Soaring

So my partner Rebecca has a nice little habit of buying be life threatening presents for my birthday. These presents are usually in direct alignment with some of my major life goals and this is a very good thing! Past incarnations of this gift include paragliding from the top of Grouse Mountain in BC to bungee jumping from a tower crane over the Ottawa River. This year she bought me an introductory glider flight at SOSA, the local gliding club that happens to be 12 minutes down the road from our awesome new house.

Becoming a pilot has ALWAYS been on my life list but it wasn’t until today that I realized how close that goal actually could be. My Grandfather was a pilot in the war and eventually a glider pilot but I have to admit, like most of “those things”, I had no idea really what that meant (until today). Sure, I have seen gliders soaring up there on thermals and it looked interesting but that was pretty much that. I was too “busy” caught up in the day to day of life down here on terra firma. One day I would become a pilot and somehow I was happy with that reality.

Well, “one day” turned out to be today as we pulled up to the field in Rockton ON on a BEAUTIFUL Thanksgiving weekend fall day. There were people and dogs and gliders and tow planes everywhere. Not at all like a normal airport where humans are securely insulated from any and all forms of danger. Here, if you weren’t on constant lookout I am pretty sure that you would be mowed down in a heart beat. Me, I like scenes like that. I am a firm believer in natural selection and felt immediately at home.

Right away I knew I was in the right place as the field “field manager” turned out to be my original open water scuba diving instructor. He was one of the best instructors I had and I really liked him. Bit of a coincidence there but then I thought about it and realized, not really, as adventurous spirits tend to gravitate towards adventurous things (like gliding and scuba). Paul sorted me out and before I knew it I had upgraded my “tourist” single sight seeing flight to a more realistic 5 flight package leading directly into flight school and solo pilots license. Makes sense to me!

The first flight was amazing. Once we cut loose from the tow plane and the soaring world became quiet and all I had to do was point the stick in the direction that I wanted to travel. Magic! Not many thermals today but I got hooked on just what I had for that brief time up there. Man and machine become one and get to soar like a bird. Awesome!

By the end of the day I had three flights under my belt and I felt like I started to understand some of the stuff the instructor was saying. Things like:
-relax - let the plane fly itself.
-2 fingers! It only takes two fingers (and a thumb) on the stick to fly.
-Stop yelling so much, you’re hurting my ears!

Yes, it was awesome. I am hooked and I can safely say that I have another expensive hobby to contend with. I am on the path towards becoming one with the skys. I’ll add that to fire and water. What a terrific Thanksgiving and a wonderful birthday present. Thank you Rebecca and thank you life for providing oh so much fun!

Scuba - Why?

What is it about scuba diving that gets me so excited? Yes, there are periods of time where I put it away on the shelf and don’t do it for a while but then I always come back to it. And it seems with more vigour and passion than before. This summer for instance I was forced to abandon my relatively new hobby (no, wrong word - lifestyle...no, headspace...no, REALITY - perhaps that’s it). I was so busy with this schoolhouse project and my work with Circus Orange that I was starting to crack. Something had go go for a while and scuba drew the short straw. Unfortunately until scuba pays the bills for scuba (and everything else) then it won’t be top of the food chain time commitment wise. That is fine. It is nice to go away and then come back again. I can look at it with new eyes. Like now. I am looking at them through the eyes of a homeowner who doesn’t live in Toronto, a ten minute drive to Humber Bay on Lake Ontario. I still dive Humber but it is an hour drive and that is just fine. I spend an hour thinking about the dive before hand and then digesting it afterwards in the truck. I will also seek out other sites both near and far to satisfy by dive bug. I won’t take what is close and handy but rather what I want to do. Tobermory, for instance, has been on my radar huge with two weekend visits over the past month.

I look up at my goals wall and there is a 14’ Zodiac and an Aquatica housing for my 5D. Now that I feel I have transitioned from the beginner diver level it is time to start adding layers. I will start to fold in some of my other passions, like photography, into the mix. A boat seems a natural progression so I can dive where and when I want.

Yes, scuba is here to stay. I look forward to seeing where it takes me over this next year. And the year after that and...

Real Estate Investing - Talk About Scary!!!

I think that one of the scariest things a person can do is attempt real change in their life. Well, this is the path that I am presently embarking on. Oh don’t worry, I’ll still blow stuff up, climb up scary mountains and get my cave diving certification (this year!!!). However, another thing that I am going to accomplish is to become a professional real estate investor. I guess I am at that point in my life where I am starting to think about the rest of my life and the idea of some security and cash flow seems like a sensible idea. Boy, didn’t that sound all growed up. After all, how else am I ever going to afford the luxury or some of those real hardcore adventures that I have planned without some serious cash behind it to make them a reality? I mean, come on, a scuba diving rebreather setup is $15,000 just for a start!

How does one become a professional real estate investor? Well, I started out with a boat load of books (and I read them too!). Stuff like Rich Dad, Poor Dad and other general financial planning, investing books. I then transitioned to more specific stuff like David Lindahl’s Multi Family Millions that told me how to buy whole apartment buildings and transition them from money loosers (or break eveners) to cash generating machines. All purely hypothetical at the moment but exciting to read about and imagine.

I am the kind of guy that when I get into something I send out as many feelers in as many directions as I can. I asked everyone I knew who I thought knew a thing or two about real estate and I got some great leads and information there too. The internet is a great place to search for this stuff so I did a bunch of looking there as well. It wasn’t long before I came across this group based in Edmonton called Fast Track To Cash Flow. They provide real estate investing seminars and training among other things. Next thing I know I am here in Edmonton trying to pull myself together after sitting all day in a conference room in a hotel. A group of 125 of us spent the day listening to a whole bunch of diverse speakers who filled our heads with strategies, advice, and experience. I feel like a balloon about to burst and there is still one more day of it. Sitting on my butt in a conference centre all day is not my first idea of fun but believe it or not I am very excited. Really looking forward to getting back home to start to put it into practice. First step, start finding real estate deals. Second step, find a group of investors who want in on these deals and start buying property. Very crazy and scary and I can’t wait!

I set up a web site for this new endeavor (of course). No, not much there yet but it will be the place to go to find out what Big-Wheel Investments is up to. I’ll keep you posted on this and all the future adventures that this new career path sponsors. And hey, if you have a real estate deal or want in on an investment let me know!

Ice Flow Racing - Another Strange Thing to Do in Canada

Yesterday I participated in the Peterborough Ice Flow Race sponsored by the Ontario Underwater Council. This is one of those strange side line kind of things that scuba divers from Canada do to while away their winters and make things more exciting. Basically you get a team together and push giant-ass ice flows down the river wearing wet or dry suits, fins and scuba BCDs. It is not diving at all but you are in the water and kicking like mad.

To be honest that only real reason I took part was because this event sounded totally ridiculous and I just love that. There is nothing I enjoy more than seeing the blank looks on people’s faces when it comes up in conversation that I did ____ (enter ridiculous hobby or event here) on the weekend. The idea of pushing huge chunks of ice down a half frozen river fit this category nicely.

The teams could be anywhere from 8-16 members. Our team, The Frozen Frogs, had just 8 as that was as many folks as we could talk into the madness. The ice flows were twenty feet square and twelve to sixteen inches thick. This maybe doesn’t sound like much but if you consider the weight of a piece of ice this size you get some pretty impressive numbers. Ice weighs 92% of what water would weigh. If the ice flow was made of water and was 20’ X 20’ X 12“ it would weigh 24,971 pounds. As ice it would weigh 92% of that coming in at 22,973 pounds or just over 10 tons. Pretty impressive! It was stressed to us by the organizers that we really didn’t want to get caught between the ice flow and anything in its path. Good call!


The race was a staggered start with the seven teams leaving at five minute intervals with best overall time winning the prize. It was our first year so we really didn’t know what we were doing but we were told that the more you keep your ice flow in the current the better. Makes sense - let the river do the work. The starting position was sheltered just below a lock north of Peterborough Ontario and when we started it was all human power to get out in the river and catch the current. There was a bit of stress at the start as we were not sure if we would get out past the marker buoy in the river and if we hit that we would have been disqualified. We just squeaked by and were off. Once we were in the current and underway things steeled down a bit. We kicked pretty much the whole way through to the finish but also spent a lot of time moving around the ice flow to change our direction and steer. It was pretty hard work and by the time we crossed the finish line 59 minutes later I was definitely ready to stop kicking.

The winning team came in at just over 42 minutes and we were 5th overall which we felt pretty good about as it was our first year. Thanks to everyone involved particularly the OUC, my team led by the mighty Davis, Helen and Neil for putting us up and cheering so loud and to my darling Rebecca who gracefully volunteered to cook hot dogs that she can’t even eat for a bunch of ornery divers.

All the photos in this post are by Neil Muscott. Thanks Neil!

Different Kinds of Diving

On my way back home from vacation in Cozumel Mexico. What a great time it was. I had the opportunity to do 13 dives in my 10 days away and, though all of them were wonderful, safe, fun dives there were some distinct differences. Most of my diving was on the colorful reefs off the south west portion of the island. This type of reef diving is what attracts so many tourists to this area and I can see why. From my first reef dive to the last I was blown away by the color and diversity of life down there. Bare in mind, I live in Toronto and I am not a fair weather diver. I dive where I live which is usually in the great lakes, the St. Lawrence river and Tobermory. We dive all winter long and it is awesome! Sure, there is lots to look at back home but mostly we dive on ship wrecks and other various sites that certainly lack the diversity of life and color found here.

There are literally hundreds of dive companies on the island of Cozumel and I dove with two of them. Basically you get to the peer with all your gear, load on a boat (cattle boat) and head out to the site with a dive master and 6-12 other divers you may have never met before. Rebecca doesn’t dive so I am almost always on my own paired up with someone on the boat. There is not a lot of time to get to know your new dive buddy and before you know it you are all in the water descending towards the reef. Everyone will have basic training and a “C” card but probably not much more. Many of these folks only dive on vacation which is probably once or twice a year and let’s just say that many of them could be a little more fit. Though diving is not particularly strenuous things can happen down there where you will require good fitness. Diving is physical and the best divers I have met are always in good shape. It helps with pretty much everything about the dive from your efficiency in the water to the bodies ability to off gas the absorbed nitrogen. The gear is very safe but let’s face it, you are breathing underwater and that should never be taken lightly.

On my reef dives I almost always felt a little rushed, a little un prepared and usually unsure of my buddies skill level. This adds stress which in turn detracts from the dive. I witnessed dive masters yelling at a boat full of clients to “just get in the water and get down now” to tanks falling off BCDs underwater (that were put on by the dive company) and even two instances of decompression illness. Most of the dive companies schedule the first dive as a deep dive (80-130’) and the second a shallow (30-60’). We always take a “surface interval” between dives to allow the body to off gas nitrogen but this is often shorter than it could be. My buddy who got decompression Illness got separated from his group at over 100’ so he came up (maybe a little to quickly). When he was up he saw the group below so he descended to meet up with them, finished the dive and promptly felt tingling limbs and fainted. He spent 5 hours in a decompression chamber and is fine but it didn’t sound like a good experience. At the end of the day each diver is responsible for their own well being but I think the dive operators could possible be doing a better job as well. My buddy was diving in the morning and afternoon so he was basically doing deep, shallow then deep dives again which is not good. He should have known better (and did) but perhaps the dive operator should have had a chat with him too.

My other dive here was my cavern diving experience. My guide spent over an hour briefing me on the dive at the cafe before we headed out and we spent a bunch more time at the cenote discussing everything about the dive. By the time I was in the water I knew exactly what to expect so I saw a lot more along the way. There was no rush at all and I was put in such a relaxed, confident state that I had my best dives ever and I felt that I dove better than I had in a long time. The difference was that I felt great, relaxed and I was in exactly the right state of mind for the dives. I will admit that cavern diving is a whole different deal than ocean dives but I don’t think either should ever be taken lightly. You can die on any dive and it is so important to dive consciously. That means being prepared for the dive, no matter how “easy” it is. Not drinking your face off the night before, eating too much for breakfast or not hydrating yourself. I believe that you should stay fit and healthy and practice, practice, practice. Good diving doesn’t happen by accident. If you haven’t been in the water for a while do some pool dives at home before getting back in the water.

My advice is to dive safe and dive often. Dive with god dive operators who come with references from folks you respect. Spend time on the dive forums (here is mine) and become part of a conscious community. Don’t dive if it doesn’t feel right. Thumb (end) the dive if anything feels wrong in the water. Get a good buddy and if you are diving with people you don’t know get to know your new buddy. Communicate! Stay fit and stay hydrated! I strongly believe in practicing skills and drills. Don’t get paranoid but spend some time thinking about things that could go wrong and then mentally run through how you would deal with them. As my friend Will Gadd calls it, “the positive power of negative thinking”. Rehearse bad situations in your head and practice your responses to these situations. Do this over and over. You can do it anywhere and it is an invaluable exercise. On a plane, waiting for a taxi, wherever. This mental rehearsal combined with physical drills and practice will make you a much better diver (or anything else) and more capable with whatever the waters send your way.

These are my thoughts on diving as I sit in the departure lounge at Cozumel airport. Goodbye 79 degree water and colorful reefs full of fish, sharks, turtles and chorals. Hello Humber Bay and 34 degree winter dives. Bring it on!

Never Say Never - Cavern Diving Rocks!

I remember quite distinctly a few years ago watching some documentary on Mexican cave diving and saying that that must me the craziest, stupid, scary thing ever. Certainly something that no sane person like myself would ever attempt (this coming from someone who once made a living juggling chain saws). That was before I was a diver (obviously) but I figured that even if I was to dive I certainly wouldn’t do a thing like that.

Guess what I did today? Tough one huh... Yup, I went on a cavern diving tin Mexico and IT WAS AMAZING!!!

We are staying in Cozumel and the cenote (mayan for well or cave opening) diving is mostly on the main land south of Playa Del Carmen. It was a bit of an adventure to get there with all our gear. Taxi to ferry, ferry to Playa Del Carmen, cab to Puerta Aventuras to meet our guide then a pickup truck ride to the cenote.

If you don’t know much about cave and cavern diving let me just say that it is pretty much the bleeding edge of diving right now. The main gist of it is that you can’t fuck up as you are in a water filled cave deep in the ground. With most open water diving situations there is always the option (though usually not a good one) to surface and get back to where the air is. Not so much with cave and cavern diving. Therefore safety, redundancy and skill mastery are foremost with this kind of diving. You surface at the cenote opening and deal with what ever happens under water. Fix it or die!

Cave diving is a very serious undertaking and involves a bunch of intense training and loads of certifications. The difference between cave and cavern diving is that with cavern diving you can basically always see the light from the opening so that you can therefore always find your way back to the exit point (surface). There are some other things too like you can’t go more than 200’ linear feet from the surface, you can’t go deeper than 70’ and there has to be 50’ of visibility. Let me make one thing very clear - I am not a cave diver. I am actually not even a certified cavern diver as that involves a three day course that I didn’t have the time for this trip (already making future plans though..). What I did today was a cavern tour. I hired a certified guide, Natalie from Diablo Divers and she made sure I got back in one piece. I had to have decent skills under water like good buoyancy and trim but she did all the hard stuff like make sure we didn’t die etc. That being said, she was kind enough to drill into my head the path home even if she vanished through some mole hole in the space time continuum or whatever and I found myself in there all alone.

The first site was named Ponderosa and is basically just a dirt road off the highway. The road leads to a parking lot and a hole in the ground full of fresh water. It felt great to get in the water and escape the heat. Once we submerged a whole new dimension opened up and it was diving like I had never experienced before. The viz (diver slang for visibility) was awesome as the water is so pure and clear. Everything took on a dreamy etherial quality with shafts of light streaming down through holes in the cavern roof. Air expelled from previous divers is pooled in little pockets on the ceiling that looks like shimmering mercury. We follow a set guidline that leads us of a tour of the cavern. Along the way we go up and down and pass various other openings in the cavern rooftop (other cenotes). We don’t surface at these other openings but enjoy the amazing light show they provide for us below the surface. At times the roots from the mangroves above can be seen extending down into the clear water. Spectacular!

The highlight of the dive for me had to be the halocline. It is a long story but basically the lower depths of the caves are salt water and the upper levels fresh. The halocline exists where these two densities of water meet. Most of the cave is clear but this couple of foot deep layer of cloudy water exists between the two. Natalie described it best when she said it would look like swimming through vaseline. Sure enough, she dropped into the halocline and her form pixelated before my eyes. She was “fuzzy” and it felt like my senses were seriously messed. If I hadn’t been told about this phenomena in advance I would have freaked. When I dropped into the halocline everything went really weird. I couldn’t read my dive computer a foot in front of my face and all I had to follow was Natalie’s goopy, distorted form in front of me. Once below the halocline everything jumped back into focus and the water got warmer. It was amazing!

One of the rules of cave diving is the rule of thirds. We budget a third of our air for the trip in, a third for getting back and a third for any emergency should one come up. Therefor once I used up a third of my air I signaled Natalie and we turned around and headed back the way we came in. Simple.

Back in the truck and of to Tajma ha. Another cavern site in the middle of nowhere. This time the dive involved a lot more ups and downs and slightly tighter quarters. Loads of formations (stalactites, stalagmites etc.) and fossils. Oh yeah, and another one of those wicked haloclines. When we got back to the surface there were a whole load of dorky tourists standing there staring at us. That was kind of weird.

I have to say that the dives today were two of my my favorite dives ever and the whole experience ranks right up there with pretty much anything else I have done. It was a spectacular day and I am so thankful to have had such an amazing trip. It just goes to show you. In life never say never. I have to say a heart felt thank you to our awesome guide Natalie and to Rebecca for coming along for the ride.

I do apologize for the picture quality of the dive pics. They are just video stills from helmet cam. I didn't want to take still camera along on this first experience as I find it distracts from diving that that was my focus today. I'll upload video upon my return to Canada and post here.

Scuba Diving - Cozumel VS Canada

Happily for me today I find myself scuba diving in sunny Cozumel Mexico. Last year Rebecca and I to our first vacation ever (Cayo Coco Cuba) and a yearly trip to the sun has become a tradition. Nice! Before the trip last year I took scuba lessons as I was worried that I would be bored sitting on the beach. I am not sure that I would have been bored at all but I sure am happy to have taken up scuba diving! Today was dive number 70 and I truly love it. The diving was the reason we chose to come here. I guess to be honest I chose as Rebecca doesn’t dive. She does like to snorkel and loves the quantity of fish here. Cozumel has some of the best, most easily accessible reef diving in the world and it is just a short plane ride from our home in Toronto. Perfect!

Before this trip I had a grand total of 2 salt water dives under my belt. I have to say the diving here is much different than diving in Canada. In my short diving career I have embraced diving Canada’s cold waters. After the Cuba trip last year I immediately bought a dry suit so that I would have the ability to “dive where I live”. It just made sense to me. I have met too many divers who live in Canada and only dive on their once or twice yearly vacations. That makes no sense to me. If you love something wouldn’t you want to do it as often as possible? I would and do.

Last weekend we were diving Humber Bay just west of downtown Toronto. It was 34 degrees fahrenheit and there was pretty much nothing to look at but a bunch of concrete blocks. Somehow we had fun and I enjoyed the dive. Today it was 79 degrees F and so far on my trip I have seen huge sea turtles, nurse sharks, massive lobsters and crabs, sea dragons, rays and many, many more colorful fish than I could ever hope to learn the names of. The reefs are teeming with life and color and we drift along on the current and fly through these foreign landscapes. It really is spectacular!



At home we look at perfectly preserved wrecks of ships from the last couple hundred years or as I like to say “broken rusty machines underwater”. Here is is nature at its best. Both are amazing and what I find even more amazing still is the contrast. If I didn’t dive at home I probably wouldn’t appreciate this quite so much and vice versa. I certainly wouldn’t be as experienced of a diver as I wouldn’t have nearly the dives that I do. I make a point of telling my dive buddies on the boats here what the temperature was of my last dive back home and you should hear them erupt. They simply can not believe it. I can’t imagine not doing it this way.

More Pictures HERE.