On December 3rd and 4th, my fiancee and I went diving in the blue hole in Santa Rosa, NM.
She was going to get her open water certification and i was just going for fun and to support her. Our friends Shawn and Julie went as well. The blue hole is a natural sink hole filled by a natural spring. It is 80' in diameter at the surface and 100' in diameter at the bottom. The bottom is 81' deep. The water is a constant 62 degrees all year which is pretty darn cold, hence the imobilitizing wetsuits. It was a nice 60 degrees outside on saturday, but on sunday it was 36 degrees out when we got in the water! The first day I dove down to the bottom with another diver. There is a gate at the bottom blocking off some underground tunnels filled with water that connect to another lake about a mile away. There is a tombstone in front to the gate in memory of Joe Cool, a diver that died while diving in the tunnels. It read something like... Poor Joe Cool, his bones lie here cold and blue...What a shame for poor Joe. This makes me realize how fragile this life can be. We could meet our end at any moment with how crazy this world is. I'm so glad that I have faith in the One who has overcome death so that I do not have to live in constant fear of dying. Not just that, but I look forward to meeting my Father, face to face.
On sunday I dove with my fiancee as her dive partner. We did buddy breathing and rescue skills. Then we got to do a free dive together at 30' down. We swam around and checked out the 5 fish that live there, the rock formations, and a crazy toy collection. That was pretty fun, but cold. However when we got out of the water it was FREEZING! I hope that we get to go diving somewhere warm for our honeymoon so I can show her just how enjoyable diving can be. Enough of this cold water crap...
