast to other companies on the river, of whom we saw quite a few really nasty wipe-outs. This was definitely a once in a lifetime, must do.

SCUBA - Summersville, WV

Well of course I can't be near open water without getting some nitrox in my system. We went out and hit Summersville Lake. The visibility was very good down to 65'. After 65' visibility was non-existent. There was not a ton to see here, this was mainly a wall-dive. The rock formations were quite stunning though. I understand that Summersville Lake supplys Summersville Damn. When the damn opens, the water level drops 15' to 20' so many of the really cool formations that we saw underwater are actually above water. The exclusive charter on Summersville

 lake is out of Sarges Dive shop. We had good experiences dealing with Mark from Sarges. He managed to provide two days of dives at very competitive prices. In hind-site, I would have packed more sunscreen. Now that I have more experiences under my belt in regards to diving, I can see that Summersville is more of a beginners dive. I think I would really enjoy taking my gear and exploring below the 65' mark. Apparently the average depth tops out at 250' which is far over recreational limits. Hiko, WV was definitely a fun trip between the diving and the rafting.

Ginnie Springs - High Springs, FL

First cavern dive WOOT! There, now that I got that out of my system. Ginnie springs is very... unique. Its a spring and an attached cavern. Its pretty safe for new divers basically you have access to about 250' of cave that is barred off at the back. The cool part is fact that if you can get upto that bar you can feel 350M gallons of water screaming past. The real attraction to this dive is not the wildlife, or the depth its the caverns. If you look at the first picture you can see columns of bubbles behind me. These are actually exhaled from divers that were below in the cavern. Once you get inside the cavern you will notice a nice white sand bottom, and plenty of maneuvering room. In order to get into the cavern you need to access 

through one of about 3 large entrances. We made it down last time at the end of March. We dove on a Saturday and much to our surprise there were about 35 open water students doing checkouts in the open area near the mouth of the cavern. We managed to log two dives at this site, and after a few hairy moments we actually figured out how to work an Oceanic Veo dive computer. Figures, it was pretty much foolproof. Although I have outgrown the computer now the Veo did log my first 50 dives, and thats something that I would recommend for any new diver. No more dive tables, well at least until you hit nitrox then you get three more. 

Gilboa Quarry - Gilboa, OH

Well here is where I talk about Gilboa. Gilboa touts itsself as the midwests primer dive venue, I have to disagree with that. However, Gilboa does have some interesting things to see for all levels of divers. From a cargo helicopter to a stripped down airplane Gilboa has it all. If you can get down there on a week day its desolate. Gilboa is a flooded rock quarry that ranges from 121' at its deepest point which is off limits to new divers to 30' around the edges. They have all kinds of platforms which makes training there really easy. Deep was very convienient too, with platforms at 60 and 100 feet, it was really easy to descend right down the lines to do the checkout, however it was rreeaaaallllyyy cold. 

Great Lakes Shipwreck Diving - Alpena, MI
We hit the following wrecks while in Alpena:
The Grecian (AMAZING)
The Nordmeer (WTF)
The Thew
I will start with the thew, it was mostly busticated. however the bow was intact and you could swim along it. The Nordmeer was a very interesting one, as we pulled up onto the site I saw something on the horizon. "Is that another boat on the dive site" I asked outloud, "That is the dive site" the captain replyed. The Nordmeer was stranded in shallow water and gets smushed more by ice every winter. The best dive of the entire trip was the Grecian. We dove the bow, the sheer scale of which I found AMAZING. It seemed like you could look 40' up and 40' down and never see the end of it. I understand that the bow is the more amazing part of the wreck, but I didnt make it down there.

 Loch Low Minn - Athens, TN

This is an awesome panoramic from Loch Low Minn, in Athens, TN. This place is crazy stocked with paddlefish. The paddlefish is a reclusive prehistoric fish that has a huge freaking nose. They eat kelp in the water. The staff at the Loch believe that they have 20 to 30 different fish and I can personally tell you that they are between 3 to 6 feet long.They are the kind of thing that will sneak up behind you and startle you.

Portage Quarry - Findlay, OH

Well I have to go on the record and say that I much prefer Portage quarry over Gilboa quarry. Portage is much larger and has much more to see, however it is not as deep. The cool things to do at portage include checking out the Silo. Which stands upright at about 60' and you can swim up through it emerging at about 20'. Also, there is a semi truck trailer which i have come across once which is very disorienting to swim through since it lays sideways on an angle. Like Gilboa, portage also has a plane and several cars boats and swim-troughs. Apparently there is a 'Seven Car Pileup' which is seven cars stacked on top of each other. I have looked for it about 6 times and have never found it. I am beginning to think it doesnt really exist. I think the real reason why I prefer Portage is because it has more to see and it is much less expensive than Gilboa. The owner of Gilboa nickels and dimes everything from parking passes to air, as opposed to the very inexpensive parking and very competitively priced air at Portage. Viz is extremely variable, I have dove portage on about 4 seperate occasions now. Three had great Viz, one had terrible viz due to rain and wind.