Chanb77's Weblog

Soo.. this is a non-diving entry of my Dive Journal. I was up at the barn, working with one of the horses that I am training, and I had a bit of a mishap. I had finished working with Jolton, a yearling gelding that I am starting to break, and had pulled out Chocolat. Chocolat is a 2 yr. old Gelding, that stands about 17.1 hh. For those of you that do not know how tall that is, it’s really freakin’ big. His back is taller than my head. He was recently purchased from the RCMP stables by the owners of the farm ~ quite a nice horse, just freakin’ big! So… the poor lad has quite a nasty cut on his right hind leg, and while I was picking out his left hind leg, he thought it might be a good idea to lift the right one too. So… logic says the one in my hand has all his weight on it now, and it fell down, strategically in the “right” spot.

Now.. I’ve broken a bunch of toes before, but never has one hurt like this one. I honestly wondered if he had severed my big toe of my left foot. I tried walking it off a little, so that my eyes didn’t feel like they were in the back of my head, but it wasn’t easing any. Ok… I was finished for the night anyway… I put Chocolate back into his “house,” and went to the farm owner’s door. No answer.. ok.. I have to get home… Home is about a 35 minute drive from the farm.

I drive standard … left foot… clutch… excrutiating pain… I have to admit that I actually cried. I didn’t even cry when I broke my back for cryin’ out loud…

So.. I get home after what seemed like an eternity, and had called Steve ahead, to mash up some ice. My toe was already purple and pretty big. The next morning, I got up, went to work, and tried to tough it out. Lucky for me, the van is not standard, so I was able to drive that to work, while Steve took my car.

The swelling was now moving up my leg, and my ankle had disappeared. I am a little stubborn (pffttt… ), and did not think I needed to go get it checked. For the amount of body parts that I’ve injured from my career training horses, I felt silly about a toe.

A few of my friends finally talked me into going to the clinic. Soo.. after the x rays, they saw (and showed me) that there is a crack/fracture all the way across my big toe, above the first knuckle. The pressure was so bad, that the swelling was going up my leg. They had to burn 3 holes in my nail to release the pressure, as well as all the blood.

So.. now I sit, sulking that I cannot dive… all because of my toe. It really is a very nice mixture of black and purple though! 

I did take a pic, but it isn’t pretty. Soo.. I will have to live vicariously through my fellow diving friends for the next little while. … *sniff sniff*

Saturday, October 6th, 2007 ~Our friend Francois came up to visit for some diving fun on the long weekend, and we had packed up for Kingston. We were up and out early, and made it to Ktown by 9am. We loaded the boat, and off we went to the George T. Davie, and the Comet. The Davie is a steel barge, once used for carrying coal. It also has a lift boat just off of it, as well as a crane from another wreck in Brockville, called the Daryaw. It lays in approximately 90 feet, with a cold freakin’ thermocline right in the middle of the wreck, at exactly 81’… We had a most excellent dive on this wreck. There are cargo holds to dive through and alot to look at.

Bottom Time ~ 38 mins.
Water Temp. ~ 65
Max. Depth ~ 89′
Vis. ~ 20′ ~ Not as good as it usually is ~ a bit milky

The Comet ~ Beautiful wooden paddle wheeler, which unfortunately, I had to give a miss on this day.. pffttt… I love diving this wreck, but sadly I was green and very sick. I wish I could say that the waves were really bad, but they really weren’t. It was just one of those hit and miss days…sometimes I get sick on boats, sometimes I don’t. Stoopid seasick… I know I’m better off in the water, and really wanted to gear up, but my body didn’t make it. So.. Steve and Francois did have quite a nice dive on it!

We got back to the shop and met up with some friends, where they all had a go at me for puking… Ahh well.. it’s all good!

Steve and I at the debriefing…

We hung around with the NTD gang for lunch and laughs, then headed back home.

Sunday, October 7th, 2007 ~

We headed to Sharky’s for fills, then it was off to Buckingham, QC for a dip in the Back Mine. This place never ceases to amaze me ~ It’s a freakin’ beautiful place. The drive up there can be a little treacherous, as it’s a small dirt road, in the middle of nowhere, and is very narrow. There are a couple of signs on the way, that are a bit morbid, IMO…

It translates…”Beware of our children, they could be yours,” which is quite odd, seeing as it’s a pic of a kid laying contorted on the ground…

When we arrived, there were a myriad of Jeeps playing off-road games in the ditches. There was also a lone Tracker…

Ahhhhh…. the Back Mine….

Francois and Steve…

Steve and I…

It’s pretty dark in the Back Mine, as the cover on the top side keeps most of the sunlight away. I did manage to get one pic from under water…

Now, it’s pretty freakin’ cold up here, year round for that reason. I didn’t last long in the water, as I still have my leaky drysuit. There is often still ice covering this place in June! It’s an old flooded mine, that does have OW in the top bowl, as well as tunnels, with some old line run eons ago.

Bottom Time ~ 20 mins.
Water Temp. ~ 44
Max. Depth ~ 37′

Steve and Frankie went back in when I got out, and it was in the 30s below 100′.

I really hope my new drysuit gets here soon!!

I took this pic at the Back Mine and kinda liked it…

We packed up in the dark, took the ferry back to Ottawa, and went to Steve’s parents’ place for some turkey!!

Monday, October 8th, 2007 ~

Today, we slept in a bit… why not? It’s the long weekend! We finally got up, had some breaky, and headed off to Morrisburg. We had Francois’ zodiac, and were trying to decide whether we wanted to take it to a little island across the channel, for some investigative diving, or to just get in at the shore, and do a drift of the old lock system. There was a small town there, as well as old docks that were flooded, so there is alot to be found around there.

We opted for the Lock drift, as Francois hadn’t been there before.

There is alot of current at this site, as with any of the flooded lock systems in the St. Lawrence. It’s fun to drift with, but it sucks if you go against it. We hit a couple of back eddies, and did end up going against the current in a couple of spots. There are also walls that you have to go up and over, that threaten to topple you over if you aren’t ready for the current there. We decided after the dive, that it might be easier to go up and over the walls backwards, so we’ll have to try that next time… I managed to keep from somersaulting on this run…

It was a bit tough to get any decent pics. I did take some, but they were either blurry or dark.. or.. well.. just sucked..

Here are a couple of images of the old lock system anyway…

We had a great dive, and were very happy that the water temps. were warmer than the Back Mine!

Bottom Time ~ 73 mins.
Water Temp. ~ 65 and 70… there is no thermocline in the river, but there were parts where the water was warmer for some reason
Max. Depth ~ 35′
Vis. ~ 20′

I think I’m going to try for Ktown again next week. I hope my cookies stay in tact!

Saturday was a good day… Steve and I lounged around in the morning, went to get fills, visited the Wooferbitch, and planned on going down to Morrisburg. By the time we left the Woofybitch’s place, it was about 3pm, so we opted to just run up to the quarry for some more skills. When we arrived, there were no other people there, which we thought was odd for a Saturday. A couple of cars did pull up as we geared up, but we were in da pool before they were (na na na na boo boo…). We did our valve drills, air shares, and I did some more back finning, then we headed to the abyss, where we did a timed ascent from 40′ to the surface. Holy crap, was there ever a thermocline! We surfaced, then did a timed descent to 30′. Vis was quite stinky, and we made our way to the plane. I played back fin some more, Steve did some bottle rotations, and we just mucked about. We were a bit surprised that the vis was so bad, as this is the time of year when it usually starts to clear up. The other divers made their way to the plane for some pics, so we headed past, along the wall. We had some laughs and decided to head back.

Bottom Time ~ 57 mins.
Water Temp. ~ 66
Max. Depth ~ 45′
Vis ~ Stinky

We spoke to Mrs. Morrison afterwards, and she said that there had been about 10 OW classes earlier in the day. I guess that had something to do with the vis.

Here are some pics!

Me, working on my back fin…

The side of the plane…

Steve in the plane…

Plaque on the plane…

Me… still backfinning…

Steve’s Inukshuk

Steve

Me!

Sunday, September 30th, 2007 ~

Well, Steve was up and out tres early for his big boy dive on the Jodrey, so myself, Anne, and Leslie went out in the wilderness for a trail ride! It was an absolutely perfect day for it, and we had been threatening to go out for ages!

Saddle Time ~ 60 mins.
Air Temp. ~ 18
Vis. ~ Endless!
Butt Sore Factor ~ Depends on which one of us you ask!

Ok… now that I am back in the saddle, I would like to get back in the water!! w00t w00t w00t!!

Ok, so I forgot to post about Sunday’s dive. We headed out to Morrisburg, where we were just tooling around in the shallows for a while, and filming. Steve, Leigh, Phil, and I played with scooters, worked on skills, blew a bag, worked some more on my backfin, and just goofed around. The bottom was very loose, and we completely silted out the entry way, just putting on fins! We weren’t in the water long, but did have fun. Phil had to get going to hockey!

Bottom Time ~ 38 mins.
Max. Depth ~ 14′
Water Temp ~ 67
Vis. ~ 0 – 35′