Oceanic Ventures, Inc.
The Strange Chronicles
August 2000
August 30, 2000 As I've said, our ham radio is dying a very smelly, death. A couple of nights ago we even had a bit of smoke coming out. Very exciting on a fiberglass boat anchored in the middle of nowhere. We're growing increasingly worried about loosing communications.
August 27, 2000 Since we're very near Belize City, I finally took the ham radio apart to see what the problem was and hopefully find parts to make a repair. There are a couple of "cooked" components on one of the board and no chance that the local technology level could repair it. Looks like a new radio for Christmas!
Plan B is to modify our other long range radio to allow email. I'll start working on that in a few days. Hopefully we won't miss a beat but don't be too surprised if we're off the air for a while soon. Meanwhile, keep your messages coming. We love hearing from you and long message don't hurt a bit from your end.
August 19, 2000 We're leaving our boat at Mojo Cay, near Belize City and heading inland for a week of exploring. Seeking comfort, we're staying at a nice lodge near San Ignacio - Black Rock. We'll do guided trips from there - see Copal, play in the jungle, see the waterfall and do a river trip. I read about one float trip takes the river through a cavern and out the other side. Bet it's the one y'all went on with your group. Can't remember the name of the river and Ayacha has our guide book.
August 9, 2000 We've been stuck on the boat in 20 - 30 knots of wind and frequent for four days now. Two strong tropical waves have been passing by. Of course this happens while we're sitting 200 yards from the Blue Hole. I finally got a chance to run over this afternoon for a single tank dive. Happy I didn't bother gearing up for a dual cylinder, deco dive because the site was pretty boring. Impressive to see and I'm glad I did it, but after 30 minutes I was back in the dinghy. The biggest treat of the dive was having a mob of purple shrimp do a very complete job of checking my hand for parasites. They managed to take a few nips so I assume I needed cleaning! All in all, I enjoy life around 40 feet on a good reef.
August 5, 2000 Probably doing the first of three or so dives on the Blue Hole tomorrow or the next day. Thought I would start with a 100' with simulated deco to practice bag deployment, gas switch, etc. Then I'll do a 125 with a short deco. If those go smoothly, I'll do 154' (30 meters) and quit at that.
August 1, 2000 We're anchored off the south end of Turneffe, Belize. This is a long mangrove island. Sounds lovely, but mangroves mean mosquitoes and this is prime season. So we're anchored way out on the tip of a reef extending south from the island. We managed to find a nice big patch of sand in about 15 feet of water. The mosquitoes don't find us out here—at least not when the wind is blowing. It's a typical, lazy Caribbean morning. I know it's not the weekend, but I'm not sure what day of the week it is. Doesn't really matter, since we're not near a town and don't need to keep track of what day the vegetable boat delivers fresh produce.
Morning coffee is over, Rebecca has finished her class work and the three of us are getting ready to launch the dinghy from the foredeck. I'm up on the bow getting a halyard ready to lift the dingy. Rebecca decides to surprise daddy by climbing out her hatch (Becca’s hatch is the Hatch in the V-Berth also known as Fort Becca-Boo) and sneaking up on me. She made it out of the hatch and over to the rail before I noticed her. A nice little squall was blowing in and I suppose the boat rolled a bit as she reached for the lifeline. She made the grab, but with the hand that was carrying Skip. Skip went flying into the water. Rebecca's face went from delight at "surprising daddy" to horror as Skip slipped below the waves. She knows full well when you drop something overboard it's gone for good. Skip, by the way, is a tiny little 1 1/2", black and white plastic dog who used to belong to Barbie but has recently become Rebecca's favorite toy. Hopefully Skip is laying on the bottom, not too far down current and not too well hidden in the sand and turtle grass. I had planned to go on a dive later this the afternoon. Looks like a morning dive is on the schedule now. Snorkeling equipment is almost always at hand in the cockpit, but it took us a while to dig out the BC, regulator and a cylinder. During the scramble to get everything assembled the squall moved closer, the winds shifted, the boat moved and Skip is no longer directly under or behind us.
Once below the surface, I couldn't help swimming around aimlessly trying to spot Skip. Of course, that never works and after a few minutes it was clearly time to practice some of those search and rescue drills. I usually carry a small reel of line when I dive - a carry over from my technical diver training. I stuck my dive knife (okay, dive tool) into the sand, tied on the line, moved out a couple of feet and started to swim a circular search pattern. The techniques came back quickly - keep the line taunt, stay at a steady height, resist the urge to look off to the side, concentrate on the area you swimming over, use a marker to show you've completed a circle, and so forth. Forty-seven minutes into the dive I found Skip resting on the bottom and returned him to his delighted young master.
A small reel of line is a very handy thing to carry as part of your normal dive equipment. It doesn't have to be a big tech diver reel, just one of the small ones that slip into the pocket of your BC. A search pattern can't be run methodically without one and you never know when someone is going to drop something off a dive boat or pier. You might not end up a hero to a three year old but an hour of so swimming a search pattern at the Beautiful Blue Lagoon or off at Lake Travis might easily turn up some "treasures".
We're putting together a simple weight and float contraption that can be toss to mark the spot the next time something goes overboard. Assuming the water isn't too deep we'll make the next recovery with snorkeling gear.