AlaskaDiver
Contributor
- Messages
- 612
- Reaction score
- 6
- # of dives
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We dove yesterday with Off The Wall Charters under Captain Bill Routh on the Cooper River, SC. This was a fun fossil-finding adventure for all. We had two adults and two teenagers in our group, however all are experienced divers. For safety, I was tethered to one of the boys with a bungee cord around the upper arms. I was a bit skeptical at first of this as this is not the DIR method to which I am accustomed, but Bill knew what he was doing.
The weather was unseasonably cool at a morning low of 36F and a daytime high of mid 50sF. The water temp was much better at 63F to 64F. The current was extraordinarily strong when the power plant nearby began generating power during our second dive.
There were essentially two groups on board (us = 4 people and a group of 3 men from Michigan who dove solo). The boat ride was only about 5 minutes to the first dive site and all on board were in awe of the birds and alligators seen topside. We did 4 dives, each for 60 minutes in the Cooper River at a max depth of 35. Once below the water, visibility was 0-1 at best. This is not the dive for those who panic or are claustrophobic. Light Canons and canister lights were a must. Captain Bill had several of these handy for rent in case one of ours died (which it did) or if someone had a lesser powered light (which another did). He came very well prepared with canvas bags for sale as our mesh bags had too large holes for the fossils we picked out. I was very glad we had his mesh/canvas combo as I was able to secure some of my smaller finds.
We found Snaggle tooth shark teeth, several sizes of Megalodon teeth, a huge gigantic Mastodon femur, some small Ray plates, a few various aged bottles, Sand tiger shark teeth, a Long Lipped Llama tooth, plates from an Armadillo, a Cormorant wing bone, an unknown coccyx bone from a large mammal, an unknown claw and several unusual pieces of bone still yet to be identified. The bottles were of course from the recent era (new to 50 years old) with the other items all ranging from 1-8 million years old from the Mistocene era. Very impressive to all aboard to compare loot at the end of each dive. Captain Bill had a fossil book by Frank Kocsis which was very pictorially detailed and probably one of the most comprehensive I have ever seen. I will purchase one on line. We ended the day purchasing t-shirts from Captain Bill and departing with a feeling of great accomplishment and fun. Id definitely come back again and dive with him.
The weather was unseasonably cool at a morning low of 36F and a daytime high of mid 50sF. The water temp was much better at 63F to 64F. The current was extraordinarily strong when the power plant nearby began generating power during our second dive.
There were essentially two groups on board (us = 4 people and a group of 3 men from Michigan who dove solo). The boat ride was only about 5 minutes to the first dive site and all on board were in awe of the birds and alligators seen topside. We did 4 dives, each for 60 minutes in the Cooper River at a max depth of 35. Once below the water, visibility was 0-1 at best. This is not the dive for those who panic or are claustrophobic. Light Canons and canister lights were a must. Captain Bill had several of these handy for rent in case one of ours died (which it did) or if someone had a lesser powered light (which another did). He came very well prepared with canvas bags for sale as our mesh bags had too large holes for the fossils we picked out. I was very glad we had his mesh/canvas combo as I was able to secure some of my smaller finds.
We found Snaggle tooth shark teeth, several sizes of Megalodon teeth, a huge gigantic Mastodon femur, some small Ray plates, a few various aged bottles, Sand tiger shark teeth, a Long Lipped Llama tooth, plates from an Armadillo, a Cormorant wing bone, an unknown coccyx bone from a large mammal, an unknown claw and several unusual pieces of bone still yet to be identified. The bottles were of course from the recent era (new to 50 years old) with the other items all ranging from 1-8 million years old from the Mistocene era. Very impressive to all aboard to compare loot at the end of each dive. Captain Bill had a fossil book by Frank Kocsis which was very pictorially detailed and probably one of the most comprehensive I have ever seen. I will purchase one on line. We ended the day purchasing t-shirts from Captain Bill and departing with a feeling of great accomplishment and fun. Id definitely come back again and dive with him.
