Trimix in Tennessee

[Vtach]

It was a great week but good to be back home, I just wish the ice was out already  :-\.  We left for TN about 1am from Milwaukee and made it in about 10 hours.  As soon as we arrived we were welcomed by the staff at Rhea's Diving in Maryville, TN.  Like Chris said, the hospitality was great from Alan and his staff.  We crashed for a while and then started getting gear ready for the next 6 days of diving.  We dove in a former Zinc mine named Immel quarry with a max depth of 210ft.  Just getting into the quarry was a bit of an adventure due to the limited access roads.  The quarry has great visibility up to about 175 ft then it starts to get dark with the same type of sulfide layers that we have around here.  The underwater scenery was cool.  Mostly vertical cliffs and quite a few vehicles.  A couple of motorcycles, Nissan Frontier pickup, Mitsubishi Eclipse, Plymouth Acclain, Chrysler Cordoba, Chevy Cavalier along with the Unicorn Bong and a sawed off shotgun.  We started out the first day diving at 100-130 with 28/35 just to knock the rust off.  After getting into the groove we practiced some OOA drills, valve drills, lights out....etc.  In the following days we worked our way through 18/45 and 15/55 along with more drills like deco gas sharing, long hose deployed deco ascents and of course Lift Bag 101.  The diving went very well, we were definitely challenged but not overwhelmed.  After every dive we were given solid feedback which gave us an idea on our progress.

At the end of the dive day came the work of gas mixing and taking care of gear.  We were usually back to the diveshop by 4-5 pm and spent the next 3-4 hours getting the tasks done.  By the end of the week our collective a$$es were dragging.

So...was it worth it?? >

ABSOLUTELY!!  This is an excellent course taught by 2 excellent instructors (Greg and Alan).  We were mostly with Greg but we were able to tap Alans brain also.  We were constantly being challenged not only by tests and skills, but also by example.  No macho $hithead stuff, just real people who happen to love what they do and are damn good at it, teaching us to do the same.

As far as Helium goes....I've been more nervous/narced diving air in Red Granite Quarry at 90 ft  with a 10 watt HID in blackout conditions than I was in 200 ft on 15/55 with a Scout light in Immel with virtually the same conditions and I remember more of the 200 ft dive.....hmmmm......

Looks like I'll be remembering more dives in the future....

Thanks Greg and Alan, nice job ;D