XK1 | Chanb77's Weblog

Nary A Photo Was Taken

21 07 2014

July 20th, 2014 ~

Today, Eric B., Jen, and I went out for a scooter run. Eric and I brought along enough bottles for us to do rotations, after our dive.

We scootered upstream for 30 minutes, then made our way into the channel. The visibility was much better in the channel, than in the shallows – thank goodness! There were spots where the current was absolutely ripping, and spots where it was non-existent. Go figure.

We drifted at 100′, for about 30 minutes, then made our way back up. We did a little deco, then some bottle rotations.

Hooray, for bottle rotations! Exciting, I know!

Bottom Time: 2 hours, 29 mins.
Max. Depth: 103′
Water Temp.: 68F

I can’t believe that I didn’t take a single photo of our dive, entry, exit, team, bottles, scooters, anything…

I shall use a picture from a previous post, then. We cannot have a post without pictures! Pics, or it didn’t happen! 😛

T2 = T minus 7 days…

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Tags: Bloggy Thing, Brockville, Centeen Park, Chan's Bloggy Thing, DIR Ontario, Diving Blog, Diving Goodness, Gaskin, GUE, GUE Divers, GUE Ontario, Scooter, Scooter Dive, Skills, St. Lawrence, St. Lawrence River, Suex Scooters, Technical Diving, XK1
Categories : Two-Oh-One-Four

Morrisburg – A Current Affair!

1 07 2014

Sunday, June 29th, 2014 ~

A large gaggle of us met down at the Morrisburg public dock, where we discussed our dive plan. We would enter down the road, then scooter/drift through the old channel, and through Lock 23. Since we had a bit of a distance to drift, we unloaded at our entry, then brought most of the vehicles down to the exit, and drove back to the entry, in our van. We would pick up our van, after the dive!

Some of the gear, unloaded…

It appears that sometimes gear DOES grow on trees!

We were going to scooter/drift in “this” direction (east)…

We entered the water, carefully. There were some slippery rocks, so we took our time. We scootered south, into the old channel, then started to drift. The visibility was not great, so staying together was a bit of a task. We did manage, though.

When we reached the lock wall, we tried to stay on the north side, but the current was absolutely ripping there, so we opted to go up and over, to the North side. I was loving how the XK1 handled the screaming current! Perhaps we can try to scooter upstream, another time… the dives where we always have to resort to “Plan B,” since the current gets to strong, to even scooter against.

Before we made it to the beach area, we found what may have been a dump area. There was some old garbage, and a large pile of bottles, in the silt. We blew an SMB, then swam over to the beach area. It was a beautiful day, so the beach was quite busy. We usually get asked by both kids and adults, “What do you see, down there?”

Bottom Time: 1 hour, 39 mins.
Max. Depth: 58′
Water Temp.: 62F
Vis.: 5′ to 10′ – Milky

Our exit point…

Chris took Steve to pick up our van, while I was the designated gear watcher. Raph had quite a drive ahead of him, so he left right away.

After gear loading…

At our post dive meal, I could not help but think of my friend, Jeff Schrieber, making fun of our mooses aboot the hooses…

Cheers, Jeff! 😛

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Tags: Bloggy Thing, Chan's Bloggy Thing, DIR Ontario, Diving, Diving Blog, Diving Goodness, Gavin Scooter, GUE, GUE Divers, GUE Ontario, Lost Villages, Morrisburg, Scooter, Scooter Dive, St. Lawrence, St. Lawrence River, Suex Scooter, Technical Diving, XK1
Categories : Two-Oh-One-Four

Turtle Turbo Alley

10 05 2014

Saturday, May 10th, 2014 ~

Ahhhh… We are finally back in the RIVER! With the tough winter that we have had, it has taken the St. Lawrence River a little bit longer to thaw/warm up, than usual. Today’s air temperatures are the nicest that we have seen (this year), at 22C… and sunny!

The van was packed, and we hit the road!

Surface shots taken by me. In-water shots taken by Steve, today!

I had only used my new scooter for a short time, on our last dive, and didn’t really get to do much, since the dive was cut a little bit short. Today, we planned on heading to either Ivy Lea, or to Island 99, for some scootering goodness! Steve was bringing one of the cameras, to practice with, too. On our way down, Frankie and Christian messaged us, to let us know that Ivy Lea was not fully open, but that there were people there, getting ready to open, for the following weekend. They gave us permission to dive there, which was most excellent!

Check-In…

It was finally warm enough to wear flippy floppies!

We got to our entry point, and the staff told us just to make sure that the boat launch was not blocked. No problem. I think we can handle that.

There are some crazy currents, here.

Steve and I finished our gear checks, and Frankie had a glove issue, so while he and Christian were tending to that, Steve took a few pics of me. The current was pretty strong, too.

Me, hitting the trigger…

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Cheese!

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We went back for Frankie and Christian, and away we went! There were turtles, everywhere! Small ones, medium-sized ones – they were everywhere!

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We even saw a few mud puppies…

This guy was standing his ground, as Steve neared him. He stood up, and stared him down.

We kept moving, and hit some crazy currents. There were even a few moments, where we had to aim our scooters straight down, as the current swept upward.

Christian…

Frankie Boy…

Poisson…

Yippppppieeeeeeee! What a ride!

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We went all the way around, and exited at the beach area. Since the camp ground wasn’t officially open, there were no people there, so we had the place to ourselves.

Bottom Time: 56 mins.
Max. Depth: 52′
Water Temp.: 46F
Vis.: A lot of green goop in the water

Christian and Frankie…

Rock on, dude!

I took one of Steve, too!

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We dropped our gear, and Frankie stood guard, as we went for a walk, to get the vehicles.

We did come back for him, though. He DID have our gear, after all.

Exit…

It was such a beautiful day, so we had to hang around, and talk about are most awesome dive!

We went for a quick bite to eat, and we headed our separate ways. I absolutely loved spending the day this way. Diving Goodness, friends, and… TURTLES!

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Tags: Bloggy Thing, Brockville, Chan's Bloggy Thing, Diving, Diving Goodness, GUE, GUE Divers, GUE Ontario, Ivy Lea, Rockport, Scooter, Scooter Dive, St. Lawrence, St. Lawrence River, Suex, Technical Diving, Turtle Alley, Turtles, XK-1, XK1
Categories : Two-Oh-One-Four

It’s (FINALLY) Spring!

16 04 2014

Sunday, April 6th, 2014 ~

This winter has been a terribly brutal one, and one that many Canadians didn’t think would end. It became a cruel joke, to which we stopped laughing, quite a while ago… until today!

The sun was out, and it was above 0C!!! FINALLY!! A great day to take the scooters for a ride! The St. Lawrence River is mostly open, but temperatures are still hovering around 32F and 33F. There are still flash freezings and ice floes, so it isn’t the safest place to be diving, right now. We went back up to the quarry, and I finally got to take my new XK1 for a spin!

We brought the gear to the water…

Frankie, Christian, and Mike teamed up, and Steve, Eric, and I teamed up – even though we were still all together. Our team of three was going to run a line over to the plane, the shark, the rock wall, then back over, so that we would have a large square, to scooter around.

Steve and Eric, after Steve ran the line…