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DIVE CLUB Judy Minier, 941-979-7316, judyminier@earthlink.net, www.pgidiveclub.com

Happiest of New Year’s greetings to everyone! Here’s hoping that 2018 will
be a very good year for all of us in our little corner of paradise. Our club is
looking forward to more fun and adventures in the new year.

The December Dive Club article described the last big dive event for the Club
for 2017, the “Disney Dive” at Epcot Center in Orlando. A dozen club
members enjoyed a behind-the-scenes tour of the aquarium before donning
the provided dive suits and equipment for the swim in the huge tank. You can see their happy faces and traditional ok
hand signals in the accompanying photo as well as the divers doing their buoyancy check. Everyone enjoyed the great
experience of swimming about the large tank among the sharks and rays and seeing the smaller critters. The exhibition
is now called “The Seas with Nemo and Friends”, (formerly the Living Seas) and claims to be the second largest
saltwater aquarium in the world. It holds 5.7 million gallons of water and measures 203 feet in diameter and is 27 feet
deep. The aquarium holds 70 varieties
of fish and other marine mammals,
totaling 80,000 inhabitants, according to
their website. Of course, this number
includes a few dozen divers here and
there who are lucky enough to have the
privilege of diving in this unique
environment.

A couple of members are planning a
dive trip to Roatan, Honduras in late
January, so stay tuned for fabulous
photos from that adventure. Others are
looking forward to the Caymans in
February and maybe other slightly exotic
locations as we head into the new year.
We are fortunate to live in a part of the
world where we can readily get to world
class diving sites. You’ll be seeing more
interesting stories and photos of unusual Tanya & Jenny at Disney Dive Quest
sites as well as local and state dive
places our Club Members will visit as we head into 2018!

We also have several upcoming social and
party events, so the social committee is
busy making arrangements for gatherings
approaching in February and March. We
are fortunate that our club members step
forward and are willing to host these
events and that we have a treasury to fund
such get togethers.

The PGI Dive Club exists for the purpose
of promoting the scuba diving interests of
our members (and to support our parent
organization, the Civic Association),
regardless of the diving skill or experience
one may have. Some of our excursions
are also appropriate for snorkelers if
Disney Dive Quest anyone prefers to stay above the water
while others dive. If you have an interest in
diving, please attend one of our monthly meetings. We gather on the fourth Thursday of each month (except November
and December) at 7 p.m. at the Civic Association. Our next meeting will be January 25.

In addition to our regular monthly meetings, we encourage divers who want to learn about our Club to come to the Tiki
Hut on Charlotte Harbor behind the Sheraton Four Points Hotel. We congregate for an informal social time at 5:30 p.m.
on the second Thursday of each month. You’ll know who we are by our divers’ name tags as we congregate on the
beach in the Adirondack chairs or at the picnic tables. We are always happy to meet fellow divers who enjoy
conversations about diving who also might know about special equipment, far-flung or worldly dive experiences, or
underwater photography.
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