These are the questions I've been wrestling with for years since learning what a 'blog' was. My first (and still running) impression is that blogs are for people who either: have too much time on their hands, just love to abuse the spelling of 'definitely', or simply feel that the world is more interesting in virtual reality than Real Life(tm).
Many people accuse me of being a 'net addict... though it is true that over half my livelihood is made via the internet (the other half is in electronics design), I definitely have a 'work to live' attitude, not 'live to work'. In the same way I 'internet to work', not 'internet-is-my-life'. If at anytime you don't have something more interesting to do than surf the 'net randomly, then it is time to start a new hobby. Or at least get out of the house and see what's outside the front door.
So back to the original question, Why blog? There's got to be as many reasons as there are blogs, though I think the two most common must be: (1) there's a lot of interesting things going on in my life and I can't help but write about them... before I forget the details! or (2) writing is therapeautic for me and it helps me work through 'X', or try to understand 'Y' in my life. Without a doubt, the purpose of this blog is (1). I feel blessed to have a really interesting life, but in the past six months... no make that the past ten YEARS, it has been a fascinating and exciting journey with the last three months living on Isla de Cozumel being a non-stop tour de force.
Truth to tell, one activity stands above all else, and that is what I will be writing about... mostly. Cave Diving began as a semi-whim three years ago when Tracey and I wanted to try a different kind of scuba diving. On our first trip to Mexico we heard about cenote dives and saw many pretty pictures in the shop windows. I was enticed. We hired a guide (who would later become our cave diving instructor) and did two spectacular dives at Dos Ojos in the Riviera Maya region of Mexico.
Just like Discover Scuba was for Tracey just after we met, Cave Diving then became a major interest for me in the following year. When we returned to Cozumel in '04, getting our cave diving rating seemed like the right thing to do and for all the right reasons: we had over 100 dives under our belts, we wanted to do more than just cenote dives with guides, and we believed that the techniques taught in Cave Diving would make us better, safer divers. Thus began our introduction to the mystical world beyond 'recreational' scuba into full technical ('tec') diving. The two really are different like day and night... almost literally. The training was difficult and stressful, we took an unplanned few days' break in the middle of it to do some simpler ocean diving... but in the end we got our Intro to Cave certs with flying colours and a great sense of accomplishment.
Now let me take a moment to explain this whole certification thing. To try scuba diving for the first time you don't need to be CERTIFIED, but you do need about 1-2 hours of basic training in the gear and you can only go with a professional on a limited 'led-by-the-nose' dive. Not that this isn't a fascinating experience in itself , but if you love it like I did, it isn't enough. (Thinking back on it, if you fall for the whole scuba addiction, no experience underwater is ever quite enough - you will always want more!) So... off to scuba class you go and after four training sessions and four successful dives in the ocean, you now posess an Open Water certification, i.e. Recreational Scuba Certification. This allows you to go diving in the ocean, in lakes, rivers, etc... anywhere where you can get to the surface safely (thus the term 'open' water) at anytime during the dive. The main constraints are: (1) no deeper than 130 feet and (2) you should absolutely adhere to the Dive Buddy system.
Recreational scuba diving is what 97-99.5% of all scuba divers are doing. Even for me, I'd say at least 75% of my dives while in Mexico are going to be open water.
Now, Cave Diving is considerably more extreme. In fact, there is debate (at least among those who like to brag about their exploits and enjoy testosterone battles with their friends) that Cave Diving is the most dangerous sport in the world. I think that without a doubt it is one of the most dangerous but I'm not interested in bragging rights. I just love caves. Why? I'm not sure, really. In life, I think a person is lucky if they find something... an activity, a book, a social group, whatever... that really SPEAKS to them. Makes them feel alive. Feels like such an integral part of themselves that they cannot believe there ever was a time they were without. Words cannot describe the feeling, and unfortunately most people in this world will never experience this kind of harmony. For those who find such a passion in their lives it can't help but be consuming. Consuming can mean many things; when you talk about Cave Diving, it certainly consumes your wallet, at least.
Cave Diving is taught by only a few instructors worldwide. There are at least three international organizations offering certifications, of which I belong to and was trained under (I think) the largest, the National Speleological Society - Cave Diving Section (NSS-CDS). There are four levels of certification which you can read about on other websites:
- Cavern Diver
- Intro to Cave Diver
- Apprentice Cave Diver
- Full Cave Diver
Training is expensive and rigorous. The latter is especially true if you don't come from a tec diving background which I didn't. Cave Diving was my first experience with double tanks, backplates and wing-style bladders. Literally, you wear [at least] twice as much equipment for tec diving than you do open water and for good reasons. In these environments you need to be able to self-rescue under virtually any circumstance. Redundancy is the rule.
Tracey and I got our first two certifications in November 2004. Intro to Cave gives us the ability to guide ourselves into a full overhead cave environment (also technically referred to as 'penetration') and go along an established guideline. For Tracey, that was enough and sad to say I think her interest has waned... or maybe it was not as strong initially as I hoped... or maybe I went further down the path of addiction than I thought I did. Anyway, 2nd level certification never seemed enough and as I took more guided tours in caves both in Cozumel and in Riviera Maya I was absolutely convinced by 2006 that there was no other option but to go for 4th level, Full Cave Diver.
Full Cave certification opens almost all of the remaining doors in the cave diving world. You are qualified to go into more challenging caves. You can explore and map new caves and new passageways in the old ones. You can dive solo (though its not recommended and Tracey won't hear of it!) And you can go on real adventures inside caves that map like Escheresque mazes. Circuits, traverses, "Tees" and jumps are now tools for you to use, not roadblocks telling you to turn around.
For reasons I won't go into here (nothing to do with my health, I'll say that much), the training almost didn't happen. This was a source of extreme frustration, some anguish and notable stress. But it did do one good thing: it tested my will and asserted for me that without question Full Cave Certification was what I wanted, at any cost. Finally, five days before Christmas I got the green light and off I went to Cave Class again. This was going to be a stress diet and I knew it -- four days nonstop intensive training. Maybe I'll blog a recount of those four days later, but for me now they were a means to an end, and I was extremely relieved when it was over. No, not just relieved. Elated. Not because the training was over, but because I *felt* like a different person. It's like achieving your black belt in martial arts. After you get it, you realise you aren't the same person anymore.
I thought the feeling would abate with time, but weeks (and many cave dives later) it hasn't. Every time I go into a cave I feel ALIVE; I feel the confidence of knowing what to do, that my buoyancy and trim are what they should be as a cave diver, that each time I lay a reel down I am going towards something interesting, that when I pick it up again I am feeling a sense of regret that I am leaving the cave, and the end of each dive is a sense of Accomplishment. Safety first, enjoyment always. And since I've been bringing my DSLR with me on most of the dives, I have these unbelievable memories of where I've been, photos to share, things that happened are remembered easier. Writing about it to complete the recounting is why I think I chose to blog.
Thus begins the tale.
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