Tag Archives: Divemaster

May 9, 2014 · 7:04 am

Rum and Sand Flies Fuel Seaweed Sculpting Contest

A Mount Rushmore-inspired Bangles homage in its early stages on the Eagle Ray Cove beach.

May’s southwest winds have piled turtle grass high on Blacktip Island’s western beaches, heralding the Turtle Grass Sculpting Contest at Eagle Ray Cove resort.

“The wind and the currents mound the seaweed up at The Cove like no place else on the island,” resort manager Mickey Smarr said. “There’s tons of it. Literally. Last year we hauled away 6,800 pounds in May alone.

“We decided to turn lemons into lemonade, so to speak, make it a social event for the whole community. Plus, it helps with cleanup.”

Four-person teams have half a day to create their most imaginative sculptures before the grass rots.

“You have to work it pretty quick,” sculptor Alison Diesel said. “It gets damn rank after a few hours in the sun, and they banned respirators a couple years back. And the sand flies – oi!”

Past winning entries have included a scale model of the Kremlin, a linear depiction of the Battle of Waterloo and a couchant fuzzy bunny rabbit.

This season’s entries are equally impressive.

“We’re finishing a Mount Rushmore-inspired sculpture of the Bangles,” Eagle Ray Divers divemaster Lee Helm said. “We’ve got Vicki, Debbi and Michael down brilliantly. We’re having a bugger of a time getting Susanna’s eyes and nose done proper, though. Right now she looks more like Robert De Niro.”

As with any island competition, emotions run high.

“There’s extra security on hand after last year’s seaweed fight,” Eagle Ray Cove’s Mickey Smarr said.

“Had no idea there was washed up Portuguese man-o-wars in that grass we was flinging,” sculptor Jesse Conlee said. “Hell, stung our hands, too. But no one talks about that. Just those kids got caught in the crossfire. A little rum and they were fine.”

“Rum does play a big role in the contest. No denying that,” Diesel said. “I’m not sure it’s a definite cause-and-effect thing, but the team that drinks the most while sculpting usually wins. And feels the sand flies less.”

Contest winners receive bottles of Flor de Caña rum and tubes of cortisone cream.

Losers are required to haul away the turtle grass afterwards.

All contestants receive complimentary tetanus shots.

Spectators are advised not to stand downwind of the sculpture area. Tiperon Airways is providing airsickness bags for those who ignore the warning.

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Tagged as Bangles, Blacktip Island, blog fiction, Divemaster, fiction, humor, islands, rum, Tim W. Jackson, turtle grass

April 25, 2014 · 5:26 am

Scuba Fashion Week Comes to Blacktip Island

Designer wetsuits hang ready for Blacktip Island’s Underwater Fashion Week.

Underwater Fashion Week returns to Blacktip Island this weekend, with top local and international fashion designers showcasing their latest collections.

Underwater runway models have been chosen from local dive staffs following last year’s near-drownings.

“Blacktip has always been at the cutting edge of Caribbean dive fashion,” event organizer Georgio Pompano said. “This year’s designers have pushed that edge to put us at the absolute fringe of the submerged fashion map.”

“‘Retro, sassy and fun’ is the touchstone this season,” said local designer Kitty Smarr. “Your grandpa’s black is the new black. It contrasts phenomenally with our models’ sun-bleached hair”

“We’ve done some daring things with board shorts,” local designer and Sand Spit bartender Corry Anders said. “We’re using mole fur and alligator skin to enhance the sensory experience before, during and after the dive. And all our shorts are edible, of course.”

As ever, the wetsuit is at the heart of Blacktip’s sub-aquatic haute couture.

“We’ve re-imagined warmth protection to transform cliché into major pizzazz,” Pompano said. “Our suits are not your quotidian, urine-soaked farmer john-and-jackets.”

“Beaver tails are back, with a mid-60s retro vengeance,” Anders said. “And French-cut women’s shorties. It gives divers a definite ‘Dr. No’ vibe.

“Throwback dive knives are hip, too. We’ve taken the Sea Hunt-standard dive machete and updated it with a faux black coral handle, sheath and matching sunglasses.”

“The showstopper is our Chanel-inspired mid-thigh hooded vest with a chinchilla fur-rimmed hood and duct tape accents,” Pompano said. “When is a hooded vest not a hooded vest? When it expands into a hoodie-mini! Hello!”

“Makeup is the biggest challenge,” Kitty Smarr said. “All our divemaster models have brown noses and white eye sockets. We have to mask that. And the makeup has to hold up under water.

“This year we’re mixing all our bases and mascaras with a neutral-tinted axle grease to make sure they stay on during the grueling runway presentation and any backstage scuffles that may break out.”

The runway finale will be podcast live to Sand Spit bar during next Friday’s happy hour. Free hors d’oeuvres will be served.

“We’ll have all-you-can-eat popcorn and cocktail weenies,” Anders said. “Plus the full cash bar menu, of course.”

A second television will feature the first round of the NBA playoffs.

Tollbooths Installed on Island Reefs

A Marine Park ranger monitors one of Blacktip Island’s new reef tollbooths.

The Blacktip Island Marine Park Service is installing underwater tollbooths on all the Caribbean island’s scuba dive sites this week. The move is a response to dwindling public funding and increased diver impact on the island’s reefs.

“Think of it as a graduated impact fee,” Park Service spokesperson Val Schrader said.

“Instead of charging every diver a flat marine park fee, we’ll be charging based on how much of the reef they actually see.

“The old system wasn’t fair to new divers who blow through their air and surface in twenty minutes. Or to the Type B divers who stay close to the boat looking at one coral head.”

Collection boxes fashioned as oversized conch shells have been installed at all popular coral heads and swim-throughs.

“They’re big and obvious enough that divers will know what they are,” Schrader said, “but not so outlandish they detract from the diving experience.”

Divers can buy scan cards that clip onto their BCDs, and add credits in $10 increments. Alternately, divers may carry Tiperon currency to drop into collection boxes.

Divers purchasing a Park Service Reef Pass will have their dives charged directly to their hotel room or credit card at a reduced rate.

The plan’s opponents vowed to fight the tolls.

“We’ll go in from shore, on sites where there’s no collection bins,” local resident Barry Sennett said. “These reefs don’t belong to the Park Service or the government. These reefs are your reefs, these reefs are my reefs.”

Other protestors plan to take a more active approach.

“They’ll have a hard time collecting if their precious conch shells get dropped 6,000 feet down the wall,” said a local diver who wished to remain anonymous.

“We’re installing cameras,” Schrader said. “Hidden ones. To keep an eye on things. Divers caught illegally diving will be fined and have their scuba gear confiscated.”

The Park Service has also mandated all BCDs on Blacktip Island be fitted with remote inflator valves. Scuba divers not paying the tolls will have their BCDs auto-inflate them to the surface, where a red dye will be released.

“We’re definitely using shame as a deterrent,” Schrader said. “Sometimes a stiff fine just won’t do the trick.”

Snorkelers will be charged at reduced rates. Free divers will be charged according to the number of dives they do as well as the depth of each dive. Blind divers will be allowed to dive free of charge.

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Tagged as Blacktip Island, blog fiction, coral reefs, Divemaster, humor, islands, marine parks, scuba dive sites, Tim W. Jackson

April 4, 2014 · 7:18 am

Resort Owners Erect Beachfront Staff Housing

A staff housing unit nears completion on Blacktip Island’s west coast.

In response to Blacktip Island’s growing housing shortage, local businesses have launched an affordable housing program benefiting the Caribbean island’s scuba, housekeeping and maintenance staffs.

“Housing’s scarce on the Blacktip,” Eagle Ray Cove divemaster Lee Helm said. “And damned expensive. We’re sleeping two and three people in a one-bedroom place. Playing rock-paper-scissors for who gets the couch.”

“It’s embarrassing, our staff having to live on top of each other like that,” Sandy Bottoms Beach Resort owner Sandy Bottoms, Jr. said. “Resort guests are put off when they hear of it. It reflects badly on us.”

“We’re building lodging for every worker on the island,” Club Scuba Doo owner Nelson Pilchard said. “No one should have to share a couch. Unless they want to.”

The initiative is not without critics, though.

“It’s not about providing housing,” community activist Jerrod Ephesians said. “It’s about collecting more rent from more people. Instead of renting one place to four people, they’re now renting four places.

“The Sandy Bottoms of the island are building these places from junk,” Ephesians said. “It’s a company store-type scam, charging their own employees for glorified camping.”

“Are we building deluxe accommodations? No,” Bottoms said. “But these are dive hippies we’re talking about. Here for the adventure. They love it.”

“We’re experimenting with sustainable building materials,” Eagle Ray Cove resort owner Rich Skerritt added. “Driftwood, bamboo, palm thatching, it’s all natural. And what’s more picturesque than a thatched hut on the beach?”

“My place is nice,” Club Scuba Doo staffer Joey Pompano said. “So long as the weather’s nice, anyway.”

“These places allow our folks to save money,” Scuba Doo’s Pilchard said. “There’s no utility bills, no phone or internet fees, no overheard after rent. I should be so fortunate.”

Other locals are concerned about potential public health issues.

“These places have no garbage pickup, no sewage or septic,” island doctor Lance Tang said. “Any rain will wash their waste into the ground water. And the first big storm surge will push that waste into our back gardens.”

“What everyone’s overlooking is these places are on prime real estate – right on the water, right at the dive sites,” Sandy Bottoms said. “Dive staff can roll out of their hammocks and go straight to work. It saves them commute time and the expense of a vehicle.”

“If this works as well as we think,” Eagle Ray Cove’s Skerritt said, “we have plans for a rustic dive-in, dive-out resort built on this model.”

Blacktip Island To Break Free From Base

Winter waves threaten to break Blacktip Island from its base

Scientists Thursday confirmed Blacktip Island will soon break free of its deep-sea base following recent winter storms.

“A combination of ocean acidification and deep ocean waves have been gnawing away at the island for years,” Tiperon University at Blacktip marine geologist Ernesto Mojarra said. “This is soft limestone. It doesn’t hold up.

“The erosion’s most noticeable around the 100-foot depth. If you took a cross-section of the island all the way up from the sea floor, the exposed land would look like a lollipop on a needle-thin stick. It’s only a matter of time, a very short time, geologically speaking, before that sucker breaks off,” Mojarra said.

“What happens then is anyone’s guess. The island could sink, what, 6,000 feet straight down. Or, given that it’s porous limestone with lots of air pockets, it could very well float. There’s no precedent.”

Island residents have feared this prognosis for some time.

“The water level’s been rising for months, you know,” Doris Blenny said. “Now university tests proved it.

“We’re not a bunch of Chicken Littles yelling, ‘The sky is falling.’ Far from it. We’re yelling, ‘The island’s sinking.’ It’s different.”

Government plans to chain the island to its base proved impractical. Instead, authorities have stitched together a giant sail, to be raised on the cell tower at the island’s center, and are submerging a warehouse door to act as a rudder at the island’s northern tip.

Blenny and other residents are stuffing island sinkholes with Styrofoam and boat fenders to increase the island’s buoyancy.

And if the island sinks?

“We all have skiffs lashed to our roofs,” Blenny said. “We just climb up, cut ourselves free. I, myself, sleep in my skiff, machete in hand. Just in case.”

Meanwhile, island scuba operators have been taking advantage of the geological anomaly.

“Tourists ask all the time how deep you have to go to see under the island,” Eagle Ray Divers divemaster Gage Hoase said. “Now we can tell them. Ninety-three feet. Then we take them down and show them.”

“We’re selling Under-Island Diving specialty courses like crazy,” Club Scuba Doo dive operations manager Finn Kiick said. “This is the only place on Earth you can be certified to look at the bottom of an island. We charge accordingly, of course.”

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Tagged as Blacktip Island, blog fiction, Divemaster, Reef, Tim W. Jackson

November 8, 2013 · 11:11 pm

Blacktip Times Launches Inaugural Issue

Thanks to generous donations from Skerritt Construction and the Divemaster’s Local #138, The Blacktip Times community news journal has become a reality.

“It’s been a long time coming,” Times editor and publisher Samson Post said. “This island’s needed a voice for years, something to really anchor our community, but the devil’s always been in the financial details.

“It feels good to finally get everything tied off. Blacktip is one of the best tropical islands around, with a lot more going for it than just beaches and margaritas and scuba diving. We aim to let folks know that.”

The Blacktip Times will be published weekly, and will focus on island news, business, entertainment and sports, Post said.

“Our goal is to provide fair and objective coverage of the community, for the community, from the Pinnacle to Mango Sound, from Spider Bight to Eagle Ray Cove,” Post said.

“We won’t play favorites, whether we’re covering our best friend or our biggest financer. If we ruffle some feathers in the process, well, that’s an inescapable part of quality journalism. We’re going to cover this island like a Cat 5 storm surge, leaving no stone unturned.”

Post also stressed the need for Blacktip Island’s 100 or so residents to be involved in the newsgathering process.

“If you see news happening, call or text our news hotline,” Post said. “There’s not many people here, but if we can find enough happening, we’ll make the paper a daily.”

The Times is one of a growing number of Caribbean island community newspapers being published in electronic-only format.

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Tagged as Divemaster, Scuba diving, Tim W. Jackson