Ice is nice...

When you're ice qualified and Spring is clearly on the way, you seize every chance to get wet where some of the water's still solid. Today's destination, once again, was Brule Road, where we took a large reel out to its full extent exploring some of the usual sights. For the second time, close to the entrance hole, a large bullfrog was defying hibernation to examine our activities. A Small shoal of Striped Bass was also very active. Conditions couldn't have been better, with clear, blue skies, flat calm and an air temperature of 2C (36F). The water was 40F (4C) and visibility better than 50 feet.

Easter Morning Dive

Today Jim and I headed for the winter time hotspot Brewers Mills. Even though there is a strong current it is still a good winter dive spot, especially when you are craving the need to get in the water. We found the water temperature to be a warm 37F/3C. I can say warm because we both were sweating in our dry suits from swimming against the current. We did find a few stems from a pipe and a bowl. We did not get to the deepest part of the bowl as we were whipped around by the current but we did hit the 20 ft mark.

Pooling the knowledge...

Tonight's latest pool session was again well attended. A dozen divers engaged in a variety of activities, including video capture of line-laying and bag shooting, buoyancy checks and basic skill refreshers. It's been great to see a large number of our Club members cycle through the monthly pool nights. It predicts a really strong dive season ahead - and there was no snowstorm this evening. Things must be improving....

Hannah handles operations...

Today's dive was dedicated to conducting research for Hannah Cole (Matt Cole's daughter) to complete a heritage project on the HMS Princess Charlotte, a War of 1812 wooden warship wreck lying on the bottom of Deadman's Bay. Hannah mustered 4 divers, including her father (pictured) to make a dive through the 14" (36cm) thick ice of the Bay and complete survey videos and measurements of the wreck. The party was blessed with excellent topside conditions (sunny, with maximum air temperatures of 7C (44F)). Frankly, for dry-suited divers, it was way too warm...

The water, on the other hand, fulfilled all expectations, showing 32F (0C) on the gauges.

Visibility below the ice was really good - in excess of 40 feet. All Hannah's tasking was successfully completed in two dives; each of about 25 minutes duration. A large, very sleepy turtle was left undisturbed on one of the wreck's main frames. The whole event was really satisfying. It's always important to have a good reason for a dive - and this one couldn't have been better.

More pictures can be viewed on the Club's Flickr site.

Dolphins Scuba Olympics

How do Canadian divers beat a 36 hour snow storm? The answer is easy by diving of course. Today 10 members of the club made it out for an energetic two hours in the pool for the scuba Olympics. Our overall winner was Gerard. Adam put us through our skills and over saw the officiating of the event. The list of events included basic dive skills such as buoyancy and buddy checks to an underwater obstacle course and ultimate frisbee. Even though it was little miserable out first thing we all enjoyed sitting in the pool in open water. With the end of a successful games we had to honor a time old scuba tradition of going to Tim Horton. Just a reminder for club members that if you are looking to get out and practice some skills or just socialize we do have another pool day next Saturday which is posted on the homepage.

POW Annual General Meeting

Today was the annual general meeting of Preserves Our Shipwrecks (POW). It was an interesting meeting where divers and interested individuals got together to talk about the last year of the organization and to elect a new board. There were 16 members in the attendance. The meeting started with an enjoyable presentation about Truk Lagoon by Warren Lo. The new board of five members is interestingly staffed with three dolphin scuba club members. So if anyone wished to volunteer with POW in the future let Mike, Dan, or myself know, as there will be more then enough for everyone to volunteer with. On a side note as well if you purchase a membership last year it is being held over to this year.