Today was a great day for flying kites. Our ocean day started calmly with an almost flat sea and a family of dolphins swimming nearby. Even as Thor tied up the R/V Delta on the fuel mooring, you could see the sand channels 50 ft below the boat. Once we jumped in, it was a quick safety check of your buddy's equipment, a drill on rescue breathing and we were off. Our first dive was spent on lost line drills, complete with no mask. Otter told us where to tie off with our reel, then we swam a fixed length of line in a circular fashion around that point trying to find a boundary line that would lead us eventually to the Aquarius. Sounds simple but imagine wearing a pair of someone else's glasses that are way off - everything was a blur. And on top of that, your eyes sting like crazy - what you get for wearing someone else's glasses! This drill is just made worse if your buoyancy isn't exactly right or you're having trouble with your ears. But, in the end, you learn that you can handle the situation. If someone looses a line during the mission, we have the tools to get home safely and the confidence to stay calm. I think I'll carry an extra mask, just in case.

Dive two led us to a sand patch at about 45 ft where we gained some skill in flying "kites" underwater. I finally know what Mary Poppins must have felt like as she opened her umbrella and sailed away. Our training exercise required us to each fill a buoy float with air from our regulator. As you put in air, the buoy fills to look like a sausage (but five feet long) and eventually takes off with enough lift to carry you away, if you're not careful. The first trick is to play out enough line so that you stay on the bottom and the sausage screams to the surface. As it hits the surface, the tension on the line drops and you can reel in enough slack to fly your kite effortlessly. By the second pass through this drill, all had attained the elevated status of sausage flyers. With the few minutes left, we swam to the Aquarius and peered into the wet porch of that big yellow submarine. Getting inside awaits us tomorrow.