I turned 24 on July 27th and started driving towards one of the best birthday presents of my entire life (although I didn’t know it at the time)!!!  I flew into Atlanta, Georgia on the July 26th from Seattle and drove down to High Springs, Florida on the 27th (my birthday) for a week of cave diving with Jill Heinerth.  I had no idea what I was in for.  All I knew was that I had been traveling and training for over five weeks and I was feeling a bit worn out.  I arrived in High Springs late on the 27th and went straight to bed without touching any of my gear in my car.

I woke up bright and early the next morning and headed over to Amigos Dive Center to pick up my doubles, lights, and reels before heading off to Ginnie Springs to meet up with Jill and the two other students I would be spending the week with.  After a brief introduction we went straight into lectures and finished the day with a few cavern dives.  My interest in cave diving was starting to build after those few cavern dives but it still wasn’t anything crazy to me.  Day two started with a brief lecture and then our first plunge into a real cave, Devil’s Eye.  All I can say is that somewhere between the entrance of Devil’s Eye and ten feet into Devil’s Eye my interest in cave diving went from 0 to 60!  I came out of the water absolutely hooked!  I’m pretty sure Jill enjoyed my reaction as she was laughing at how big my smile was after surfacing.  I surfaced with a smile after every dive from that point forward.

 

Unfortunately my time with Jill ran out and I didn’t have the chance to finish the training through full cave certification.  Since I have only included a couple of pictures in this post, expect more posts in the future when I manage to hook up with Jill again to finish up my full cave certification and hopefully take my cameras on some cave dives!  I don’t know how to explain it but my cave dives with Jill were some of the happiest dives of my life.   She is an awesome person, an awesome instructor and I’d like to congratulate her for recently being awarded the Wyland Icon Award!!!  The award, founded by artist Wyland, is presented annually to individuals who exemplify the adventurous spirit of the underwater world and inspire others to do the same.