Passing Down the Dive Passion

I'm never going to be a famous diver, like my friend Jill Heinerth, whose commitment and dedication led to her membership in the Women Divers Hall of Fame. I'll never be an explorer, like my friend Wes Skiles, whose daring has led to his membership in the Explorer's Club. I'll never be an inventor and an innovator, like Dive Rite founder Lamar Hires, whose name and reputation are synonymous with the creation of groundbreaking dive gear designs.

In fact, I'm quite sure that I'll never approach the level of diving skills and accomplishments of a great majority of the advanced and technical divers that are a part of Dive Rite's world.

Maia and Guy go through a gear check at Ginnie Springs. (© 2008 Russell Sparkman)

But I'm OK with this because in my own personal relationship to diving, I have just achieved my greatest diving-related accomplishment. Well, technically it's not really my accomplishment, but it's one that means the world to me.

This summer, my two kids - Guy, 13 and Maia, 12 -- successfully completed their SCUBA training and are now certified divers.

Their young age alone is a fact that makes me proud of their accomplishment.

Guy prepares for his second dive into Devil's Den. (© 2008 Russell Sparkman)

However, the fact that they completed their open water check out dives in full 7 mm wetsuit, hood and gloves in the chilly waters of Puget Sound makes their achievement all the more remarkable.

In this regard, I owe a debt of gratitude to SSI Instructor Pat Beach, owner of Whidbey Island Dive Center in Oak Harbor, for being willing to teach such young dive students. His approach to teaching diving, along with his assistant instructors, was focused entirely upon helping his students succeed, no matter what it took. And with these young divers, he took extra care.

In our case, after Guy and Maia had passed their written test and completed their first five pool sessions, Pat offered to let us continue the pool sessions so that Guy and Maia could practice with their full wetsuits and weights in the pool, before heading into cool, green waters of Puget Sound. These additional pool classes, combined with outfitting them with Transpacs and Travel Wings, were the ticket for preparing them for the challenges of doing their check out dives in the cold, low visibility conditions of Puget Sound.

Guy and Maia, working with instructor Peter Pehl, completed their open water dives in early August, just in time for us to make plans to go to Florida to dive in the springs.

We arrived in Florida just after Hurricane Fay had dumped massive amounts of rain across the swath of Florida where we planned our dives - Ginnie Springs in High Springs, and Devil's Den in Williston. Although not optimal, we were fortunate to be able to dive in both locations over two days.

We did four dives in two days, each one a little better than the next.

With fascination, I watched as Guy and Maia handled with aplomb diving in the overhead environments of both Ginnie and Devil's Den.

Maia is all smiles as she prepares to go diving in Ginnie Springs, near High Springs, Florida. (© 2008 Russell Sparkman)

In Devil's Den, in particular, I watched with joy, amusement and even a bit of trepidation as they navigated over, around and under huge limestone boulders, and short expanses of tunnels that were more like cave diving than cavern diving. At one point, they even turned into a short crevasse that dead ended, and the ensuing turn around in a tight space kicked up silt. I was more than a little anxious, as I helped lead them out of this spot, about how they might react to the situation. To them, it was an adventure, and one of the "highlights" of the dive that they like to talk about the most.

The highlight of our second dive together at Devil's Den was feeding the catfish. Not itsy bitsy catfish. We're talking about 2 to 3 foot long catfish. It was a thrill for young and old divers alike.

At the end of this dive, Maia expressed an interest in learning more about marine biology and Guy expressed an interest in cave and wreck diving.

No, I may never achieve the greatness that Jill, Wes, Lamar and others have as divers. And for that matter, neither may Guy or Maia. But a little bit of the passion for diving that's been a part of my life has been handed down to them, and it will forever be my greatest diving accomplishment.

Now, I look forward to seeing where their dive passion leads them in the coming years.