Drysuit anyone?

[PonoBill]

The death anchor was always a stupid myth, water weighs the same as water. Duh. What is not a myth is that diving drysuits require special training to be safe. Since a lot of my diving was in Puget Sound or in the Farallon islands, I used a diving drysuit.

You might find one of those more interesting than the Koketat Kayak style drysuit--they are neoprene and fit snugly, but have dry collars (neck, wrists, and feet if you don't have integral booties). If you rip a hole in them they are still a good wetsuit, not a dacron rag. They are typically worn for diving without a buoyancy compensator since you can let air into the drysuit to increase buoyancy. For paddling use, I attached a regulator to the inflater hose and just blew air into the suit with the valve held open. On a cold day when you do this, it feels like hot air going in across your chest. Like peeing in a wet suit. Mmmmm toasty.

One of the little issues is that if you have a lot of air in the suit and tilt downwards, the air goes to your feet, which turn into balloons, holding you face down. That IS a potential problem with the baggy suits as well, and one of the reasons they can be tricky to swim with. I bought a Koketat suit that I used for a couple of years when I was still working--nice in the winter but Maui is better. Being an experienced diving drysuit user if I had to swim I'd just blow the suit up by blowing into the collar gasket until I resembled the Michelin Man and just paddled myself like a boat.

[SUPeter]

I've been using my dry suit less and my neoprene more. Even 2 wetsuits at times.  a 2/3 over my 6/5/4(older suit).  Last downwinder, yesterday, I put a nylon shell jacket over my 2 wetsuits and was never warmer.  I very much like the indestructability of wet suits over dry suits.  Being so far from a friendly enough shore , I would be risking more if my dry suit failed.