GUE Cave 1 report, Florida November 2004, Tyler Moon

[And]

A Cave Dive

The entrance to the cave is unseen, the crack in the ground masked by the tannic water from the Santa Fe river. After signalling my buddy, I drop down first into the crack, the force of the spring forcing my reg to freeflow as I crawl headfirst vertically into the cave below, my light in one hand, my reel in the other, struggling to find time to clear ears, adjust drysuit, check on my buddy, and look for a decent primary tieoff. A pointy looking rock looks promising and I wedge my knees into the rocks in order to stay still and secure the line. Getting an OK from my buddy I then continue down into the cave and reach the floor below at about 15 mtrs. Crawling along the floor pulling against the strong flow I find a good place for a secondary tieoff and quickly secure the line.

A quick check to ensure my buddy is still with me and after a quick look ahead I venture further into the cave where the flow eases a little to tieoff to the mainline. The mainline is on the ceiling so I tieoff to a rock and for the first time inflate my BC. I am now at 20 mtrs. After what seems forever I gain positive buoyancy and run the line to the ceiling, finding the mainline and tieoff my reel finally, where it will stay until the end of the dive, ensuring we have a safe route to open water. All OK, check gauge for gas, and begin todays sojourn into the cave.

The flow is strong and it is necessary to stay up highnear the ceiling, pulling and gliding along the walls to make good progress, always watching for light signals and also for the direction of the cave. The HID lights, combined with the limitless visibility make the scene almost surreal, blue-white light bouncing from the light coloured limestone walls. The height of the cave is nearly 5 mtrs high and 2 mtrs wide. There are crevices and rooms along this ‘gallery’ which promise further exploration but today we want to travel further into the cave. We reach the end of the gallery, and the cave opens out wider and more rooms and openings can be seen. It is almost spiderman like as we effectively jump from rock to rock and outcrop to outcrop keeping out of the flow as much as possible, as any finning action wastes energy fruitlessly. The mainline is still running to the right of the ceiling, a bright orange against the scattered black and white patches on the walls, the white patches caused by many hundreds of divers travelling along the cave. Approaching the end of this hallway, we jump over to the right hand side in readiness for the restriction known as the devils ‘lips’, a horizontal opening barely wide enough to get through with our twin 16 ltr cylinders.

I’m almost ready to enter the lips, when a wild flashing of light immediately turns the cave alight, but is met with a practiced action, that of deploying my main regulator and swiftly turning round to my buddy, who takes it quickly and, after placing it in his mouth, matches my OK signal. After deploying the full 7ft hose we thumb the dive and start to head back. Within a few seconds one of our primary lights fail, closely followed by another, the cave which seemed so bright and full of light is now replaced by an ominous inky blackness where it is impossible to even see our depth gauges. We hold the mainline in an ‘OK’ grip and go to touch contact, my buddy leading first. The flow is now pushing us along, our fins being great water catchers, threatening to tip us head over heels and bounce us from rock to rock, just at a time when caution is necessary. We need to take it slow so as not to lose the line, our only way out of the cave. Complete concentration is necessary so as not to make any mistakes. Losing the line will almost surely be fatal.

My other senses are heightened and I can clearly hear my buddies breathing as we progress slowly along the main line, one hand on the line in an OK sign, and one hand on my buddies arm, where I am able to signal him to slow down, spped up, and stop if necessary. This is probably the worst thing that can happen, way back in a cave with no lights and sharing gas, no idea how much gas we have or how far we have progressed, it is just our continued persistence in ensuring that we stay on the line and make as fast progress as possible which will get us out of this mess. After what seems like an eternity we find the reel on the main line and, leaving it where it is we descend down the reel line to the floor, and make our way to the tie offs. At this point the flow is now threatening to propel us out of the cave which is obviously dangerous as we are sharing gas and we do not want to miss our safety stops. We expel all gas from drysuit and BC and then steadily climb up the wall of the cave, now able to see from the ambient light coming from the exit. Reaching a log at 6 mtrs we signal our OK’s, check the gas, and agree to do 3 minutes of deco, after which we exit the cave to the safety of open water.

So ends my last dive on the GUE Cave 1 course, and also the point were I fell in love with cave diving.



The Course

5 days earlier I had arrived in Florida, driving up to High Springs, cave country, the headquarters of GUE, Extreme Exposure and Halcyon, where DIR began, and stayed at the High Springs Country Inn. The course was taught by Tyler Moon, an excellent instructor who has been with GUE right from the start and has been instrumental in developing the Cave and Tech courses from the days when he worked in Ginnie Springs with JJ.

Day One was spent on academics and equipment, Tyler never needing slides or notes and choosing topics and asking our views and then analysing our responses, pointing out the positives and negatives. We discussed where GUE came from, and how the organisation sits alongside the NACD and the NSS-CDS organisations. After a bite to eat we set up our kit and Tyler went over it, my only changes were taking the boltsnap from the ballast on my light and swapping out the comfobite mouthpiece on the longhose for a standard one. Tyler spent a long time going through each piece of kit and explaining why it is where it is, not accepting any vague responses, he wanted us to truly understand the whole DIR system and why it is how it is. I learnt a lot in this session.



Day two we did some more academics covering such things as signals, and a bit of geology, before driving to Ginnie Springs for the swim test which was relatively straightforward and I did it in 7 mins out of a time limit of 14 mins. We then did some reel work which I already knew from Tech1, which consists of Tyler running the reel through some trees and my buddy, Scott, and I, having to follow the line, eyes closed, with touch contact. It became very clear that Tyler is keen to get the message across at just how much slower this task is when eyes are closed as whilst doing the exercise Tyler reroutes the line through a childrens playground, complete with complex climbing frame! We followed this by a couple of dives in Ginnie Cavern, my first impressions were of how clear the water is and how much the 18W HID lights the whole cavern up. Running the reel is hard work and it is easy to become preoccupied with this task. I immediately began to reassess my awareness (or lack of it) and was not confident at all about my performance. Caves are a lot more complex than ocean and an environment I soon realised I knew absolutely nothing about.

Day three involved a trip to Ginnie for our first cave dives, of which we did three, first Tyler ran the reel and after tying off he beckoned me to lead the dive. I took heed of his advice at the briefing and we made it past the restriction known as the lips which seems to be a bit of a landmark for the beginner divers and I was happy we got that far. The next two dives didn’t go so well with myself running the reel first followed by Scott.

Diving on sixths doesn’t give much gas even though the 104’s are equivalent to twin 16’s. I must admit to being quite surprised just how ill-equipped I was in this new environment, the flow of the cave making things very difficult and my experience of wreck diving being pretty useless compared to the complexities of cave diving, such as position of the main line, finding the best ways through the system and identifying appropriate places to tie the line, whether to use placements or tieoffs ‘You need to start thinking like a cave diver’ was a phrase often aimed at us. Other than the first dive where we were left alone to get on with our new environment we were being presented with ‘problems’ on the exit, in the form of light failures. These are pretty easy to handle, the lack of gloves making it easy to quickly deploy a backup light. One feature I didn’t realise about the scout lights is how easy they are to hold with the Halcyon reel, which was useful when winding the reel at the end of the dive with no primary light.

Day four we drove an hour up the road to Manatee, a set of sinkholes near the Suwannee river, where alligators, manatees, and vultures are often seen. A friendly deer met us in the carpark and readily accepted pieces of bagel. The recent hurricanes had made a large impact on these systems and a stark water line on the trees easily showed just how much water had been deposited in these rivers. We did two dives in Catfish Hotel, which is an offset sink, having both an upstream and a downstream section. Cavedivers prefer to dive upstream as it is easier for gasplanning as the rule of thirds is used often, a third in , third out and third for reserve. In cave 1 we use sixths, the logic coming from the Intro to Cave class which states that single cylinders be used on the rule of thirds so sixths of doubles is the same as thirds on singles. GUE doesn’t see the point of learning to dive cave in singles, as Cave 1 has much larger safety factors and it is also easier to transition to Cave 2. It was apparent that Cave 1 is somewhat higher than Intro to Cave but not quite Apprentice Cave due to the gas restrictions,and then Cave 2 was at least equivalent to Full Cave.



Catfish Hotel is an imposing place as the sinkhole is covered in Duckweed and as such there is very little daylight penetration at all. Tyler told us that he had cave 1 students not even find the mainline on this dive and even Cave 2 students spend 15 minutes or more. I ran the reel first and made a whole bunch of errors including tangling the reel and having to cut and mend the line before eventually finding the mainline shortly before having to call the dive. We used this info to our advantage on the second dive quickly choosing the better routes and tying to the mainline. The flow is stronger than Ginnie and at one point during the penetration we reach a restriction, suddenly Scott let go of the rock and started floating out of the cave. I flashed him with my light to ask what was wrong and he thumbed it without looking at me. Immediately he was hit with a primary light failure followed by a simulated valve failure. After closing his primary and isolator he signalled out of Gas and I donated my long hose. After a dodgy exit I found out that his spring straps were slightly too long and the flow had been so strong as to nearly force the fins off his feet. Tyler saw this and made the most of it with the subsequent failures. Yikes! I can only imagine what kind of taskloading he experienced.

Day Five after more academics covering diveplanning and more geology we were back to Ginnie to dive in the eye this time. This involves running the reel quite aways through a more restricted passage favoured by some of the sidemount guys. I swaw plenty of sidemount divers during my trip and the Armadillo setup they were using was quite neat and tidy, a good solution I think, if you want to choose that type of diving. By this time in the week my fingers were starting to suffer what is commonly called as ‘Florida Finger’ which is a result of bad pulling and gliding technique in harsh limestone environments with water soaked skin, and my finger tips were starting to bleed and very sore. Can’t wear gloves though, you just have to improve your technique. These two dives were OK, and we did a lost buddy drill, consisting of tying a spool of to the mainline and searching for a simulated lost buddy. More light failures and an Out of gas exit through the restricted tunnel finished the day.

The last day of the course involved the test, which was a case of going through the answers with Tyler discussing every question ensuring that we understood all of the answers and the whys rather than just accept what he was telling us. We then did the final two dives of the course, both from Devils Ear, the first one doing a lost line drill with eyes shut, which involves Tyler getting you to close your eyes and then he leads you to some part of the cave, turning you upside down and spinning you about (all to the sound of him humming the Flinstones theme!) before placing you near a rock. We had to get out a safety spool, tie off to the rtock and then do a search for the mainline. This wasn’t too bad and after apparently touching the line with my manifold I sank back down and tried again, this time finding the line. The second dive is the toughest dive, which, as you read above, consists of a no lights gas sharing exit

After the dives we travelled back to Extreme Exposure for the debrief at which Tyler gave us the blessing and told us we had passed, at no time did I think that this was a definite despite my hours and hours of training and previous Tech1 pass. It is a tough course but thoroughly enjoyable.

Apres Course

Bob Cooper arrived that night and I wasn’t leaving for another four days, so we had a great time pleasure diving, spending more time at Ginnie exploring this fabulous cave system and falling in love with Cave diving, so much so I’m in a bit of a depression, thinking of UK ocean diving. It is kind of cool when you are able to get kitted up at a picnic table, jump in nice warm freshwater and do an hours dive which is challenging and exciting all at the same time, not even scratching the surface of this system penetrating to the 300 mtr mark, seeing fossils and experiencing an environment which can only fill you with awe, my HID lamp easily reaching 40-50 mtrs ahead, incredible. Then surface after sunset, decoing next to a small turtle, before getting dekitted and then going for a beer. That’s what diving should be like.



Costs

Tylers fees were $800, tank rental was $14 (total of $126) per day and gas fills were $14 per fill for twin 16s filled with 32% (total of $126) Ginnie Springs charge $27 per day and manatee and Peacock $10 so $209 for the dive site fees making a grand total of $1261 plus flights, lodgings, food. EE is also a dangerous place as it is too easy to buy kit. I needed to buy some line arrows but I also picked up one of the small SMB's for use back home. Very similar to doing a Tech1 course in the UK really.

Summary

All in all I had a great trip, learnt a whole lot more about diving, DIR and GUE. I’ve now dived Ginnie Springs, Manatee, and Peacock Springs and can’t wait to go back, hopefully during the summer. Tyler Moon is a fabulous instructor and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend him. He has a laidback approach and is happy for students to find the answers for themselves, more of a mentor than a teacher, much the same as Andy Kerslake, and an approach I prefer.



As for the quality of the training, it only took a few dives to see how bad some of the training out there is with all sorts of nightmare kit configs, bad buoyancy skills and generally poor quality diving. I was happy that I chose GUE as the agency to learn cave diving from. I still have a lot to learn, but Tyler has helped provide a solid foundation upon which I can build my cave diving skills, and it can only make me a better ocean diver.

Andy

[Davey Willo]

You had me salivating during the phone conversation but the full on trip report was even better, nice one bro, as you know I've always fancied Cave 1 but after listening to you describe it and reading this I'm now gagging for it...

Erm.. can you break the news to Di for me?

Cheers for the read Andy, and very very well done mate, although I knew you'd pass it.

[Mr T.]

Dude!


No small achievement! And no shock to find out how you deployed and got through on the trip and course. Class report - more like you please !

Green in-coming.

[Mark]

Well done Andy! How much did it all cost including flights etc?

Regards,

Mark.

[Andy Edit:] I have included a costs section in the report for you Mark.

[Mark Chase]

Stunning report M8 and congratulations on your achievement.

I have to admit caves scare me but wit quality training like that and your description of them I am almost tempted to give it a go.

I bet the thought of emigrating has crossed your mind

ATB

Mark Chase

[DJL]

Great report and well done on passing.

One Q - why did Tyler have you remove the boltsnap from the ballast?

Dave.

[Janos]

Pass me a new set of underpants!

Reading that report I'm not sure if I'd be able to make it past the first few metres (shivers).

Top report. Thanks for taking the time to type all that out.

Laters,
Janos

[And]

Originally Posted by DJL

Great report and well done on passing.

One Q - why did Tyler have you remove the boltsnap from the ballast?

Dave.

He said it was not needed in cave and was sometimes used as a crutch. The light is held in the left hand always and only clipped off when not in use. We clip it off in ocean as we ascend so as not to blind our buddy and leave hands free for gas switching. In cave there is no need as you need your light for gas switching and should never need to clip off unless it is turned off. I will now use the small bungee loop and a double ender as per Andy G, although I'll probably just stick to keeping the light in my hand unless turned off, just to keep the same habits and build muscle memory.

Andy

[Tim Ingmire]

Great report Andy, enjoyed reading it.

[Mr T.]

Just had another read of this and seen the pic's you've added!! Stunning mate. And that first pic is print-quality! [Edit: in fact all the pics are!]

Congrats.