Date: August 5, 2006
Dive Location: Yukon/San Diego
Buddy(ies): Gina
Bottom Time: 30 mins
Max Depth: 90
Vis: 20-25
Temp at depth: 57
Surface Temp: warm
Gas mix: 32%
Comments:
We took us a small trip down to San Diego this weekend.
Despite the hideous traffic (a 4 hour drive for me, 3 for Gina), we somehow managed to arrive 2 minutes early. Only to discover that the boat was going to be over an hour late.
I thought we were in for it when the boat finally did arrive as it seemed like they had had the trip from hell in the morning. One person was told as they left the docks "They'll call you every few hours to see how you're doing" and the boat briefing actually had to include the statements "Please don't pee in or drop pee-filled wetsuits in the camera wash bucket"
I dared not ask.
Luckily the Yukon is just a short trip out, and we were soon tied in. This was only my second trip out there, and the previous one was a twilight dive in cruddy vis that left me wanting more.
We'd heard reports from the previous trip that morning of 40+ foot vis, but for us it was more like 20 once the first group had finally unloaded themselves (at no great haste) from the boat.
Since I was playing with my video lights for the first time, we decided to hang around the superstructure, which is great for video. Depth was about 80-85 feet average, so we planned for a 30 min bottom time on 32% nitrox.
I love the Yukon!
The metridums are just so cool:
We made our way along the ship, gawking at and videoing everything we could.
Unfortunately I didn't quite have the lights dialed in properly and the spread was a bit too narrow which caused some hotspots on the footage.
I just can't believe how this stuff grows like this. In some places big clumps, and on others nothing...
We then made our way back to this structure (some kind of crows nest?)
which is covered in really really small metridiums.
They are eensy
There are some crazy angles as the ship sank before she was supposed to, and didn't settle upright on the bottom.
There were plenty of smaller fish around
But the big stuff was missing. People earlier in the day had seen a couple of big ling's, and I'm betting there are some decent-sized bass around too.
Reaching the end of our planned bottom time, we made our way back to the line and started our ascent.
There was one worrying point where we did see two people breathing off of a 13 cu ft pony bottle (which seemed to have a full reg + octo setup on it). Concerned, Gina offered them some of her gas but was politely declined, so we left them to it.
Turns out it was a requirement for some kind of deep/wreck class.
Odd.
Back on the boat, the sun was shining and the fun had only just begun. The Ruby/E was next and this was going to be a stunner!