CMU SCUBA goes to Ohio - White Star Quarry 2022-09-03

Gaurav and Dan visited White Star quarry in Gibsonburg, Ohio on Saturday, 3rd September 2022. We drove there and back, taking over seven hours in total in the car.

The diving was disappointing -- the website promised 45' of visibility, plenty of colorful fish, and even an underwater habitat. The reality was a 15' of visibility to a flat quarry floor with a few attractions sprinkled around. We saw four fish the entire day (one was in a sandwich). The habitat was a mini-gazebo with a decorative bubble of air maybe 4" high. It was so disappointing that, after three dives, we cancelled the second day and drove back that evening.

At least this trip allowed us to test diving at 45' depths. After this trip, we decided to stop any further quarry diving for at least this season, and started kicking around ideas for future dive trips to Florida/Mexico.

Crusty's Quarry 3: More Silt and Sand edition 2022-08-14

Dhruv, Dan, ang Gaurav (left to right) hanging out on their yacht

Dhruv, Gaurav, and Dan visited Crusty's quarry on the third explorer's club dive trip this season. There was a substantial crowd of both classes and families. We quickly got situated and hit the water about forty minutes after arriving, which is pretty quick.

The visibility was somehow even more poor than the first two times. Since we had already visited all the attractions in the quarry, we practiced our underwater navigation skills instead. Gaurav wound up diving in circles, but Dhruv unerringly led us to four separate attractions in visibility of less than 10 feet.

A fish joined us to check out the airplane.

We also attempted to visit the deepest part of the quarry (under the airplane) but had to abort the attempt at 30' when the visibility dropped from 10' to about 2'. The silt was so complete that the white light from the flashlight turned red from scattering. (Checking with some staff later, we were told the nadir is at about 40' and is silty year-round.)

Crusty's Quarry 2: Electric Boogaloo 2022-07-23

Gaurav, Dan, and Dhruv (left to right) after their dives

Dhruv, Gaurav, and Dan visited Crusty's quarry on the second CMUx dive trip this season. There was less of a crowd than before, with more classes and fewer families. This time, we brought along a tarp. Thanks to some new equipment and rented 5mm wetsuits, it took us over an hour to get equipped and into the water -- it was noon when we started our first dive.

We swam out to a training platform and sank down to 6m, and the thermocline was not unmanageable thanks to the thick wetsuits and boots. Unfortunately, because of the nature of the quarry, visibility was poor (no more than 12'). From the platform, we attempted to navigate to the plane by compass, but (somehow) missed an 8' high aircraft tail. After resurfacing to find our bearings, we managed to find the boat and then the bus. We spent our time attempting to navigate in the dark, testing out a new underwater flashlight, and just practicing our finning technique.

For the second dive, we visited the aircraft, an underwater pirate display, and then briefly a boat. This was fun! Gaurav also learned a valuable lesson at the end, when he dropped a fin in the water. Fins are designed to be neutrally buoyant in seawater, but the fresh quarry water is less dense and the fins sink in them. After a crash dive, we were able to recover the missing fin at about 8' of depth, just before it was swallowed up in the foliage.

Diving in Crusty's Quarry 2022-07-02

Dhruv Naik and Gaurav Manek visited Crusty's Quarry on a sunny Saturday afternoon. There was quite a crowd in the morning, with families (and kids!) all there to dive in this (seemingly) warm freshwater quarry together. While getting suited and booted on the grass, we had the unwelcome surprise of an extruded o-ring on some new, untested equipment. The folks over at the quarry kindly gave us a replacement ring for free and even installed it for us.

We plunged into the warm water for our shakedown dive, and spent the first 20 minutes adjusting weights, testing out new equipment, and just generally enjoying the shallows. Once ready, we swam out to a training platform and sank down to 6m (18'). On the way down, at about 3.5m (10-11ft) we crossed a sharp thermocline of probably 15 degrees F, which was absolutely brutally cold, especially in our thin summer suits. After freezing down there for a minute, we ascended to just above the thermocline and decided to spend the rest of our time exploring the shallows.

Over three dives (totalling 2 hours submerged), we explored the shallows quite thoroughly. The fish were very friendly (they'll come within inches of you) and there were sloping fields of freshwater grass with zones of petrified wood to swim around. The underwater surfaces were all very loose and silty, and visibility was greatly hampered by the slightest pressure wave from our finning.

At the northernmost point, at about 4m, we saw a collection of fish (of the same species) having arranged beautiful nests and were quite intent on defending their turf from creatures easily twenty times their size. Somewhere in the south shallows, we came across an underwater tree that had been completely covered in some sort of thick mucus, which we avoided. Throughout the quarry there are about a half-dozen manmade attractions sunk at various depths. We were only able to visit the sunken airplane, and even that was limited to a short two-minute visit.

Visibility in the shallows was okay (10' to 15') and greatly improved with depth (to 20' at a depth of 15'), but it was surprisingly dark -- probably due to silt in the water at higher depths.

Next time, we'll rent thicker wetsuits and bring a tarp to prepare on, instead of the grass. Also, lights!

Grand Cayman Islands

CMU explorers who went: Josephine Palencia

We stayed at the Morritt's Tortuga Resort (nice). I dove with the very professional Ocean Frontier's dive shop while Neda got certified with Red Sail.

Dives done: Did a total of 20 dives (josephin), 6 dives (neda) in over a week.

Grand Cayman east diving is mostly ~100 ft great wall dives on one side
(shoulder) then plunges into the abyss on your other side/shoulder.

Neda got certified and did 4 check-out dives, the Kittiwake wreck, and the
Stingray City dive. All of my dives start at 100ft or so followed by
60-80ft dives. I dove each one for over an hour so averaged about 4-5
hours of diving/day.

We rented a small car for ~ $200/week.
A great diving vacation. Would love to return there again.

Below are the dives. (*favorites)

Dive - Depth - Duration
1. Babylon Gardens - 100ft - 1hr
2. Club Hole - 67ft - 1hr 10m
3. Pat's Wall - 100ft - 1hr
4. Maggies Maze - 60ft - 1hr
5. Scuba Bowl - 100ft - 45m
6. Light House on the Prairie - 65ft - 1hr 10m
7. Eeny, Meeny, Miny Mo - 100ft - 1hr 5m
8. Frand Sound Gardens - 41ft - 1hr 10m
9. Turtle Pass - 100ft - 45m
10. Cinderella's Castle - 65ft - 1hr 5m
11. High Rock Drop-Off - 100ft - 1hr
12. Ironshore Gardens - 65ft - 1hr 10m
13. Andy's Wall - 100ft - 1hr
14. Eagle Ray pass - saw 2 eagle rays (mate) going towards the abyss - 100ft - 1hr
15. Kathleens' Reef - 82ft - 1hr 10m
16. Split Rock - 80ft - 1hr
17. Sunset Reef - night dive: cool with UV lights - 21ft - 1hr
18. Stingray City - 12ft - 50m
19. 3 Sisters - 100ft - 1hr
20. The Arch - 70ft - 1hr 10m
21. Kitiwake wreck - 60ft - 45m

-J. Palencia