Been busy

 Well lots of things have happened to me since my last post, I will try and keep it to Watermen related stuff! Actually that is all that has happened anyway! Where should I begin?

 So on Tuesday, April the 20th, I made my first Scuba dive in the ocean. I went 3 miles offshore with some of my good friends. We dove what is locally known as the liberty ship. This is a link to the shipwreck that I dove! http://www.nc-wreckdiving.com/WRECKS/RAMSEY/RAMSEY.HTML Due to the fact that I do not have a waterproof camera, I have no photos, sorry, I am working on that!

 What an incredible experience! I spent 30 minutes underwater at depths between 48 feet and 30 feet. I was a bit uncomfortable at first but once I was underwater and saw the wreck and my buddy, who was great, not to mention a school of Sheepshead, a favorite target of mine as a newbie spear-fisherman, I was more than comfortable! I couldn't help but feel that I have been missing out on this for too many years!

 For those of you that have not dove a shipwreck, you simply have to! This wreck is part of the artificial reef system so it had no "cool" history behind it, other than being over-fished due to its proximity to Masonboro Inlet! None the less it was a great first dive! Needless to say I surfaced super excited!

 On Friday April the 23rd, I started my freediver course. Intense! I am tired and exhausted and full of sushi will write more about this soon, when I am not burnt out! In the mean time I will leave you with a post that I wrote on the Carolina Freedivers, ( a Club of which I am a member), forum on spearfishingplanet.com.

Hi guys and gals,

I spent the last 2 days taking Ren and Ashley's course (Evolve Freediving). For those of you who have not taken a formal freediving course, YOU NEED TO! You owe it to the people that care about you! I can guarantee that you will exceed your expectations. The safety issues that are drilled into your head will save your buddies life and vice a versa!

Personally I was more or less scared, but Ashley and Ren made me feel more than safe, mentally I was ready to go deeper than my ears and sinuses would let me, which was frustrating, but after discussing what I went through, I am ready to keep working towards my goals at my own pace. I have a lot of work to do to reach my goals and feel confident that I can reach them with the help of Ren and Ashley.

If you have not taken "the course" as it has become known among freedivers, you have to! If you are one of those "tough guys", such as myself, you will be humbled! What I thought was freediving experience, was really snorkeling. Many of you reading this have much more experience than I do, and for that I commend you, but some of you may be at the same level as me, for the latter you simply have to take this course. If you don't, good luck explaining to your dive buddies family why they are not coming home. Remember what I just wrote! 

You will meet new people who have the same interests as you. After the past 2 days I can guarantee you that I would never dive with anyone who has not been trained by either Evolve Freediving or PFI.

Dive safe friends!

Brian




This oughta keep you amused since I know my writing was less than stellar tonite! This is a video my instructors made. I SUGGEST YOU WATCH IT! http://vimeo.com/9746803
Pay attention to the second song. LISTEN TO THE LYRICS! It really hits home for me! 

New beginnings!

 Well, I got another job, working at Aquatic Safaris. To be totally honest I am scared shitless! It is an incredible opportunity for me. I wanted to learn how to dive, here we go!  I will be put in situations that I am not totally comfortable with, I will have to dive at night, I have to take rescue diver courses. Sharks will soon become an almost daily encounter, but none of this is what scares me! Well maybe a little bit...

 I am soon moving out of the dump that I live in and putting what little I have in storage. I am going to stay with my loving girlfriend in her apartment until I can find a place. I am so lucky to have her in my life, and also very lucky to have the Hardee, Adams, and Taylor families on my side! (and it goes without saying my own family but they are 600 miles away!) So I am going to be sort of homeless, and starting a new job, well more of a new life than just a job. Starting out I will make VERY little money and hopefully move up to making a little money!

 Now we are getting at why I am scared. Everything is very uncertain right now. I have to keep both jobs and spend as much time as possible underwater. I can't survive on just one of the jobs, I need to be able to work both jobs and hope they won't interfere! I have invested WAY too much money on SCUBA and freediving courses, and not to mention gear, of which I need more now, for this to not work for me! It has to work! I have never been a gambling man, but I have been gambling all along trying to make this happen, now it has happened and I am freaking scared that it won't work!

 Sorry nothing exciting like surfing or spearfishing is happening in this post but I felt like writing about whats on my mind, after all it's my blog! Actually I went spearfishing the past 2 days, well we went in the water, visibility was less than poor, there was no spearing of anything. Sometimes going hunting either for waves or fish, ( thats all I hunt) is not about actually getting waves or shooting fish, the best part is the hunt. I met some wonderful people this weekend, and am very happy to have met them! I look forward to the adventures we are going to share together in the future!

Thanks for reading and wish me luck!
Stay tuned for some more interesting posts this week, freediving course starts on Friday! If you are interested in freediving or not really sure what it is check out this website!
http://evolvefreediving.com/Evolve_Freediving/Home.html

The Shoot

 Kind of rushed for time but I wanted to post ASAP! Usually I focus on my writing here, this will be a bit different. Yesterday I had an amazing surf session that was documented by Julian Kehaya, from http://kehayaphoto.com/. I think the photos more or less speak for me better than I can write! Enjoy!

    http://kehayaphoto.com/

    http://kehayaphoto.com/

                                http://kehayaphoto.com/
The following 6 photos are a sequence of me getting very tubed! It was my last wave because I hit the bottom so hard that I am quite sure that I have a concussion. More than 24 hours later I am still very dazed. But wait till you see the pictures!

    http://kehayaphoto.com/

    http://kehayaphoto.com/

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 I think it should be noted that Julian swam for about 2 hours taking photos. He is an amazing photographer and I am SO grateful to have these great photos of myself! You can contact Julian at http://kehayaphoto.com/ and get photos like these too! Come on admit it every surfer wants a sick sequence of them getting tubed and getting a concussion in the process! THANKS JULIAN!!