Went out yesterday on the Pacific Star to Catalina, and despite the overcast in the morning, it turned out to be a beautiful day.
Our first stop was Isthmus Cove Reef. I love this site! Well, this was only my second visit there, so it all seems new to me. My buddy and I (another MIKE, 1/2 of all divers are named Mike, go figure) dropped in and headed down to 94 feet. The vis was good but there was a lot of light scatter. It felt like being in a movie. Large kelp bass everywhere in the palm kelp down there. Found an ab that was about 9" in dia. at about 84' and not too far away I found a shark egg stuck in the reef. At 65' I found the biggest lobster I have ever seen sharing an inpeneterable hole with a large brown fish. The lobster was legendary in size. I bet he was 20 lbs. I tried to squeeze in there even though I knew it was impossible, and of course, he got away.
I would have liked to have done another dive in the cove but the current was running so the boat was moved to the Rock Quarry. I was skeptical but this second dive was as good as the first. I found several eels, a 4' swell shark hiding down in a hole, and the pair of butterfly sythe (sp) that live there. We also liberated a weightbelt from the rocks. My congrats to the diver that dropped it and lived.
After lunch we did another dive at Rock Quarry and this time I found a monster eel that had to be as big around as my thigh. I found one small swim through, and did that. That was about it.
One of my friends was there with his expensive camera set-up and said he didn't see anything. If I had had a camera I would have had a bunch of good shots because I saw more worth seeing on these three dives than on any other day in a long time. I did shoot some surface pics with my VX-2000, but those would be pretty boring I suppose.
Our first stop was Isthmus Cove Reef. I love this site! Well, this was only my second visit there, so it all seems new to me. My buddy and I (another MIKE, 1/2 of all divers are named Mike, go figure) dropped in and headed down to 94 feet. The vis was good but there was a lot of light scatter. It felt like being in a movie. Large kelp bass everywhere in the palm kelp down there. Found an ab that was about 9" in dia. at about 84' and not too far away I found a shark egg stuck in the reef. At 65' I found the biggest lobster I have ever seen sharing an inpeneterable hole with a large brown fish. The lobster was legendary in size. I bet he was 20 lbs. I tried to squeeze in there even though I knew it was impossible, and of course, he got away.
I would have liked to have done another dive in the cove but the current was running so the boat was moved to the Rock Quarry. I was skeptical but this second dive was as good as the first. I found several eels, a 4' swell shark hiding down in a hole, and the pair of butterfly sythe (sp) that live there. We also liberated a weightbelt from the rocks. My congrats to the diver that dropped it and lived.
After lunch we did another dive at Rock Quarry and this time I found a monster eel that had to be as big around as my thigh. I found one small swim through, and did that. That was about it.
One of my friends was there with his expensive camera set-up and said he didn't see anything. If I had had a camera I would have had a bunch of good shots because I saw more worth seeing on these three dives than on any other day in a long time. I did shoot some surface pics with my VX-2000, but those would be pretty boring I suppose.
