SeaYoda
Contributor
A very loose set of plans (due to the weather) were made to make a boat trip with ScubaTech on Saturday between Pufferfish, his buddy Noah, Gulf-Gulper, and me. I watched the weather and marine forcasts for two days before the trip and was not impressed with our chances until late Friday. Saturday dawned with good looking conditions, but I got a call from Gulf-Gulper as I was about to head out for the shop. He had to cancel due to sinus issues. I excused him from the dive and proceeded on my way. The trip was on and things looked good so I signed in and melted the plastic card. The Boat ride out was not flat water but I could tell we would be doing the dives for sure. We anchored on a spot which we had not been informed of and I jumped for joy when Nancy said we were on a reef! This was a new reef to me. It is called Shore-Line reef. I was hoping for some good viz as we geared up.The water was just a little unstable from the wind changes so current, wind, and waves were all mixed up causing the boat to settle into a side to side rocking motion that made gearing up interesting. I was the third member of our team until Nancy asked if I would dive with her nephew (turned out to be a great buddy). While everyone was almost ready to jump in the water, Noah's tank made a pop and started hissing. The O-ring had blown. While they were fixing that the rest of us hit the drink. Surface temp was not bad - 78ish. We were warned of a thermocline and I found two on the way down. Bottom temp was 73 and I was glad I brought my 3 mm full. The water was blue but had the usual particles in it. Upon reaching the anchor the viz was a nice 30 - 35 feet. No current at all and the reef was overflowing with life. The reef sits in 85 feet of water and is an "L" shape. Nothing much on either side and it is about 3 feet tall with some pathways across its narrow width and some ledges along the way. Nancy had put us right in the bend of the "L" so I decided to go right. That turned out to be the short leg so I got to the end and turned back. I followed it back along the long leg and back to the anchor. My nitrogen level was pushing the upper limit of yellow and I was at about 700 lbs of air left. I wanted to stay longer but I knew it was over after a 38 minute bottom time. I had forgotten how quick that last bit of air gets sucked up coming from that depth so I got my money's worth out of that tank - almost dry at the surface. Back on board we waited for Puffer and Noah to finish with their late start and huge nitrox silos. Puff brought back two flounder that he had knifed just to show off even further. The waves were getting smaller but were still doing the side to side thing. One diver got sick and I felt a tiny bit queasy. We got under way and we all survived with some pineapple from the crew. Dive two would be - TA DA - at the bridge rubble. Basic same conditions and viz greeted us. I decided not to take the camera and just play (I wanted to make the most of this site that I have been too so often). Bottom time was cut short due to nitrogen load - 37 minutes at 67 feet. Puff got two more flounder with a pole spear for a total of four. We got back to the dock with all bodies accounted for - another great job by the ScubaTech captain and crew. We offloaded and Puff wanted to eat the flounder for lunch so we asked Steve at ST if anyone still did that. We were directed to Fisherman's Wharf where we saw a sign as we entered that said they would cook your catch for $10.99. We signed up and tried to hand the fish to them but were sadly informed that the fish needed to be cleaned by us before they would cook them. We decided that it was not such a good deal to pay that price for what they offered. Puff invited us to his parent's house and made a wonderful meal of those four fishes. Noah got us some fries and slaw from Popeye's and we ate like kings. Thanks for the meal guys, and Puff be sure to thank your Mom again for me.
Today's pictures were taken with an experiment in mind and a bit of misfortune. I set the camera up to test the manual focus length of the dome port and I set the aperture to 7.1 (a good setting for the jetties). As I descended the anchor line on our first dive, I took a test shot and it seemed too dark. I attempted to turn the knob to push the aperture button and watched as the little rubber end fell off inside the housing - leaving me with no way to change the setting. The distance I had set for focus made it impossible to get close to things yet I had to get close due to the dark pictures from the the high aperture setting. The good news is that with some more practice I think the cavern project will turn out well - the bad news is that many of the pics were out of focus or dark. Here are the ones I could salvage:
Today's pictures were taken with an experiment in mind and a bit of misfortune. I set the camera up to test the manual focus length of the dome port and I set the aperture to 7.1 (a good setting for the jetties). As I descended the anchor line on our first dive, I took a test shot and it seemed too dark. I attempted to turn the knob to push the aperture button and watched as the little rubber end fell off inside the housing - leaving me with no way to change the setting. The distance I had set for focus made it impossible to get close to things yet I had to get close due to the dark pictures from the the high aperture setting. The good news is that with some more practice I think the cavern project will turn out well - the bad news is that many of the pics were out of focus or dark. Here are the ones I could salvage:
Mat and I took some shots across the cavern Friday with some decent results. I have a few shots I will PM you. This might be a good time to get to Morrison. It is pretty nasty right now, so we had the cavern all to ourself.
