Don't underestimate your local mudhole

[TSandM]

In the Seattle area, we have a training site called SeaCrest Park. It's divided into three "coves", each with its own pluses and minuses. These are among the most commonly utilized training sites in the area, because they're diveable on any tide or current, and in almost all weather. As you can imagine, we dive these places a LOT, sometimes to the point of ennui. As I have put it in the past, I am on a first-name basis with all the starfish . . . It's easy to get to the point where you say, "Well, I'm not sure I'm up for the drive and the gear-schlepping, if it's only Cove 2."

Well, just to show you that the ocean never runs out of suprises, a couple of weeks ago Peter and I were doing a dive there, and simultaneously found nudibranchs we didn't recognize. We took pictures of them, came home, and looked them up, and couldn't ID them with certainty. We turned to the experts, and eventually learned that not only had we found a species we had never seen, but it's a small range extension on the animal. We also made "Slug of the Week" on slugsite!

Over the years, I have seen my only hagfish, clingfish, and ribbon worm in this site, too.

It's a good lesson that, as my friend Ben Messinger says, "There are no boring dives, if you look at what's there, and not what isn't."

 

[asha]

Amen. I LOVE our "mudhole," but struggle to motivate myself to go dive it (for reasons I don't fully understand, as I always have a good time)!

 

[dgreenh]

What kind of visibility are you calling a Mudhole?

 

[boulderjohn]

Your local mudhole would be an orgasm-inducing highlight to the local diving here.

 

[TMHeimer]

You never know. Last week I actually saw what I'm sure was our Atlantic version of an 18" Wolf Fish. 1st time Iv'e seen one in years now of diving the sites here. But the ONLY true place that salt water mudholes exist is on the Mississippi Coast--and parts of Alabama.

 

[spectrum]

I agree. With the changing of the season and behavior of critters you NEVER know when and where you'll come across something very cool. Congratulations on the find and recognition.

Once again, thank you for enriching my vocabulary with the word of the day..... ennui.

Pete

 

[chrpai]

I am eternally grateful for the mud hole (Like Travis) that I have 20 minutes from my house. I know there are others who would die to have it.

 

[TSandM]

I don't think the term "mudhole" really relates to visibility . . . I think it's more evocative of the site you dive when you want to dive, where you don't expect to see anything exciting and you've been there more times than you can count.

The folks whose mudholes are quarries may not have the same possibility of surprises that those of us who have ocean mudholes have -- I don't know. But if your boring local diving is in sea water, it can always surprise you.

 

[Searcaigh]

I agree with you TS&M, local salt water dives sites can always have a few surprises.

When I lived in Jeddah I had two sites that I dived on a weekly basis, one was in a Marina opposite to the compound I live in, best night dives I have ever done (apart from my first one) right down to the muddy bottom at 20M.

 

[Scuba_Noob]

Every dive is different. I probably dive the same 10 local dives most of the time, but they're always unique. Depends on when you're diving (e.g., season), where you enter, which directions you go, who you're with, and how slow you go. For example, I saw my first shark (while diving) at a site I dove in around 20 times that year already.

I tend to dive super slow with the camera and try to see as much as possible in one spot. That makes almost every dive new.

I dive in 5ft vis to 100ft vis, and it's all good.