Written by: Tony Toniolo

When I was a kid, going on vacation was easy.  My parents planned the itinerary, packed everything, and off we went.  Going cave diving with Terry is similarly easy.  He usually plans the itinerary, packs the gear, plans our meals and makes sure that Bruce and I get out of bed early.  This trip, Terry couldn’t join us so Bruce and I had to fend for ourselves.  To keep things simple, we decided to do the whole trip in side mount gear and figured out where and when we felt like diving on a day-to-day basis.

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Written By: Julie Brown

My introduction to LA started when I got to LaPrade’s house at 1a.m. after a quick trip to Anaheim to have dinner with my brother.  LaPrade had just returned from Hermosa Pier so was in a very chipper state!  We made the mistake of waiting around until his roommates returned as well.  I had grand plans to make my mark as FNGal on the LA boat by showing up with a case of Pacifico and cookies.  Well I got off work late so the cookies never happened and his roommate and friends managed to consume an entire 12 pack of ‘good’ beer in sub 20 minutes.  Who beer bongs Pacifico anyways, geez!  Moral of the story is that I will have to return again :O).

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Written By: Tony Tonilo .

The loose planning of this trip began with the great idea of tying-in a business trip, a cave-diving trip, and a wreck-diving trip with Corey Mearns.  I flew into Fort Lauderdale for business on Tuesday.  Thursday morning I drove 300 miles to St Petersburg for more business and to meet up with Bruce who was in Tampa for business (coincidence?….no).

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Written by: Terence Anderson

Bruce and I left Tony at the airport in the afternoon and continue up to the ½ star accommodations of the Cadillac Motel in the heart of High Springs. The rest of the day was spent prepping gear for cave diving, eating and drinking.

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Written by: Mike LaPrade

Solid day on the Sea Bass on Saturday (June 13). Funny though, when I noticed the three CCRs on board…I got to thinking: Next month Mankat and I will be on CCR, add to that AA and Bruce (if he ever actually dives his HH)…I guess this little fad is growing! Who’s comin with us!?

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Written by: Mike Wynd

Hi gang, On Sunday a group of us with myself, Andrew Ainslie and Terry Anderson as bottom divers and with Tony Toniolo and Bruce Wyrwitzke acting as support, went out and did a bit of a deep one on the ‘Eureka’ oil rig. 154.1 metres (505 feet) to be exact! And we still didn’t get to see the bottom!!!

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Written by: Bruce Wyrwitzke

I couldn't get anyone to join me on this trip, but I tried making the best of it. The number of dives was lower than normal and not nearly as exciting as Andrew's exploration, but they were all enjoyable.

Saturday - 3/28
I got in two solo dives at Ginnie. The first was a check out dive with a quick scooter up to the Henkel via Rollercoaster and return down the mainline then trough the Bone Room. Nothing too exciting, just getting back into the swing of things. I spent three hours on the surface working to configure my new Razor Harness. Gave up on that and put the Armadillo back on for a swim (gasp!) dive up the mainline. Spent a few more hours making tweaks to the Razor and called it a night.

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Written by: Scott Barnes

Returned from a two week cave diving trip in Mexico about a week ago.Thought I would give a short version of our trip. I was accompanied by Julia and Seann, which alot of you know, along with Jeff Highley and John DeLaney. We returned to some often visited cenotes such as Sac Aktun, Carwash, Jailhouse, Maya Blue, Naharon, Choc Mol and Chan Hol.

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Written By: Tony Toniolo

It’s comforting that there are so many aspects of our regular Florida cave diving trips that we have down to a routine.  Bruce, Terry and I left on a redeye Thursday night, landed in Orlando, and were on the Central Florida Turnpike in our stow-n-go minivan before sunrise.  We stopped at our favorite Waffle House in Ocala where the waitress remembered us.  After a quick visit to Corey at Salvo, our storage locker, and Amigo’s we arrived at Ginnie by lunchtime.  That’s when the routine ended and the antics began.

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Written By: Bruce Wyrwitzke

Day 0 -
I flew in to Salt Lake City this morning and was greeted with something I'm not too familiar with - WINTER.  It was still 28F at 11 AM.  Fortunately, there's no snow... yet.  That comes on Saturday. 

The class wasn't scheduled to start until tomorrow but, Randy (my instructor) was able to sneak me in for a few hours this evening.  We spent most of the time assembling and re-configuring the unit.  The Golem Gear CCR wing has cut-outs near the top of the wing, allowing the hoses to run through rather than over the top of the wing.  Very cool set up, but it makes all of the hoses too long.  I swapped out all of the hoses, but I ended up with a much more streamlined system.  We grabbed a quick bite then headed off to Randy's house for a not so quick lesson in scrubber packing.  Randy did it 10 minutes, demonstrating as he went.  I did it in 45 minutes, feeling like a dumb ass the entire time.

The fun begins tomorrow with academics and pool time.  Can't wait...

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