26 Degrees !!!!

Don't get me wrong. I love Canada.  It's an amazing country and I'm sooo very proud to be Canadian!!! (insert flag waving beaver here)   Now if we could just figure out a way to pick the country up and move it to a warmer climate!  (I'm sorry, I'm just not a snow lover)  Even in August I have to wear a 7mm wetsuit, booties, gloves & a full hood when diving in Ontario! (ok, sometime I omit the hood as I despise it!!!) The water is never warm.  Hell, I went diving up in Tobermory the third weekend on July this past summer and at 80 feet it was sooo cold (about 4 degrees)  that my regulator froze up and I had a free flow!!! (when air just starts rushing out of your regulator without stopping) Not exactly what I call fun!!!  Things are SOOO different here.  The water was 26 degrees here today!!  I didn't even need to wear a wetsuit.  Now that I think about it, that was my 1st certified dive without a wetsuit!! Talk about freedom!!!!  Beautiful Freedom!

Ok, so enough about the water temp, and on to the dive.  I only got 4 dives in this past summer, so I wanted to do a tune-up dive before adventuring off on a 2-tank dive. UDC (Utila Dive Centre) was more than happy to accommodate and today at 1pm I met up with Tyson (an instructor, from Toronto) to go over basic skills.  We reviewed all of the Open Water skills on the dock and then got into the water and actually performed them.  All of the skills were quite basic but I was happy to go over them in a controlled setting, and feel refreshed! (reg recovery, mask removal, out of air exercise, fin pivot, BDC removal, weight removal, controlled emergency assent, etc.)  As always the fin pivot was a challenge for me, as my feet are VERY floaty!!  (not a real big deal though)  I found my ankle weights in my luggage tonight & they will help.  I still can't believe how warm the water was!  Even last year when I was in Roatan I wore my 3mm suit.

Tomorrow I'm hoping to get out for at least one dive.  Two would be great, but we will see.  Monday my Dive Master course begins, and we will be doing 3 dives per day as part of that.   I'm still not exactly sure what my schedule will be, but It sounds like it will be full.  I can hardly wait!!!