This is an arduous course and everyone who has enrolled in this course has gone away from it very tired. The last 3 to enroll did not make it through because they did not believe what they read here. You should be prepared to spend 8-9 hours per day diving or preparing to dive and be able to spend time each evening working on classroom topics. Expect a minimum of ten days to complete this training.
The divers who successfully complete this course have started the course with most or all the following experience.
All divers that I accept into this course have a lot of recent experience diving double tanks. This is NOT a course for you to learn to dive doubles in. If you have never dived doubles, or just have a few dives in doubles, this course is NOT for you. If you have new gear that you have never used this course is not for you. You should have about 100 dives in doubles before you even consider this course. If you have not completely mastered diving doubles and all the rest of you gear before enrolling in this course please do not waste our time, and your money.
I will ask for 100% of the fees up front in cash and none of the fees are refundable.
If you want to learn how to dive double tanks and need the experience I am willing to work with you in one of our nearby open water sites. We can work toward your Decompression Procedures and/or Advance Nitrox certifications.
Most of the divers who successfully complete the 10 day Full cave Course hold certifications in trimix diving, or other levels of more advanced technical diving. This is not a course for you to learn how to manage decompression cylinders. The last half of this course frequently involves staged decompression and we do not have time to teach you bottle management skills in this course.
You should arrive at this course well versed in decompression theory and be able to manage your own decompression requirements. I expect that you can work decompression tables; including air tables, EANx tables, and accelerated decompression tables. I would also like to see you able to use desktop decompression software and have desktop decompression software on your laptop or smartphone. We do not have time to teach you this in this class, but I will evaluate your ability to do all of this on day one in the classroom.
You should be able to calculate your SAC rate and do gas planning. You should be able to calculate CNS & whole body oxygen toxicity values.
You should arrive at the class with your buoyancy already under control; we will not have time to work on your buoyancy, other than slight fine tuning. I will be evaluating your buoyancy on every dive. We will take time to hone your ability to have correct posture/trim in the cave environment but I expect this not to take a lot of time. Your ability to have correct buoyancy & posture will be a critical factor on every dive.
Your water skills should be top notch. I expect to see no sculling to maintain trim or buoyancy. Working without a mask should not cause you any undue problems, we will work without a mask on day one in the water.
Hopefully you have experience with reels, but I can teach you some reel skills. You will use a reel on every dive, some dives you may deploy as many as 5 reels. I feel that one of the benchmarks for a good cave diver is his/her ability to properly deploy, secure and take in a reel. This skill will be done in high flow caves and working on your knees is unacceptable. There will never be a time in this series of courses where working on your knees is acceptable.
You can conduct your decompression in any manner you see fit, so long as I understand and agree to it. Whether it is multi gas computers or tables; please do not arrive without an acceptable and definitive methodology you have previously used (and is generally recognized) successfully.
You must have 2 independent instruments to measure depth & time.
You can rent deco bottles and deco regulators from the local dive shops. They are aluminum 40's and are marked for 100% Oxygen. Most all of our decompression will be at 20 feet or shallower and we will use 100% O2.
You need 2 sets of doubles. You can rent doubles for $10/day.You should plan to bring a lunch EVERY day. We cannot waste time driving to the fill station for gas and restaurants for lunches.
You must get the Cavern/Cave diver workbook/e-learning from me several weeks in advance of day one. I will expect that you will have completely read this manual or completed the e-learning and completed the written exams before the formal class begins.
Schedule yourself to be here at least one day early so you will be well rested for day one classroom. Schedule an appropriate surface interval for flying.
Day 1: Will be classroom all day. No dives will be made. Generally we meet at 9 AM and finish by 5 PM. We also will look at your gear configuration. I will ask you to set up your gear as you would just before you dive it. We will together look at that configuration. I would expect only minor gear modifications to be made, if any. We will not have time to make major gear configuration changes. I expect you will have this done before you arrive in High Springs. I encourage you to call and talk to me about any questions you have regarding gear configuration. (DO NOT listen to your Local Dive Shops' advice on cave gear configuration unless there are current and up-to-date cave divers giving you this advice.)We will also work on dry land line drills.
Day 2: Complete 4 cavern dives.
Day 3: We will complete 2 or 3 dives.
Day 4: 2 Dives
Day 5: 2 Dives.
Day 6: 2 Dives.
Day 7: 2 Dives.
Day 8: 2 Dives
Day 9: 2 Dives
Day 10: 2 Dives
This is a lot of dives. The MINIMUM number of dives required to meet training Standards is 16. I reserve the right to extend that number of dives. If we have to do extra dives over extra days I charge an additional fee for these makeup days.
You will most likely know how well you are going to do overall by the end of the 3rd or 4th day. If you don't know how you are stacking up it is my fault and you need to ask. I do a detailed post dive debrief after every dive; I rarely sugarcoat these; which is to your benefit. I will not in any way embarrass or berate you. Please read My teaching philosophy regarding this issue.
I suggest staying in the High Springs area. It is more centrally located to the caves we will dive in. Contact me for lodging options.
Call Jim at 352-363-0013
E-mail Jim@cavediveflorida.com
updated May 2020
