Black Water Diving

I’d always wanted to try scuba diving, having grown up watching Jacques Cousteau specials on TV. I finally had an opportunity while on holiday in Jamaica at the Hedonism resort. I was hooked straight off and wanted more but was unsure how to be fully and permanently certified. I was under no illusion that the one hour training I’d received at the resort was of any use, regardless how difficult it was. One of the things I had to do was to tread water while holding two five-pound weights above water for a full minute, otherwise it was a no-go. I passed. It wasn’t easy, and I was a strong swimmer. FYI: that treading water was a totally useless exercise.

I was pleased to discover “Blue Water Diving,” a PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) certified company, had returned to town that summer to further train all comers, and there were a lot of us, about 20 all told who signed up for the week-long course, the last of two sessions offered. I had to take a week’s vacation to do it, in the summer. I was lucky to get it, too. I was unable to sign up for the first session (the one Henri had signed up for), two others on my crew had booked it off, the max allowed off at any given time. So, if I were to fail, I’d have to wait until the next year to try again.

The first few days of instruction were held at the Sportsplex, fairly basic stuff, mainly classroom material and tests and a few introductory dives to get used to breathing through our regulators, clearing one’s mask, use of buoyance compensators and weights, regulator care and such. Once were had the basic theory down, and once we proved that we wouldn’t panic when underwater and could use our gear reasonably well, we moved on to the Lake, the Aunor Lake, specifically. It had a lot to recommend it. It was close to town. There was a road alongside it. It had an easy grade to begin with, and it was deep enough, yet still within 33 feet. Anything beyond that depth was reserved for the “advanced” class the next weekend at Greenwater Provincial Park in Cochrane.

Long story short, I passed the PADI diver and Open Water certifications and enrolled in the advanced course. If I were to dive in the Caribbean again I’d have to have my advanced or I’d have to take their course or not dive. And their courses were a joke. They took time otherwise spent diving, and were just a cash grab as far as I was concerned.

Advanced consisted of learning navigation skills, deep water decompression times, night diving, boat diving and rudimentary rescue. It was a packed weekend. I didn’t own a camper so I booked into a room at the Westway Motel. A lot of us did. There was a bar next door, so a few of us ended up there, none of us drinking much, none of us wanting to risk a hangover. Alcohol and diving don’t mix, unless you like narcosis and the bends.

What I recall most vividly of that weekend was the deep dive. There was a particularly deep hole in Blue Lake. It was over 100 feet deep and icy cold past the thermocline. I was waiting my turn to descend into the depths, floating on the surface above it, breathing through my snorkel to conserve my tank, gazing at the weighted line plunging into the black depth. Spotters hung suspended along its length in case we got in trouble.

Once the diver before me broke the surface I was given my cue. I approached the buoy, bled my BC dry and dropped like a stone down the line, my fingers lightly tracing its length. At first the water shimmered about me, the light still strong and dancing across my mask, my jet-black neoprene glove and the bright yellow of the nylon rope, but once I broke through the thermocline the light all but failed, the depths now a rusty tea, easily twenty degrees colder than the comparably tepid shallows. My face stung as I continued to the bottom.

I had a simple task to perform when I reached the bottom. I was to inflate my BC to correct my buoyancy and float weightless above the bottom, fish out the three stones I’d tucked up my thigh between my top and trousers, display the certain dexterity required to place them in a neat triangle, proof that I wasn’t narcing out. Once my task was complete, I was to give the thumbs up and repel back up the line at a rate slower than my exhaled bubbles could rise.

I dropped one of my stones. It’s not easy doing precision work with neoprene gloves on. Not able to complete my triangle of stones, I placed two, and then pointed three times at where the third ought to have been. The instructor nodded twice and gave me the thumbs up. I returned it, and inflated my BC a little to begin my accent. I wasn’t rising fast enough to my taste, so I added another burp of air, one that proved too much. I struggled to control my assent for a few moments, finally coming to a stop opposite one of the spotters.

Cold water invaded my suit, its ice invading one of my ear canals.

Vertigo took hold and spun me like a top. I felt like I was sitting on the edge of a propeller, going round and round. I reached out and held fast to the line, fighting the black out rushing down on me. I kept a steady eye on the spotter, telling myself that the world was not spinning. The spotter was stable, in one place, and so that meant that I too was upright and stable. The blackness closed in, I focused on my hands that were clamped on the yellow line. The black circle at the edge of my eyesight slowly backed off as the spotter inched forward to check me out.

He shrugged and made a made a circle of index and thumb, pointing at me. Are you okay, he was asking.

By then, the spinning propeller had come to a stop and I was. I gave him the okay signal back, then the thumbs up. Thumbs up does not mean okay, it means ascending to the surface.

My final ascent was slow and measured.

Vertigo and narcosis kept its distance.

I broke the surface, never so happy to see the glitter of sunlight dancing on the water’s surface.