PADI has launched their 2010 Go Pro Challenge. Follow the link to see last year’s winning submissions and the entry form.

Entry is simple: earn a PADI Pro rating (divemaster or above) in 2010 and submit a testimonial on why you love your life as a professional diver. This testimonial can be in written form, pictures, or video.

Prizes include iPods, jackets, and more. Submissions are due September 30, 2010. Good luck!

Sport Chalet, the retail store, is holding a scuba treasure hunt.

They have planted three gold-painted bars somewhere in the ocean, and are periodically leaving clues as to their location. Retrieve a bar and bring it to your nearest Sport Chalet and receive a $5,000, $3,000, or $1,000 gift card.

The contents began Monday, July 12, and ends on the 25th of July, so I imagine clues will begin getting more explicit. Here’s an example clue:

A treasure can be found south of where the Adriatic sunk in 1930.

Clue #2 says the largest ocean holds the treasure, so this contest might only be accessible to U.S. west coast divers.

Happy hunting!

Diving can be a meditative process—just you, the sea, and the rhythm of your breath. It’s very easy to find yourself in such a state of mind. I’ve been exploring this further by reading Raja Yoga: A down-to-earth manual on spiritual consciousness with advanced meditations on purification, energy transmutation, and the five states of mind. This book delves deeper into the mysteries of a meditative state of mind, and the seemingly impossible tasks that can be achieved.

In particular, I hope to master the process called Elemental Transmutation. Transmutation is the changing of an object into another form. Elemental implies something’s primary or basic components. In this case, I am learning the art of breaking water down into its constituent parts: hydrogen and oxygen. The hydrogen bonds in water are strong, which is reflected by its relatively high boiling point. This means it takes quite a bit of energy, and thus focus, to mentally break these bonds.

Mastering this process enables would enable me to complete my transformation into an ocean-dwelling creature by giving me “gills”, so to speak. There are various monks and gurus who have achieved this feat, breathing underwater without a regulator. Through intense meditation, these amphibious men can take water into their mouths and transmute it into a breathable form.

The trick is not so much to be able to “just do it”, I have achieved this much. Rather, the true skill comes in attaining this meditative state with such ease that I am free to enjoy my dive and take pictures of any fish I see. You must also be so relaxed that you are not disrupted by boats passing overhead and drown.

When completing the process, the hydrogen and oxygen are not a problem, but other elements can be difficult. In particular chlorine, which when inhaled bleaches the cilia (tiny hairs) that line the lungs. Swallowing a high-quality hair conditioner pre- and post-dive alleviates this problem. For reasons like this, it is advised to have an experienced counsellor to guide you through the process.

You must be careful, for sea water is about 85% oxygen. To reduce the risk of oxygen toxicity, you should not practice Elemental Transmutation at pressures greater than 1.4 / 0.85 = 1.65 atm, or 6.4 m / 21 ft. Reducing the partial pressure of oxygen during transmutation is an even more advanced skill that is as difficult as it is dangerous.

There are various levels of accomplishment with Elemental Transmutation. As I said, I am comfortable performing this feat in a bath tub, but have yet to finish my Open Water certification. I hope to at least get up to a Rescue certification, that way I am comfortable helping others who accidentally choke while performing transmutation. For information about certification, please click here.

I hope to see you one day regulator-free under the sea.

Here’s a random set of underwater photo / video links across the web.

The beautiful nature blog featured a few underwater photographs.

Amsterdam couple Cor Bosman and Julie Edwards have their photo albums online. Their photography has been featured in articles and magazine covers.

And here’s a video of a clever little penguin.

This picture has been making the rounds on the internet. In Norway, a couple of guys dressed up in scuba gear and chased the Google Street car down the road.

I wouldn’t normally write about something like this, but People magazine reports that Tiger Woods is building a 61-foot luxury diving boat. It’s well-known that Woods is a NAUI divemaster, and that he and his wife-for-now Elin are avid divers.

I’m guessing this is a me-so-sorry gift for being a sleezebag (taking a page out of Kobe Bryant’s playbook). The boat, appropriately named Solitude, is supposed to provide some much-needed family time. I’m sure that plan will work out great. Have fun on your new boat, Tiger.

Here are some stunning photos of a 14ft great white shark. I don’t think I have ever seen a diver this close to a white shark outside of a cage.

The photographer is Amos Nachoum, who is known for his close encounters with large creatures both above and below the sea. In fact, he takes tourists on expeditions to experience big animals up-close and in person. I, for one, would love to drop in the water during the famous Sardine Run off the coast of South Africa, or swim up close with a blue whale.

Back when I was in the process of getting my basic certification, a diver friend told me there are two things every diver gets used to:

• Spitting in their mask
• Peeing in their wetsuit

I am told by Maritza that this is something familiar to swimmers as well (substitute goggles for mask and swimsuit for wetsuit).