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Gran Cenote (Left side line) May 2007And now for something really different.Richard, Pete and I did two dives at Gran Cenote. The first was on a very short line that forks off to the left side behind the "Have a nice day sign." We paralleled the left side of the cavern line for a while, ran our line underneath the cavern line (about the only way to do it) and then forked off left at the sign. I have no idea what to call the tunnel because it seems to be unnamed on the map. Swimming the actual tunnel takes less than 10 mins, so it's a very short dive, but the density of "really amazing cool structures" to simple "amazing cool structures" seems higher than the other line (the one that is mostly straight behind the sign) Since I was running the video, I hung out as #3 to start with while Richard and Pete put the line in. Then I took over as #1 on the way in. After a bit of mucking around in Carwash, we discovered that having video guy behind does not work too well as the lights just don't penetrate much distance, so it's very hard for the diver in front to keep track of them. Also, who really wants to see minute after minute of the diver in fronts butt? The water is so amazingly clear here, in most of the video you cannot even really tell we are submerged (the water temperature is also significantly better than California!) The platform before setting off.  Descending to put in the primary tie.  Some of the awesome structures in the cavern zone.  Tying into the main line. The main line is white exploration line, and the initial tie-off does not look very stable. We ended up tying in to the far side of the line arrow, so if the primary mainline tie-off somehow failed (which it looked like it could), our line was going nowhere.  This tunnel is quite narrow and tall, so really giving the impression of "being in a cave" -- in places it was significantly narrower than the video lights.   Some parts toward the ceiling however, are a bit more open.   There are some awesome delicate-looking posts sticking up in all directions, and plenty of columns  Pretty soon, the line goes through a pretty significant restriction before ending in a cenote (Not sure the name of the cenote). Wisely, I called the dive at this point! I would have like to have shown Pete and Richard the restriction but didn't feel like re-ordering the entire team.  On the way back, I moved to position #2 and got some shots of Richard.  The posts rise up quite close to the line, so careful finning is needed so as not to damage them.  Coming back into the end of the cave/cavern zone   And we can see daylight again...  and back to the steps  Link to the video: http://nickambrose.com/diving/movies/gran-cenote-left-line-may-2007.mov As mentioned, this is a really short dive (runtime was less than 30 mins, even with us spending 10 mins tying into the main line -- none of us had dived this line before and we had a bit of scrabbling around finding it and making sure our reel line was routed so it would not affect cavern divers) But it is absolutely beautiful in there... 8:29 AM - 5/29/2007 - post comment
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