First dive was for 15 minutes, achieving a depth of 7.2m. Water temperature 12 degrees celcius.
Wore a hired 5mm full length BodyGlove suit and a 5mm shortie and carryied 12kg in weight. Hired from Ocean Turtle in Basingstoke, along with a hood, regs and buoyancy control device.
Entered water from ramp and followed instructor, Simon, into deeper water. Saw nothing except some pond grass, shingle and other divers. Visibility poor – around 3m.
Performed some mask clearing and regulator retrieval exercises at the end of the dive, in shallow water.
That’s it – the log of my first dive. Like aircraft pilots, divers meticulously record the number of hours they’ve spent going about their business. For pilots it’s flying time, for divers, dive time. You can buy specially prepared diving log books, complete with smiling and frowning faces to tick as a record of your overall impression of the dive.
Logging time is important because hours equate to experience. Recording other information is equally valuable because you’d soon forget exactly what equipment you were carrying and what issues you encountered. Writing a log soon after the dive creates a record you can refer back to and will probably come in useful in the future. When you return to a dive site you can use the log to remind yourself of potential problems or sights to look out for.
I haven’t bought a log book yet but I probably should. I’m certainly not logging every dive on this blog although I’m tempted to log it electronically, perhaps online using Google Docs, but that will make it less accessible offline. A physical log book is a useful paper record but it's something else to carry around and, in my case, something else to misplace.
If you have any novel tips for a diving log, or ideas for other things it's useful to record in it, why not leave a comment on this post?
When I've had to maintain such things (mostly in nautical settings - ship or boat) the key has been to do it immediately. DO NOT put it off under any circumstances or you'll lose the moment, forget the detail, not get round to it.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised you don't include a brief note on weather. ISTR diving been relatively weather dependent.
I also presume you're including location - even if it's not suitable for the blog.
And wouldn't be too hasty to rule out a physical log. You may be underestimating what a valued 'treasure' such a thing becomes in the future when you've a host of entries and memories to refer back to.
What, youd didn't get a log book when you joined? SSAC provides a log book when you first join and as soon as I started doing open water dives I was using it to record them. It's been invaluable and is a brilliant reference. I use mine to record any marine life that I see and it's been a useful reminder when I've changed the weight that I carry.
ReplyDeleteGary - thank you for your great comments. As a novice diver I'm still not entirely sure what details should be logged and I hadn't thought about including something about the weather.
ReplyDeleteI've already learned that when you're hiring gear and something fits, log the size to make it easier next time!