First, thanks to all who primed me with outstanding information on diving Monterey Bay. On March 9 and 10, I planned four and completed three dives on the bay.
I signed up with the Cypress Sea boat for the dives. This in itself was an adventure. The first call I was told that the boat had only openings on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. I agreed and gave out my CC number. A couple of weeks later, I was emailing about another diver accompaning me and was told I had no reservations! Then I was informed that the Anchor Shack had the boat on Saturday afternoon and I would have to book with them.
I checked my recent CC card invoice and no billing appeared. maybe I just screwed up! I booked Saturday afternoon with the Anchor Shack and Sunday morning with the Cypress Sea directly (handled by All Water Sports in San Jose). A couple of days later, my CC invoice was billed four times! I will cut to the chase and just say I handled it and the shop was somwhat embarrassed. All in all they took it quite well (All Water Sports).
The Saturday afternoon dive was a OW checkout dive. The air temp was about 60 and the water around 50. Everyone except for the instructor and me were in wetsuits. There were 6 other divers like me who just wanted to get wet.
I was able to talk with several of the certified divers and I settled on on gentleman who appeared about my age. He was with the Anchor Shack too getting his nitrox check out dives. He also had a new MX10 camera and wanted to try it out.
The crew of the Cypress Sea made everything run very smooth. Everything was explained including how to purchase and use nitrox (if certified). We all signed waivers. I mentioned this because this is the only time they had any idea of how many or who was on the boat. Through out the two days, not one roll call was done.
We did a short trot out just beyond the breakwaters fro our first dive. The bottom was about 45 feet. A sand channel was perfect for the OW students. No surge and viz around 35 feet.
My buddy and I started down the Anchor line and immediately I knew this was not going to be a pretty dive. He had trouble hanging onto the line, keeping track of the camera and entangling his light cannon in the kelp. Once on the bottom he sank into the sand and sitrred up as much silt as possible. Then he shot to the surface! I did a normal ascent and asked him what was the problem? He claimed his BC was not filling with air fast enough. I also inquired about his state of mind and body but he felt he was OK and wanted to go down again. We made it down and he was able to stay off the bottom by contantly bicycling his fins. He was never once horizontal. After 15 minutes he was down to 1000 PSI (I had over 2000) of air. Since I was afraid he would not make it back to the anchor line, I signaled for a free ascent using a kelp strand as a reference. Shortly after starting he blew to the surface again. I did a safe ascent with a 3 minute stop before surfacing.
After ditching my gear on the boat, I had a heart to heart talk. First, how much weight are you using? 38 pounds! I could not talk him out of at least 10 pounds. He felt strongely that he could not go down without 38 pounds. Losing that battle, I requested he settle on the sand bottom on the next dive and adjust his bouyancy before we went anywhere. He agreed. The next dive was much better and all went well. My question is this? Who trained him? Or maybe he was not present for the weight belt and bouyancy class? I spent so much time keeping track of my buddy that I could not tell you what was down there except there was lots of kelp.
On Sunday, the weather was rainy and cold. A full boat of divers was on hand anyway. This time we were going to the Carmel coast near Point Lobos. I also was able to befriend a veteren instructor who allow me to observe with his two AOW students. This was their first deep dive (80 to 100 feet). We would be diving near a canyon which if we were lucky is the closest thing they had to wall diving. Unfortunately the viz was only 20 feet and even at 80 feet you could feel the surge as we were only 500 yards off shore.
The instructor did the "egg trick" which I had never seen before. Lots of fun! The dive location inself was colorful with even more kelp and tons of colorful star fish. Few real fish was seen. The site had many turns and twists with great rocky relief. Unfortunately the two AOW students were in wet suits and were sucking air hard. We did a free ascent on the kelp (also good training for the AOW students). Once on board one diver was shaking uncontrollably. Even with the warm water flushes in the wet suit she could not get warm. She was dried off and allowed to stay in the wheel house (note: the main cabin was not heated and almost everone including myself was cold. It was still raining and 50 degrees). Due to a bad cold I had been fighting all week I decided to call the second dive. Apparently most of the other divers were not eager either because everyone was back on board after only 15 minutes into the second dive.
I would love to dive the Monterey Bay again but in better conditions topside. I also will take my life long buddy with me too! There is another dive boat, the Monterey Express. It appears to be a more modern boat but not as large as the 50 foot vessel called the Cypress Sea.
I signed up with the Cypress Sea boat for the dives. This in itself was an adventure. The first call I was told that the boat had only openings on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. I agreed and gave out my CC number. A couple of weeks later, I was emailing about another diver accompaning me and was told I had no reservations! Then I was informed that the Anchor Shack had the boat on Saturday afternoon and I would have to book with them.
I checked my recent CC card invoice and no billing appeared. maybe I just screwed up! I booked Saturday afternoon with the Anchor Shack and Sunday morning with the Cypress Sea directly (handled by All Water Sports in San Jose). A couple of days later, my CC invoice was billed four times! I will cut to the chase and just say I handled it and the shop was somwhat embarrassed. All in all they took it quite well (All Water Sports).
The Saturday afternoon dive was a OW checkout dive. The air temp was about 60 and the water around 50. Everyone except for the instructor and me were in wetsuits. There were 6 other divers like me who just wanted to get wet.
I was able to talk with several of the certified divers and I settled on on gentleman who appeared about my age. He was with the Anchor Shack too getting his nitrox check out dives. He also had a new MX10 camera and wanted to try it out.
The crew of the Cypress Sea made everything run very smooth. Everything was explained including how to purchase and use nitrox (if certified). We all signed waivers. I mentioned this because this is the only time they had any idea of how many or who was on the boat. Through out the two days, not one roll call was done.
We did a short trot out just beyond the breakwaters fro our first dive. The bottom was about 45 feet. A sand channel was perfect for the OW students. No surge and viz around 35 feet.
My buddy and I started down the Anchor line and immediately I knew this was not going to be a pretty dive. He had trouble hanging onto the line, keeping track of the camera and entangling his light cannon in the kelp. Once on the bottom he sank into the sand and sitrred up as much silt as possible. Then he shot to the surface! I did a normal ascent and asked him what was the problem? He claimed his BC was not filling with air fast enough. I also inquired about his state of mind and body but he felt he was OK and wanted to go down again. We made it down and he was able to stay off the bottom by contantly bicycling his fins. He was never once horizontal. After 15 minutes he was down to 1000 PSI (I had over 2000) of air. Since I was afraid he would not make it back to the anchor line, I signaled for a free ascent using a kelp strand as a reference. Shortly after starting he blew to the surface again. I did a safe ascent with a 3 minute stop before surfacing.
After ditching my gear on the boat, I had a heart to heart talk. First, how much weight are you using? 38 pounds! I could not talk him out of at least 10 pounds. He felt strongely that he could not go down without 38 pounds. Losing that battle, I requested he settle on the sand bottom on the next dive and adjust his bouyancy before we went anywhere. He agreed. The next dive was much better and all went well. My question is this? Who trained him? Or maybe he was not present for the weight belt and bouyancy class? I spent so much time keeping track of my buddy that I could not tell you what was down there except there was lots of kelp.
On Sunday, the weather was rainy and cold. A full boat of divers was on hand anyway. This time we were going to the Carmel coast near Point Lobos. I also was able to befriend a veteren instructor who allow me to observe with his two AOW students. This was their first deep dive (80 to 100 feet). We would be diving near a canyon which if we were lucky is the closest thing they had to wall diving. Unfortunately the viz was only 20 feet and even at 80 feet you could feel the surge as we were only 500 yards off shore.
The instructor did the "egg trick" which I had never seen before. Lots of fun! The dive location inself was colorful with even more kelp and tons of colorful star fish. Few real fish was seen. The site had many turns and twists with great rocky relief. Unfortunately the two AOW students were in wet suits and were sucking air hard. We did a free ascent on the kelp (also good training for the AOW students). Once on board one diver was shaking uncontrollably. Even with the warm water flushes in the wet suit she could not get warm. She was dried off and allowed to stay in the wheel house (note: the main cabin was not heated and almost everone including myself was cold. It was still raining and 50 degrees). Due to a bad cold I had been fighting all week I decided to call the second dive. Apparently most of the other divers were not eager either because everyone was back on board after only 15 minutes into the second dive.
I would love to dive the Monterey Bay again but in better conditions topside. I also will take my life long buddy with me too! There is another dive boat, the Monterey Express. It appears to be a more modern boat but not as large as the 50 foot vessel called the Cypress Sea.
