Another Day, Another Lousy Dive

[MaxBottomtime]

Margaret Webb found an undescribed nudibranch on the crane near Haggerty's yesterday. I made a Dawn Patrol dive today hoping to find the little guy. With the conditions I experienced it would have taken a miracle.

A brown layer of water hovered three feet below the surface. I dropped anchor about ten feet from the crane but had to spend a few minutes finding it. There was nothing but shadows and haze on the bottom with surge kicking up the sand quite a bit.

I looked at every piece of algae on the crane for fifty minutes before giving up and moving on to moral eel photography instead. All of my photos today are grainy due to the dark, dirty water. I'll try again tomorrow and hope for better luck.

 

[JamesBon92007]

I love your "lousy dives."

BTW, what are those shrimp-like critters called that are always with the morays? There was something that we used to call them but I can't seem to find it anywhere and I don't remember what it was. If I heard it I'd probably remember.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

Lysmata californica, Red rock shrimp

 

[deeper thoughts]

Great moray pix

 

[JamesBon92007]

Lysmata californica, Red rock shrimp

Thanks, but that doesn't sound like the name I remember (or don't remember). Most likely we simply had an incorrect name for them, but everyone I knew called them the same thing.

It's been a while since I did any shore diving in SoCal. When the state started buying up some of my favorite sites and making access much more difficult, I bought a boat. The boat is long gone and I've been doing mostly vacation diving but would like to start doing some more shore diving again. I looked in my old log book but don't even remember where many of the place are. Can you recommend some places with fairly easy entry? My girlfriend has never gone through the surf so I don't want to freak her out

 

[MaxBottomtime]

Maybe cleaner shrimp?
The only two places on the peninsula with easy entries are Veterans' Park (Vet's) and Cabrillo Beach. Most involve long walks like Marineland, Malaga Cove and RAT Beach. The rest involve goat trail climbing.
I have 25 sites listed in my book Diving the Palos Verdes Peninsula
I may have to begin work on Volumn 2.