lamont
Contributor
Went diving with OE2X at cove2 and had a really good dive. Technically the dive was awesome. I figured out that my floaty feet issues are not actually related to boot size on my drysuit, but too much ankle and calf material. I took my gators and make sure that they were down about as far as they could go to my ankles and that kept them from puffing out during the dive. All I had to do for managing buoyancy on the way up was got head up slightly, roll a little and (since my dump valve sticks) squeeze my arms across my chest to force the air out. Much better than dealing with floaty feet all the time. I also hammered on the drysuit inflator a bunch going down, which led to a much more comfortable and warm dive. I didn't start to get core body temperature chill until the very end.
We went down the rope to the I-beams, then cut across at 70-80 fsw to the rockpile and checked out the wolf eel. That was the first I'd seen her, but she wasn't being very sociable and was just tucked into her hole. Swum down the I-beams, then back up the honey bear. Saw a big old octo under the bow of the honey bear, and it was just sitting back there watching us, chilling out. Viz was kinda bad shallower because of all the seals feeding, it was also even worse down at the I-beams which wasn't just because of the seals. We had company for most of the dive. On a couple of occasions I was laughing my head off through the regulator at what the seals where doing. On a more evil note, I was deliberately hitting some of the fish with my HID and suggesting them as food for the seals. The fish seemed to get the picture that my light meant that they were marked for death and would run away from it. I thought it was interesting that the couple of ratfish that we saw down there weren't very fazed by the seals at all -- they got annoyed when the seals were swimming too close, but they were never acting like they were running for their lives and the seals never went after them. Up shallower I saw something that looked like a tiny jellyfish that which sparkled white and blue in my HID which was cool to watch while we did deco.
My air consumption wasn't anywhere near as bad as I thought it was. 3400 psi to start (warm tank after getting filled too, I forgot to check how much it dropped on the way out to the buoy), 1000 to end, 60 min dive time, 47 fsw average depth. that makes for a .61 cuft/min SAC. I was still catching myself breathing pretty heavy at times too and was generally not at a 'resting' breathing rate for most of the dive, so there's still more improvement to be made there. At least I wasn't hyperventiliating from hypothermia like I was the night before...
We went down the rope to the I-beams, then cut across at 70-80 fsw to the rockpile and checked out the wolf eel. That was the first I'd seen her, but she wasn't being very sociable and was just tucked into her hole. Swum down the I-beams, then back up the honey bear. Saw a big old octo under the bow of the honey bear, and it was just sitting back there watching us, chilling out. Viz was kinda bad shallower because of all the seals feeding, it was also even worse down at the I-beams which wasn't just because of the seals. We had company for most of the dive. On a couple of occasions I was laughing my head off through the regulator at what the seals where doing. On a more evil note, I was deliberately hitting some of the fish with my HID and suggesting them as food for the seals. The fish seemed to get the picture that my light meant that they were marked for death and would run away from it. I thought it was interesting that the couple of ratfish that we saw down there weren't very fazed by the seals at all -- they got annoyed when the seals were swimming too close, but they were never acting like they were running for their lives and the seals never went after them. Up shallower I saw something that looked like a tiny jellyfish that which sparkled white and blue in my HID which was cool to watch while we did deco.
My air consumption wasn't anywhere near as bad as I thought it was. 3400 psi to start (warm tank after getting filled too, I forgot to check how much it dropped on the way out to the buoy), 1000 to end, 60 min dive time, 47 fsw average depth. that makes for a .61 cuft/min SAC. I was still catching myself breathing pretty heavy at times too and was generally not at a 'resting' breathing rate for most of the dive, so there's still more improvement to be made there. At least I wasn't hyperventiliating from hypothermia like I was the night before...
