I'm now a PADI-certified open-water
diver. We did our four open-water dives down at
Haigh Quarry over the weekend;
two each day, with most of the certification-related work being done during
the first three, and a tour of the quarry in our last dive. It was raining
most of the weekend, but it really only lowered visibility a bit; when
you're underwater, it doesn't really matter how wet it is on the surface.
Water temperature was in the high 70's at the surface, and dropped a bit as
you descended; as we learned the second day, it dropped a lot at the
thermocline, and made me very glad we were wearing full 7mm suits (sans
hood and gloves; I'm definitely investing in some gloves before we go
diving again).
The first dive was really the only one I had problems on; my BCD had a few
pull-release valves on it, and one of them managed to get stuck open after
I descended (I assume I snagged one of my regulator lines on it). I
couldn't see the bubbles behind me, but after I got the attention of one
of the instrustors, he saw the problem pretty quickly. Then we were back
underway trying to find the group, and my
buddy, who lost me pretty
quickly in the poor visibility caused by students walking along the
bottom. Valuable lesson learned: the group be damned, we need to keep an
eye on each other all the time; an instructor won't be watching next time.
After that, we did fine; both of us practiced a lot with our buoyancy
control, now that we were properly weighted: in the confined dives, I
barely had enough weight to descend. By the end of the weekend, both of us
were resisting the temptation to flail our arms around like complete
newbies, and overall I think we were doing pretty well. I appear to burn
through air like crazy, though; after the last dive (about thirty minutes
long), I'd gone from just under 3000 psi to about 750, although we suspect
that the first stage was leaking; we checked the o-ring, then just swapped
tanks, and you could still hear a mild hiss at the surface, but Erica
didn't see any bubbles when we got underwater. I need to work on... er...
working less?
At the end of the second day, we filled out our logs, had them signed off,
and I received my temporary certification card. We then went home,
showered, and collapsed...I was completely physically drained after that. I
have no idea how the instructors can do this every weekend, then drive back
to Aurora to do pool work with another class in the afternoon. I'm sure
your stamina would build up after doing it long enough, but right now I
have a hard enough time getting up at 5:30 every day for a desk job. But
that was definitely a hell of a way to spend a weekend, and now we're all
set to go diving in the Carribean when we go on our wedding cruise in
January.