Cave Diving

Telford Springs

James Garrett

Breathing Gas–
Max Depth–
Avg Depth–
Visibility– 50ft on the way in, 15-20ft on the way out.
Water Temp– 72F
Dive Time:

Notes:
Received a free boat ride up the  Suwannee River from Cave Excursions West during their REACT party, which is a great place to get cheap gear, a free meal, and meet several cave divers!  I lead the dive, and Stacey followed.  The guys at Cave Excursions had already placed a primary reel for everyone to use during the party, as well as placed the gap reels in the two nearby sinks where the gold-line breaks.  I’m not exactly sure where we ended up, but it’s very easy to describe, as Telford is one of the most changing caves that I’ve seen!  One thing is for sure, you can tell that Telford isn’t dove often, as it’s VERY silty, and exiting is always done with less visibility than entering.  This time it wasn’t as bad as last year.  We also got to make it quite a bit further in than last year, maybe an extra year of experience helps here :-P!  We made it to an area where the cave gets very black, with rock that branches off quite a bit, similar to the double lines area of Ginnie, except far darker.  Shortly after that, the cave got very low, with pristine white columns from the ceiling all over the place, similar to the Olsen (Pothole) line in Peacock, aside form the height, and there were also several more formations.  From talking to other cave divers, it sounds like we nearly made the first T.  I certainly would take a stage to Telford this time, as the cave changes so much, and it’s so shallow, you really could use more time to enjoy it!

Suwannee RiverS

Devil’s – To the Heinkle and then Hill400

James Garrett

Breathing Gas– 32% Backgas / 100% Deco
Max Depth– 106ft
Avg Depth– 85ft
Visibility– 150+ft
Water Temp– 72F
Dive Time:

Notes:
Met up with Jeff Marchand after he got off work and finally got to take the new Gavin Standard into a cave after spending several hours with it in open water.  We had decided to go somewhere that was very open, and the mainline section of Ginnie fit the bill, with the added bonus that we had already swam this entire area of cave, most of it multiple times, so we had a solid idea on how much gas is needed to swim out from that far back.  The first thing I noticed is how fast the cave comes at you on a scooter.  It’s VERY task loading keeping up with a buddy, the scooter and the line….and also enjoy the cave.  Getting through the lips on the throttle scared me, so I decided to swim it…WOW does the flow really catch a scooter in this area of the cave, and with the safety bottle on the other side of me, getting through the lips was no fun!  Once through the lips, we established communication again and got back on the throttle.  I found myself constantly on and off the throttle, as I’m paranoid of getting too high and hitting cave.  We made it to the Heinkle in about 27 minutes, and turned the dive there, not wanting to stretch gas for the first cave/dpv dive.  On exit, we stopped at Hill400 since we had built up reserves, recalculated our gas math, and tied in a spool.  The cruise down Hill400 went quickly, and we were at the p1000ft arrow before we knew it.  Since Whitney was waiting on the surface, we decided to turn here before deco got too long and left her bored out of her mind.  Deco was < 10 minutes, which was awesome seeing as how we had just covered 3700ft of Ginnie, a dive that would have required about 40 minutes had we been swimming!

Madison Blue Springs State Park – Potters Delight (Attempting the Courtyard)

James Garrett

Breathing Gas– 32% Travel / 100% Deco
Max Depth– 71ft
Avg Depth– 70ft (Shallower, but we used 70 for deco)
Visibility– 30-50ft
Water Temp– 72F
Dive Time: 127min

Notes:
Met with Stacey at her place and carpooled up to Madison Blue Springs State Park.  The water was clear, flow was reasonable, and in general it was just a great day to dive there.  The only downside was the heat, which makes the setting up time in a drysuit not too fun.  We swam to a tunnel near the end of the gold line, went down it, and turned after we found ourselves in a complete silt out.  Backtracking, we finally got on the potters delight jump, and made it to Rocky Horror where the slate is, then turned the dive, as Stacey’s drysuit had flooded.  Deco was uneventful, and it was still a fun dive regardless of the fact that we didn’t get to the Courtyard as planned.

Cow Springs – Mainline to 1400ft

James Garrett

Breathing Gas– 32% Travel / 100% Deco
Max Depth– 103ft
Avg Depth– 70ft
Visibility– 75ft+
Water Temp– 70F
Dive Time: 71min

Notes:
Met Stacey at her place and carpooled over to Dive Outpost to get the key.  Despite a few issues getting in the water, we had a great dive.  Unfortunately my doubles were only at 3100psi, so even with a stage, we only made it about 1400ft.  Running a primary reel while pushing a stage ahead of you isn’t nearly as easy as I’d hope.  For some reason the mainline seems to be run in less than ideal places, sometimes you can swim 5ft off mainline and be in a much larger area where you won’t bang your tanks, something to look out for if you’re backmount like me.

Cow SpringsCow Springs

Royal Springs – It’s just as crappy of a dive as you’ve heard it is…

James Garrett

Breathing Gas– 32%
Max Depth– 46ft
Avg Depth– No idea, I couldn’t see my bottom timer half the dive
Visibility– 0ft after, maybe 30ft to begin
Water Temp– 72F
Dive Time: 39min

Notes:
Dove with Jeff Marchand just to see if this place is as bad as people make it out to be…it is.  The cave looks a lot like Little River in color, without hardly any damage.  The silt is insane, on the floor and ceiling.  There are plenty of other dives in the area to do without resorting to this one.  We got about 200ft into the system and turned because it was small (barely backmount even for good viz), and the extreme silt.

Little River – Full Cave Class – Shortcut & Mud Tunnels to the Florida Room

James Garrett

Breathing Gas– 32% Travel / 100% Deco
Max Depth– 101ft
Avg Depth– 90ft
Visibility– 75ft+
Water Temp– 72F
Deco Schedule:

Notes:
Third dive of full cave class.  To avoid giving Rich’s class away, I wont go into much detail here.  I placed all the jump spools in, and lead this dive.  I did have a real light failure, and the superbowl was later that night, so we postponed finishing the class until the next weekend.  I hate this cave, and it must hate me back…this was my worst dive in a long time, and it happened during class 🙁

Little River - Dive 3 of Full Cave

Ginnie Springs – Full Cave Class – Expressway Circuit

James Garrett

Breathing Gas– 32% Travel / 100% Deco
Max Depth– 97ft
Avg Depth– 85ft
Visibility– 150ft+
Water Temp– 72F
Deco Schedule:

Notes:
Second dive of full cave class.  To avoid giving Rich’s class away, I wont go into much detail here.  I placed all the jump spools in, and lead this dive.

Expressway Tunnel Full Cave Class Dive 2