Black Water Diving? No Thanks!

I'll be the first to admit that I lack the huevos to try this myself, but Kona appears to be at the cutting edge of a new extreme diving experience: Black Water Diving. How does it work? After dark, your boat takes you into deep Pacific water. You tether yourself to the boat, drop overboard with small lights, and sink to about 60 feet. Then, if you really want to feel like part of the planktonic community, you turn your lights off and just drift. Excuse me as I pause here to let the goosebumps settle.

I met one of the dive leaders for black water diving last night, and Liz had a good laugh as I stared, shocked, as the whole concept was explained to me. As I repeated over and over, "Why would anyone want to do this?" Since I can't comment from personal experience, allow me to quote from Jacks Diving Locker, one of the premier Kona dive shops that offers this adventure:

Have you ever floated in a crystal clear black abyss, drifting peacefully along a current line somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, watching tiny organisms seemingly made of light and rainbows making their way through life around you? Have you ever abruptly woken out of your dreamlike trance to be face to face with something higher up on the food chain than you? The mesmerizing jellies put on a colorful display that can only be described as breathtaking. Some zooplankton that only rise to the surface to feed when the lights go out are now visible to us. Cool.

I'm not thinking that "cool" is the first word that come to mind. More of a gutteral, bubbly scream the second the lights go out.


Despite my admittedly wimpy take on this new dive frontier, I'm still mesmerized by the types of people who would feel comfortable with this experience. I'm in awe of anyone who feels comfortable dropping into an inky black abyss to experience whatever may pass in front of your lights. I've certainly had my share of night dives, and while they aren't my favorite dives, at least I've always had the mental "safety net" of a reef wall or ocean floor within view. But hovering in thousands of feet of pitch black water watching twinkling bioluminescent flashes? Yeesh! Not my cup of tea. Besides, aren't you just asking to be Architeuthis bait?

How about you? Is this something you would jump to experience? I'd really love hear if I'm an outlier in willingly passing on a "once in a lifetime" experience.