Great day of diving with everyone out on 'Giant Stride'! Riding with Robert makes things really nice. While you do have to hump your gear to the boat, most of the way you do it in a golf cart. The boat is really nicely set up and entry is done thru one of 3 gates in railing and entry is done via ladder in the port side gate. tanks are held securely on the benches along the railing. Plenty of room to stow reasonable amounts of gear.
I dove with Jared in the morning and afternoon, with lisa marie joining us for our afternoon dives. First dive was along oasis wall, I saw more fish on that dive than anywhere else that day. vis along wall was about 8-10, opening up as you got deeper. I had not dove there in forever due to lack of access (my one buddy with boat would not put it on main basin on weekends due to all of traffic), it was just like coming home, lots of funky rock features and small grottos with fish drifting in and out of vis.
Second dive to old scuba park, this is park where I was certified back in '77, and used to dive it a lot with dad and other buddies back in the day. Me and jason went down and checked out the first big grouping of objects at bouy and then went in search of 3 story house boat, but heading we took only took us across some muddy flats with occasional barrel or odd looking frame to break the monotony. vis here was not quite as good as wall, maybe 6-10 ft
After a run back to marina to trade out tanks and pick up lisa marie, plus eat our lunch, we headed out for afternoon dives. Lisa was a little apprehensive diving with her first instabuddy(s), and a borrowed bc setup, but settled in fine once she got wet and did two excellent dives with jared and i.
First of afternoon dives was rattlesnake(stearnes for you newcomers
. Robert gave us a pass around the island and explained the dive plan(also allowing us to eye some of the hotties on the party barges). we dropped in and swam from edge of shallow side around to steep side and across it, checking out the various grottos and assorted offering from the party boats (beer cans, beads, a burned out flare, and sunglasses, lots of sunglasses). With all of us following different contour lines which led slightly different directions, this dive scattered us further than the wall did. This is where I missed having a spool with me to shoot a smb, I had left my smb/spool hanging in closet and while Robert provides a smb, he does not provide spool or reel to shoot it (probably a good idea not to hand spool or reel to diver not yet familiar with them).
So I would recommend taking your spool if you're doing the Stearnes dive.
After picking up our slightly scattered group and their collections of sunglasses and other booty we headed back to second dive at old scuba park. Jared and I decided we wanted to try the other direction on leaving the down bouy at the main wreck collection and maybe try to find the 3 story house boat or the resident giant catfish. Lisa was fine with just getting in the water, direction didn't matter much to her so we headed out. Found the 2 story house boat and the silo and several different platform looking things, but not the 3 story, I have a feeling that the depth it was at was keepin us away, the therocline felt colder over at the scubapark area than elsewhere and we kind a kept bouncing off of it. Lisa did find a toilet in one of boats there, not sure what it is with her and toilets, guess she is just a 'potty girl'
Still lots left to see at scubapark area, I will definately be coming back to that again, and no end to party boats at rattlesnake to drop fresh loads of sunglasses, beer, beads, and bikinis for us divers to find. Diving a full day with Robert will leave you feeling like you've done something, in future I will be probably just doing half days at a time, easy enough for me since I am only 10 min from the marina, but I can see why someone driving in from out of area would want to book full day and make the most of it.
It was also my first full day of diving with my Quattros, Jared was also diving a big yellow pair, sure helps to keep your buddy in view through the mirk. I love my Jets, but they are sometimes a little to stealthy for muck diving
I could feel my calfs this morning telling me I need to get out and get a little more work in the quattros.
Enjoyed meeting Robert and talking with him, recommend his operation highly to anyone wanting to do some great diving in harder to access areas of travis. A big thanks to Robert for providing a great time, Thanks to Charlie for offering us the opportunity to get in on his trip, Thanks to dive buddies jared and lisa marie for buddy'ing up with me, thanks to whoever brought the muffins, great to meet donna, zach, katherine, michael, and jeff. I will post profiles and pics from yesterday later, got to get ready to take dog out for his day at park now.
I dove with Jared in the morning and afternoon, with lisa marie joining us for our afternoon dives. First dive was along oasis wall, I saw more fish on that dive than anywhere else that day. vis along wall was about 8-10, opening up as you got deeper. I had not dove there in forever due to lack of access (my one buddy with boat would not put it on main basin on weekends due to all of traffic), it was just like coming home, lots of funky rock features and small grottos with fish drifting in and out of vis.
Second dive to old scuba park, this is park where I was certified back in '77, and used to dive it a lot with dad and other buddies back in the day. Me and jason went down and checked out the first big grouping of objects at bouy and then went in search of 3 story house boat, but heading we took only took us across some muddy flats with occasional barrel or odd looking frame to break the monotony. vis here was not quite as good as wall, maybe 6-10 ft
After a run back to marina to trade out tanks and pick up lisa marie, plus eat our lunch, we headed out for afternoon dives. Lisa was a little apprehensive diving with her first instabuddy(s), and a borrowed bc setup, but settled in fine once she got wet and did two excellent dives with jared and i.
First of afternoon dives was rattlesnake(stearnes for you newcomers
. Robert gave us a pass around the island and explained the dive plan(also allowing us to eye some of the hotties on the party barges). we dropped in and swam from edge of shallow side around to steep side and across it, checking out the various grottos and assorted offering from the party boats (beer cans, beads, a burned out flare, and sunglasses, lots of sunglasses). With all of us following different contour lines which led slightly different directions, this dive scattered us further than the wall did. This is where I missed having a spool with me to shoot a smb, I had left my smb/spool hanging in closet and while Robert provides a smb, he does not provide spool or reel to shoot it (probably a good idea not to hand spool or reel to diver not yet familiar with them).So I would recommend taking your spool if you're doing the Stearnes dive.
After picking up our slightly scattered group and their collections of sunglasses and other booty we headed back to second dive at old scuba park. Jared and I decided we wanted to try the other direction on leaving the down bouy at the main wreck collection and maybe try to find the 3 story house boat or the resident giant catfish. Lisa was fine with just getting in the water, direction didn't matter much to her so we headed out. Found the 2 story house boat and the silo and several different platform looking things, but not the 3 story, I have a feeling that the depth it was at was keepin us away, the therocline felt colder over at the scubapark area than elsewhere and we kind a kept bouncing off of it. Lisa did find a toilet in one of boats there, not sure what it is with her and toilets, guess she is just a 'potty girl'
Still lots left to see at scubapark area, I will definately be coming back to that again, and no end to party boats at rattlesnake to drop fresh loads of sunglasses, beer, beads, and bikinis for us divers to find. Diving a full day with Robert will leave you feeling like you've done something, in future I will be probably just doing half days at a time, easy enough for me since I am only 10 min from the marina, but I can see why someone driving in from out of area would want to book full day and make the most of it.
It was also my first full day of diving with my Quattros, Jared was also diving a big yellow pair, sure helps to keep your buddy in view through the mirk. I love my Jets, but they are sometimes a little to stealthy for muck diving
I could feel my calfs this morning telling me I need to get out and get a little more work in the quattros.
Enjoyed meeting Robert and talking with him, recommend his operation highly to anyone wanting to do some great diving in harder to access areas of travis. A big thanks to Robert for providing a great time, Thanks to Charlie for offering us the opportunity to get in on his trip, Thanks to dive buddies jared and lisa marie for buddy'ing up with me, thanks to whoever brought the muffins, great to meet donna, zach, katherine, michael, and jeff. I will post profiles and pics from yesterday later, got to get ready to take dog out for his day at park now.
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