Tec 40 Dives 2 and 3

Left out of Manassas to Lake Rawlings before 6:30 to be in the water at Lake Rawling before 10 to start the next two dives in my DSAT Tec40 training.

Was a lot of fun. Rachel made it a challange, as she should. Lots of task loading, to make you think about the "what if" with all of the gear.

Diving is diving - look here, breath here, kick.  This adds the option of  more bottom time and more depth. I am not so much looking for the depth but the bottom time.  That is not to say with some more experience  depth won't figure into this. There are several wrecks in south Florida that will put this training to use.

Now on to the real Open Water - the Ocean.  I will keep you posted.

Scouting Discover Scuba Lake Rawlings

This weekend I met up with Troop 295 for a Discover Scuba Saturday. We had six scout and adults that wanted to Discover Scuba.  We chose Lake Rawling because they were camping and the water is warm and clear this time of year.  

Broke them into two groups. We started out on the shallow platform. Once we completed all the skills we went for a  dive cross the quarry to the bus.  Found the computers, rocking horses, the stove and B Ball court. One the hoop is looking kinda sad. Found the bus the odd chacater that was driving it. Then dove our way back to the shallow platform.

Did the same trip with the second group but the scouts wanted to see the hubcap tree and since we had plenty of air, why not.

All in it was a good day if though it rain most the time we didn't mind we were already wet.

Thinking about trying Scuba Diving, this is a great place to start.

ScubaJam 3 - another great time

This was year 3 for ScubaJam Virginia.  As regular reader of this blog know each ScubaJam is held Labor Day weekend at Lake Rawlings in Rawlings VA .

ScubaJam is where  Boy Scouts, Ventures crews or any other organized youth group from Virginia, Maryland, DC and North Carolina get together for a weekend to dive for FUN.

This year was no exception.  Diving, all you wanted, Games, in-water challenges, I think while underwater limbo and the balloon contest are always favorites, the new underwater ping-pong spoon race was a blast the dive teams were very competitive.

The new challenge this weekend was the rain. it did not rain often but when it did it poured. The rain on Saturday I missed, I was diving. The rain on Sunday during dinner made it hard to fit everyone under Ford's pavillion. It did stop in time for the award presentation. A ton of dive gear was donated by manufactures and given away, There was three door prizes as well as $3000 dollars of continuing dive education scholarships given away

ScubaJam just keeps getting better and BETTER!

I am running behind this year with the video but I plan to have it done soon.

Get your group together and plan on joining us Labor Day weekend 2014 at Lake Rawlings!

SCUBAJAM Virginia 2010 was Great Fun!

Labor Day weekend 2010, what better way to end the summer then diving and camping with Scouts.  I was asked to join Troop 1833 out of Haymarket Virginia as their dive professional for the first ever ScubaJam Virginia held at Lake Rawlings in Rawlings VA.  Pictures posted here, working on the video over the next few days.

Boy Scouts and Ventures crews from Virginia and I think there was a group from North Carolina too. Got together for a weekend to dive for FUN.

Hurricane Earl did not show up and we had fantastic weather. Sunny not a cloud in the sky, temps where in the high 80's low humidity.  Nights where clear and cool.  Next  time I am taking a telescope too, so many stars.

Lake Rawlings was never better.  Warm, 84 at the surface and 80'ish right down to the thermal-clim at ~35 ft. On the deep side at the airplane and boat at ~60 ft the water temp was 44 degrees.  After the initial dives to explore the deep stuff we all ditch the wet suits and hung out in the near bath water temperatures above 35 ft.  There is a lot to see and explore in the shallow depths so the deep was not missed.

The organizers of ScubaJam Virginia had both land and water based activities  and demonstrations set up for Saturday and Sunday.  At the end of the weekend they had a ceremony where the winners of the land and water activities where awarded dive gear.  Scout/Crew member received dive lights, mask, dive bags, fins and DAN gear.

There where two scouts/crew that received $250 continuing dive education scholarships and one scout won a spot on Blackbeard's live aboard cruise for next year. How awesome is that!

From what I hear the ScubaJam Virginia folks are going to take a day or two to rest up, check in on their real jobs then are going right back at it to plan ScubaJam Virginia 2011.

I am planning to be there either as a dive pro for a troop or crew, if not I will see if I can become part of the ScubaJam Crew.