It has been rainig for the last 2 days. Unfortunately the weather report doesn't say it will stop anytime soon. It was a torrential downpour yeaterday. But today has some sunny spots so far.
We were supposed to do our last dive in Camillo yesterday, to pick up our safety bottles that are still there, remove some jumps and check out the new lead. Good to go right......Nope! Once again our plans were foiled by the land owner. She changed the lock....we had the key, but she changed the lock....really? Long story but the short version is she didn't want us in anymore, and thought we were letting other people in and not telling her. We paid her for the 6 people we took in there one day, but she got confused because she or her son let other people in that day also. Confusing day for her equals no access for us...apparently. Fernando went over and spoke to her, gave her back the key and now we have to go in on Saturday.....not what we had hoped for, but at least we can get back in. Fernando told us we should not let people in without calling her first....since she speaks no English and really fast Spanish, I am not sure that would work out so well....but next time we will do that.
On Monday we went on an excursion with Danny and some other folks to Yax Chen. Yax Chen is a cenote and one of the entrances to the Ox Bel Ha cave system that the Zero Gravity guys and MCEP (Mexico Cave Exploration Project) are exploring. The cave system is really interesting and neat. There are so many centoes that you really only ever go 20 minutes through cave before you get to another one. The cave does not have the magnificant decorations that other caves in the area have, but it was still a neat dive. A great scooter cave for next time. We swam alot for a total dive time of about 2.5 hours...maybe 3...I have to check. One of the coolest parts was a section called the Milky Way. It was a Hydrogen Sulfide layer that looks like a witches cauldron brewing.....it creates a visual distrubabnce that is really cool. Plus if you look at some areas there are "milk ribbons" that are floating in the water. It was really specatular. We also saw a few tarpon in the cenotes. I would go back to this cenote again......with a scooter.
We have been attending the nightly seminars at Zero Gravity. They have been really great. There was one on video, one on the Ox Bel Ha exploration and last night was on some wrecks in Canada and some in Australia. The Australia presentation was done using Microsoft PowerPoint 2010....that had some great features. The Australian who presented works for Microsoft and said it will be available soon. He said if the presentation tanked he could wow us with the graphics and technology. It didn't tank....:)
Only a few days left until we start our drive back to the States.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Sunday, April 11, 2010
And now for a few pictures
Some pictures:
Lunch at Casa Cenote after the Camillo kick dive. John is wearing one of his new mosquito repellant shirts...."repels mosquitos up to 70 washings". I love the pinatas.
John on the way to Zamas Restaurant.
Almost there! They still hold the #1 spot for strongest margaritas....we did another test.
Street in front of Fernado's house, where we stay. You can see the brick grill that used to be used to cook really good hamburgers. It now sits dormant....so sad.
John entering the "compound" with our laundry. This is a side door to get to the room we rent from Fernando.
Once inside the "compound". Our room is around the corner by the dive area.
Lunch at Casa Cenote after the Camillo kick dive. John is wearing one of his new mosquito repellant shirts...."repels mosquitos up to 70 washings". I love the pinatas.
Camillo kick dive.....yes it is true.
We dove Camillo today, but not an exploration dive. We actually, hold on to your hats.....did a kick dive without the rebreathers. Here is how it went down...there are a bunch of folks down here for the GUE Mexico Fun Event and we have the key to the Ranch and they wanted to dive Camillo. Plus one of the guys is doing some photo documentation of the cave system for us. The Global Underwaters Explorers Fun Event was an impromptu event set up by two GUE instructors with the help of Zero Gravity. There are about 30 people down here doing different diving and excursions. So there were 8 divers today heading off in different directions of the cave. it was nice to do a kick dive and poke my head into some holes when we usually just scooter on by to get to our destination.
Tomorrow we are doing an "excursion dive" with Danny and some other people to a cenote called Yaxchen....it is part of the Ox Bel Ha system (currently the longest system in Mexico). On Tuesday or Wed we will go back into Camillo when I get to check out the lead I saw and run the reel. I hope it goes a long ways!!!
The seminar we heard on Friday was an update on the WKPP (Woodville Karst Plains Project-they hold the world record for the longest/deepest cave dive) by Mark Messersmith. It was really interesting, the Powerpoint showed some numbers that are truly staggering. Each rebreather diver spends about $85,000 on gear, a big push dive costs about $10,000, the dive was 28 hours long, and there were a bunch more.....these guys are hard core. Mark talked about doing deco in Turner Sink where you can't even see your buddy because of the silt, so you put your computer right up to your face and tap your buddy on the arm when it is time to switch gas...this went on for hours. The result of these dives showed the Florida State Government how important the spring water is, how fast it travels, and the time they thought the sewage leach fields was taking to get there was actually much faster......they thought years and it turned out to be 32 hours. Guess what sewage treatment plant got moved after that discovery! Anyway, it was really interesting.
It was announced today that the 2010 GUE Conference will be in Mexico this year....I hope we can go!!!
Tomorrow we are doing an "excursion dive" with Danny and some other people to a cenote called Yaxchen....it is part of the Ox Bel Ha system (currently the longest system in Mexico). On Tuesday or Wed we will go back into Camillo when I get to check out the lead I saw and run the reel. I hope it goes a long ways!!!
The seminar we heard on Friday was an update on the WKPP (Woodville Karst Plains Project-they hold the world record for the longest/deepest cave dive) by Mark Messersmith. It was really interesting, the Powerpoint showed some numbers that are truly staggering. Each rebreather diver spends about $85,000 on gear, a big push dive costs about $10,000, the dive was 28 hours long, and there were a bunch more.....these guys are hard core. Mark talked about doing deco in Turner Sink where you can't even see your buddy because of the silt, so you put your computer right up to your face and tap your buddy on the arm when it is time to switch gas...this went on for hours. The result of these dives showed the Florida State Government how important the spring water is, how fast it travels, and the time they thought the sewage leach fields was taking to get there was actually much faster......they thought years and it turned out to be 32 hours. Guess what sewage treatment plant got moved after that discovery! Anyway, it was really interesting.
It was announced today that the 2010 GUE Conference will be in Mexico this year....I hope we can go!!!
Friday, April 9, 2010
Camillo survey updated ....new lead
We dove Camillo again on Wednesday. The plan was to place labelled markers on the lines we have surveyed so far and also survey the last bit of line we laid. While John was doing the survey, my job was to look for new leads. Dive went really well, my scooter still stuck on a few times and didn't go a few tmes, but the weighting was good and I could deal with the rest.
John completed a bit over 700ft of survey, labelled markers were put on all the lines (except 1), still don't know what kind of bones are back there....and I found a new possible lead. The good news is that the lead is "going in the right direction". We exited the cave at 4.5 hours.
One of the things I have been working on is the technique to carry my own scooter....yippee I finally got it thanks to some coaching from John. I can carry it down, but not back up yet....half the battle.
Here is a picture for proof.
John completed a bit over 700ft of survey, labelled markers were put on all the lines (except 1), still don't know what kind of bones are back there....and I found a new possible lead. The good news is that the lead is "going in the right direction". We exited the cave at 4.5 hours.
One of the things I have been working on is the technique to carry my own scooter....yippee I finally got it thanks to some coaching from John. I can carry it down, but not back up yet....half the battle.
Here is a picture for proof.
We decided to go to Puerto Aventuras for dinner since we knew we wouldn't be diving the next day....at least that is what we thought before we ran into some people after dinner. Cafe Ole is still a fun place to have dinner; they have great pies and also sometimes live music. ...plus good margaritas. Tonight the owner's band was playing and during break this Frank Sinatra impersonator got up. I have to say, before he started singing I had my doubts. This guy was good. We finished dinner and took a walk around the dolphin pools, I mean jails...someone used that term and it has just stuck....dolphin jails.
We ran into some of our friends from the Pacific Northwest along with some other folks from Canada....and joined them for margaritas. Over the course of catching up, it turned out I was going diving with them in Gran Cenote the following day.
I did two dives in Gran Cenote while John got our gear ready and blended gas.
After one of our dives, we ran into Fred (another one of the owners from Zero Gravity) who let us know about an impromptu seminar on Mayan Archeology that night....heck yeah we will be there....7:30pm at ZG. Since we didn't leave the Gran Cenote until 5pm it was going to be a rush to have dinner and get there....but we up to it.
More on the seminar later.....
We didn't dive today, but are attending another Seminar at ZG tonight. Tomorrow we are going back into Camillo to check out the lead and pull the safety bottles back. After tomorrow we may be done with that section for this trip.
That's what has been happening down here this week....we did see two political marches in the streets of Tulum this week. One an actual people march and the other a taxi driver rally. ...the police came in for the Taxi driver one. I think they were just directing traffic and "watching" that things didn't get out of hand.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Cenote Found...but no exit yet
We dove Sistema Camillo on Friday...the dive was successful but not without some obstacles. Our gear was loaded in the truck the night before, we made it to the Ranch the next morning at the record time of 8:30....that's AM. We had the key so no worries....right? It is always something, as we drove up to the gate there was a white truck sans driver blocking our entrance. John got out of the truck and opened the gate....until the point the gate opened, the guys on the other side were ignoring us. I walked in to talk to them...after introductions the man told me "we have a problem", in Spanish. I didn't catch if the truck was broken down or it just wasn't his to move....either way we did have a problem. He ended up getting inside while John and I pushed it up hill and through the gate out of our way, so we could pass. At one point, it was just me pushing the truck and the man inside started laughing...which made me start in too.
Once that was out of the way, another road block. Are you friggin' kidding me! The structure that used to be the chicken coop is now apparently a palapa for painting automobiles. There was a newly painted gold surburban with newspaper covering the windows and lights in the road now. No problem, another guy finally moved it enough for us to pass. Home free and off to the cenote!
The dive ended up being 4.5 hours long. We made it to the new portion of the cave and also found the elusive cenote...unfortunately it appears to be a breakdown area and we could not see an exit ...or leaves or fish that might indicate an opening. We did run a bunch of new line that intersected with some of our old line....in two places. At first we thought we had made a connection because the line we ran across had a old yellow arrow that we did not recognize...unfortunately it ended up being one that Fernando had put down without our knowledge so it threw us off....DRAT!!! And that was not the word that actually went through my mind when we figured it out. Defiantely not what John exclaimed when he figured it out....I heard him underwater...hahaaa. At 2.5 hours, I turned the dive. The rebreather started tasting funny and the head games started...so I wanted out...plus I had 2 spools to reel up since John had re-layed primary line.
The area we are in now should be renamed "The Bone Room", because of all the bones that are on the ground. Tomorrow when we go in to survey the line we layed, I will make an effort to try to identify if the bones are man or beast...probably beast. We originally named the line "Dance Hall" because of the large flat clay surface, too much trouble to re-label it...so it stays Dance Hall...where you can dance your bones out.
On the way out, John and I didn't do a good job of communicating. I thought he was having trouble so I wanted him to go first. He would have none of that. I kept instisting until I got the finger....yeah, that finger. Fine, I'll lead out...and the horse you rode in on...MR! What I didn't know was this.....the scooter was sticking on 90% of the time. Let me go back....John re-built my scooter and changed the batteries. That changed the weighting drastically....my scooter was a freakin' cork...terrible to dive. In fact, I was about to call the dive when John said, give it to me....I'll drive it. I happily turned it over....if I didn't the dive would have been over...it was that much a PIA to drive. So he was driving my scooter, and the darn thing was sticking on. He wanted me in front because if it silted the place out, we would rather have it behind us than in front of us. Of course, I didn't know about the sticking on business until the end of the dive. We have now come up with a "scooter sticking on" signal since it seems to be a regular occurance.
We exited the cave at around 4.5 hours and despite the obstacles the dive was enjoyable. We have plans to go back tomorrow to survey, drop some marked arrows (with the line names), and give one last check that there is no exit....oh yeah, and look at the bones.
Hope everyone had a nice Easter. Our Easter brunch consisted of Texas BBQ and margaritas while looking at the ocean from Casa Cenote.
Can't wait to see what the Ranch will throw at us tomorrow! I'll get busy with taking picture to post.
Once that was out of the way, another road block. Are you friggin' kidding me! The structure that used to be the chicken coop is now apparently a palapa for painting automobiles. There was a newly painted gold surburban with newspaper covering the windows and lights in the road now. No problem, another guy finally moved it enough for us to pass. Home free and off to the cenote!
The dive ended up being 4.5 hours long. We made it to the new portion of the cave and also found the elusive cenote...unfortunately it appears to be a breakdown area and we could not see an exit ...or leaves or fish that might indicate an opening. We did run a bunch of new line that intersected with some of our old line....in two places. At first we thought we had made a connection because the line we ran across had a old yellow arrow that we did not recognize...unfortunately it ended up being one that Fernando had put down without our knowledge so it threw us off....DRAT!!! And that was not the word that actually went through my mind when we figured it out. Defiantely not what John exclaimed when he figured it out....I heard him underwater...hahaaa. At 2.5 hours, I turned the dive. The rebreather started tasting funny and the head games started...so I wanted out...plus I had 2 spools to reel up since John had re-layed primary line.
The area we are in now should be renamed "The Bone Room", because of all the bones that are on the ground. Tomorrow when we go in to survey the line we layed, I will make an effort to try to identify if the bones are man or beast...probably beast. We originally named the line "Dance Hall" because of the large flat clay surface, too much trouble to re-label it...so it stays Dance Hall...where you can dance your bones out.
On the way out, John and I didn't do a good job of communicating. I thought he was having trouble so I wanted him to go first. He would have none of that. I kept instisting until I got the finger....yeah, that finger. Fine, I'll lead out...and the horse you rode in on...MR! What I didn't know was this.....the scooter was sticking on 90% of the time. Let me go back....John re-built my scooter and changed the batteries. That changed the weighting drastically....my scooter was a freakin' cork...terrible to dive. In fact, I was about to call the dive when John said, give it to me....I'll drive it. I happily turned it over....if I didn't the dive would have been over...it was that much a PIA to drive. So he was driving my scooter, and the darn thing was sticking on. He wanted me in front because if it silted the place out, we would rather have it behind us than in front of us. Of course, I didn't know about the sticking on business until the end of the dive. We have now come up with a "scooter sticking on" signal since it seems to be a regular occurance.
We exited the cave at around 4.5 hours and despite the obstacles the dive was enjoyable. We have plans to go back tomorrow to survey, drop some marked arrows (with the line names), and give one last check that there is no exit....oh yeah, and look at the bones.
Hope everyone had a nice Easter. Our Easter brunch consisted of Texas BBQ and margaritas while looking at the ocean from Casa Cenote.
Can't wait to see what the Ranch will throw at us tomorrow! I'll get busy with taking picture to post.
.
View from table at Casa Cenote on Easter.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Restaurant Review: Elemental -thumbs up
Tonight we walked down the street about 1 block and had dinner at a restaurant called Elemental. We have had breakfast and one lunch there...both really good, but never dinner. They are known for their fresh vegetables and fruits....but little did we know we have a new winner for best mango margarita....OMG, and they are big! And these one's count...the one's at Lol Ha do not....according to John. John had a version of a sushi roll and I had a rice noodle curry with vegetables. The sushi roll was rolled in a tortilla instead of rice, sounds weird but it was really good. I tried it. The curry was awesome...plus the owners are really nice. We ate at the Italian place next door last night and while they have good bolognese sauce for the spaghetti...the lasagna was just ok. And the owners always seem grumpy....all of them.
We ordered a margarita and the owner responded with...."may I make a suggestion". If the owner says that... you better darn well listen. He suggested we try one of their fruity margaritas....mango was what we chose tonight...and it was fabulous...along with the meal. New favorite restaurant, and I have many!
Normally we would not have a drink before a big dive day (a new rule)...however, tomorrow is not one of those. John spent all day rebuilding my scooter. Remember I mentioned in the last post my scooter was sticking on. What I didn't mention was that at the end of the dive it was a total dog on the way out and I was thinking it would grind to a halt any second. John tested the whole thing and pulled it all apart. He finally got to the root of the problem, and it is partially put together but has to be vacuum tested overnight....so no diving tomorrow. Plus the rebreathers aren't loaded....and the mango margarita side tracked the progress.
Good thing I sent my resume off to some folks today as we may be needing to look into those new Zuexo scooters....which would require more work to finance.
But I am sure we will come up with a plan B for tomorrow.....
We ordered a margarita and the owner responded with...."may I make a suggestion". If the owner says that... you better darn well listen. He suggested we try one of their fruity margaritas....mango was what we chose tonight...and it was fabulous...along with the meal. New favorite restaurant, and I have many!
Normally we would not have a drink before a big dive day (a new rule)...however, tomorrow is not one of those. John spent all day rebuilding my scooter. Remember I mentioned in the last post my scooter was sticking on. What I didn't mention was that at the end of the dive it was a total dog on the way out and I was thinking it would grind to a halt any second. John tested the whole thing and pulled it all apart. He finally got to the root of the problem, and it is partially put together but has to be vacuum tested overnight....so no diving tomorrow. Plus the rebreathers aren't loaded....and the mango margarita side tracked the progress.
Good thing I sent my resume off to some folks today as we may be needing to look into those new Zuexo scooters....which would require more work to finance.
But I am sure we will come up with a plan B for tomorrow.....
Camillo Dive...finally
We made it back from Cozumel. We had to do some logistic changes. The Cozumel Ferry website said there was an 8am ferry back to Playa, as sometimes happens in Mexico, there was no 8am ferry...just a 9am one. That put our friends Kim and Shirley crunched for time if they were to make their flight. So we adjusted...you always have to have a plan B and not just in Mexico... and we took a bus back to Tulum while they took one to the airport.
The remainder of Tuesday we spend preparing for our dive in the next day in Sistema Camillo (the cave we are exploring).
Wednesday, we headed off to the Ranch bright and early. We found the gate already open and back in the Cenote there was already a truck there....a Zero Gravity truck. Danny, the cave explorer and one of the owners of Zero Gravity was already there. We talked briefly and started getting ready for our dive.
The first dive of any trip always comes with some apprehension, even though this was not the first dive of the trip, it was the first rebreather dive of the trip. The dive went well and even though we didn't get to where we wanted to go, we had a good solid set up dive. Not bad considering, my scooter stuck on 2 times. One was really bad in that I had to aim it at the cave wall so I could get it to stop. I didn't want to break the cable on the trigger so John came over to move the magnet. I have had them stick on before, but not like this...high speed it was!! And my new favorite saying was appropriate....Mr Toad's wide ride through the halocline. We also ran a helium drive through the rebreathers to see if it would ease the work of breathing...I think it did but the gas consumption wasn't what we were expecting.
Friday we go back in with more breathing gas, and the plan is to find the darn elusive cenote. On a side note, I saw a bunch of petrified shells I hadn't noticed before in the limestone way back in the cave...that was cool. Danny said he will also be there...oh good...more performance anxiety for me. I may have used up the breathing gas last time while I was putting in the jumps to the Black Forest line ...kept picturing Danny critiquing my line...oy! We left the jumps in, so I shouldn't have that problem on Friday...only have to worry about rebreather buoyancy and getting the switchblock tangled in the line. LOL.
Hopefully tomorrow we will have news of the elusive cenote...or a plan B.
The remainder of Tuesday we spend preparing for our dive in the next day in Sistema Camillo (the cave we are exploring).
Wednesday, we headed off to the Ranch bright and early. We found the gate already open and back in the Cenote there was already a truck there....a Zero Gravity truck. Danny, the cave explorer and one of the owners of Zero Gravity was already there. We talked briefly and started getting ready for our dive.
The first dive of any trip always comes with some apprehension, even though this was not the first dive of the trip, it was the first rebreather dive of the trip. The dive went well and even though we didn't get to where we wanted to go, we had a good solid set up dive. Not bad considering, my scooter stuck on 2 times. One was really bad in that I had to aim it at the cave wall so I could get it to stop. I didn't want to break the cable on the trigger so John came over to move the magnet. I have had them stick on before, but not like this...high speed it was!! And my new favorite saying was appropriate....Mr Toad's wide ride through the halocline. We also ran a helium drive through the rebreathers to see if it would ease the work of breathing...I think it did but the gas consumption wasn't what we were expecting.
Friday we go back in with more breathing gas, and the plan is to find the darn elusive cenote. On a side note, I saw a bunch of petrified shells I hadn't noticed before in the limestone way back in the cave...that was cool. Danny said he will also be there...oh good...more performance anxiety for me. I may have used up the breathing gas last time while I was putting in the jumps to the Black Forest line ...kept picturing Danny critiquing my line...oy! We left the jumps in, so I shouldn't have that problem on Friday...only have to worry about rebreather buoyancy and getting the switchblock tangled in the line. LOL.
Hopefully tomorrow we will have news of the elusive cenote...or a plan B.
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