Post-Class Day 2: Ginnie Springs

For our last dive day of the trip, we went back to Ginnie Springs. Since we had to get our gear back to EE and take care of a few other things, we decided to just do a couple of dives in the morning. We had to get gas, so we ended up getting to Ginnie pretty late (maybe around 11). Of course by then the parking situation was quite different than it had been during the week in the early morning. So we parked by the entrance to the water by Little Devil's. The picnic tables were all in use, but the friendly chaps next to us cleared space for us on one of the tables they were using. We got geared up and into the water, and swam over to the Eye. Oleg was leading and said that he preferred that entrance. On the first dive, we made it quite a bit further in than we had on any previous dives. We turned right at the 800 foot arrow. By that point, the flow seemed to have lessened, so it was finally a bit more comfortable to actually swim instead of pulling and gliding. The tunnel also got a bit more round, which I thought was pretty neat looking. We were just about to swim through an archway created by a pillar that drops down from the ceiling when we turned it. On the way out, we basically just coasted with the flow, taking in the scenery. I finally noticed the stratified clay in the junction room which Rob had mentioned to me earlier. It was very colorful, like an oil slick, but in layers. At the little room at 30 feet, there was quite the little family of O2 bottles :)

When we got to the surface, Rob had a raging headache. Serves him right for eschewing the 30/30 to prove his manliness. We hung out on the surface for a little while. We decided it was time to dive again when we saw an open water class of about 20 people about to descend on the spring. On the second dive, we just made it to the Keyhole before turning. The exit through the eye (with the reel) was a bit more civilized than through the ear. I still like the spitting out effect of the ear though :) When we got out of the water, the team at the table next to us was back from their dive(s) and they were nice enough to get a final picture of the team, all geared up (okay, I took my hood off before I realized it was picture time). We packed up our gear, for the last time. I was sad, but I told Rob that if we had been staying any longer, I probably would have needed a day off from diving. I was pretty pooped.

We returned the tanks to EE and Rob got measured for a drysuit (which took forever, but hopefully that's worth it in terms of a suit that fits well). Then we went to David's for dinner. A variety of meats were grilled (Rob played the part of grillmaster). And at the end of the night, we sampled some of David's moonshine. Teehee. I really wanted to kidnap Bella, but decided that I probably shouldn't, since David has the power to pull my C1 card :) Here's a picture of the little princess. Awww.