Jefferson Lake in late Sept.

[Daxter]

Hey all, my brother and I along with the wives went to Jefferson Lake this past weekend. To get there you take 285 to Jefferson then follow the signs. It is a paved road that goes to gravel then back to pavement to the lake. There is a 5 dollar cost to get in. At the lake there are three parking lots the first is a walk over a small hill to the lake, the second has picnic benches and a steep hike down to the water, and the third is at the boat ramp.

We stopped at the second lot because of where the fishermen were. The shoreline is very rocky. We made two dives on Sun. One dive for 32 min and one for 36 min. Weather was about 60 with a slight drizzle. The sun did show up a few minutes here and there. The deepest we went was down to 50 ft and the vis got very poor, at about 30 -40 ft we had about 15 -20 ft vis, the temp was 42 degrees. Temp at 40 ft was 46 degrees. There is so much junk in the lake. By junk I mean lures, wieghts, fishing poles, oars, I even found a motorola talk about. This lake is a great place for treasure hunting.

Hope this helps for all of you going up on Oct 6.

Tom

 

[Waterskier1]

Weather was about 60 with a slight drizzle. The sun did show up a few minutes here and there. The deepest we went was down to 50 ft and the vis got very poor, at about 30 -40 ft we had about 15 -20 ft vis, the temp was 42 degrees. Temp at 40 ft was 46 degrees. There is so much junk in the lake. By junk I mean lures, wieghts, fishing poles, oars, I even found a motorola talk about. This lake is a great place for treasure hunting.

Hope this helps for all of you going up on Oct 6.

Tom

Thanks for the report Tom,

Could you clarify at what depths the temp were taken? Seems like both were at 40 ft.

I guess I'm hoping one was a typo, because I don't think I want to be diving wet in 42 degrees:11:!

 

[Daxter]

Sorry Rick, at 50 ft it was 42 degrees and at around 30 ft it was not bad at all when the sun came out.

Tom

 

[RonFrank]

Hey Tom, so you stopped at the second parking lot, and then you just got in? What was your profile, did you follow the shore, or swim straight out? I've only been there once, and the vis was so bad we just hugged the shoreline, and had to almost hold hands.

The Vis sounds promising! The temp, less so! I HATE a full hood, and 5mm gloves, yuck!

 

[Daxter]

Hi Ron, the boat ramp would be the easy shore entry, the first lot you have a short walk over a hill down to the water, the second lot is a steep walk down to the shore (very rocky).

For us the first dive was max depth 43 ft for 37 min. We went straight out from shore to about 30 ft and then turned right for a while then came back and went left for a while.

Second dive was about the same for direction and max depth 52 ft for 35 min. On both dives we saw a few fish some I didnt know what kind others were rainbow trout.

If you have been there you know it drops off quickly seams to have a series of shelves as it drops. Watch for the fishermen, they didnt seem to mind us. There are boats, we carried a dive marker, although I dont think boaters know what it means but we didnt have any problems.

Vis was decent not quite as good as turquoise but close. Hope this helps.

Tom

 

[charlieo]

Tom,
Time to be careful. I know we all dive altitude with a casual regard for deco rules. Here is the V-planner profile for your dives. Note I had to put in some pure o2 and a 50% mix to make the program work.

VPM code by Erik C. Baker
Decompression model: VPM - B
DIVE PLAN #1
Surface interval = 5 day 0 hr 0 min.
Elevation = 10,000ft (s)
Conservatism = + 4

Dec to 43ft (1) Air 50ft/min descent.
Level 43ft 35:56 (37) Air 0.48 ppO2, 43ft ead
Asc to 20ft (37) Air -30ft/min ascent.
Stop at 20ft 0:14 (38) Oxygen 1.59 ppO2, 0ft ead
Stop at 10ft 8:00 (46) Oxygen 1.29 ppO2, 0ft ead
Surface (46) Oxygen -30ft/min ascent.

Off gassing starts at 29.6ft
OTU's this dive: 13
CNS Total: 5.1%

63.5 cu ft Air
7.0 cu ft Oxygen
70.5 cu ft TOTAL
DIVE PLAN #2
Surface interval = 0 day 1 hr 0 min.
Elevation = 10,000ft (s)
Conservatism = + 4

Dec to 52ft (1) Air 50ft/min descent.
Level 52ft 33:45 (35) Air 0.53 ppO2, 52ft ead
Asc to 30ft (35) Nitrox 50 -30ft/min ascent.
Stop at 30ft 1:16 (37) Nitrox 50 0.94 ppO2, 7ft ead
Stop at 20ft 4:00 (41) Nitrox 50 0.79 ppO2, 0ft ead
Stop at 10ft 97:00 (138) Nitrox 50 0.65 ppO2, 0ft ead
Surface (138) Nitrox 50 -30ft/min ascent
Hope you weren't at depth the whole dive.
Frank

 

[ddavies]

Charlieo,

What did you use to get the dive plan?

 

[charlieo]

Charlieo,

What did you use to get the dive plan?

V-planner
V-Planner VPM & VPM-B dive decompression software
You can use the sample for free, but you will get reminders to register and you can't use mixes greater than 49%

 

[Daxter]

Frank, That is why I put "max depth" on it so no one whould think that at 40 degrees I was tooling around at 43 or 50 ft deep the entire dive. Max depth on both dives was attained reaching down to pick something up. Was at max depth for under 1 min. Most of both dives were spent at 30 ft or less where my nose and lips were not about to fall off my face.

There is plenty to see at shallow depths, there is a ridge at about 10-15 ft and next one was at about 25 -30 ft.

The surface interval you used was off too. Think more in terms of being at Santa Rosa with Ron, try to have only a 1 hour SI. Sorry Ron, I know, I know your almost ready

Tom

 

[charlieo]

Tom,
Yea, that much time at 40 degrees "mucho hombre". I've been running some of the high altitude profiles lately and have been shocked at the programs results. I thought I'd let everyone else see what I've been seeing. Sometimes the program won't even produce a table, sometimes the red caution comes up. Maybe this program just isn't suited to 10,000 ft dives. It has made me think about being more careful.
Frank