Monterey conditions. (let's keep it going )

[elgoog]

Pt Lobos on Saturday morning 10/13/18

@sea_otter and I headed out with a stage and DPV east out of the cove. The plan was to go past Granite Point Wall, Q Tip and close to the point where the Monastery Beach bay starts as she had seen a ton of kelp and fish in that region during a dive a few weeks ago. We were also looking for the site called Barn which is in that area.

Viz was not great around Middle Reef and the front side of Granite Point Wall - maybe 20-30ft tops and a lot of particulate. We got to Q Tip pretty quickly and there were about a dozen metridiums in full bloom on it. From there we took a NE heading and scootered for a bit until we hit a region of large rocks with a lot of fish and rose anemones (we couldn't figure out what these were as they were quite small and looked like little koosh balls - @stilldivin 's post above confirmed what we were looking at). Lings were out hunting and waay more active swimming around in the water column. We swam around a bit but couldn't find the distinctive structure of Barn and the viz was not good enough to try and go farther out. On the way back, we hit the back side of Granite Point Wall which had much nicer viz.
We had a bunch of gas left so decided to head back to Middle Reef and go west past Lone Metiridum ... but lost each other in the not so stellar viz and had to ascend and reconvene on the surface At that point we decided to head back in as I wanted to get home slightly early.

-> 82min, 94ft max, 60ft avg, 54F at depth

It's been really warm and sunny, which I'm guessing is the reason for the bad viz in the last few weeks. Hopefully this improves as it gets cooler.

 

[wnissen]

Dove the Frank Lloyd Wright Walker house, aka Copper Roof House today. Very calm at 9:30 a.m., visibility was only good right at the edge of the kelp, around 4 meters depth, progressively getting worse as we got down to 12 meters. Heading north from the stairs entry, across the bay, ran into some truly terrible viz, less than 1 meter. Still a very nice day for a dive.

 

[bjd001]

South Monastery, Saturday, 10/13

Did 2 great dives Saturday morning at South Monastery. It was pretty flat, so must of us were able to put our fins on in the water. (The really short person, not so much. ) Temps were 59 at the surface and 57 at depth. Viz was mostly 20 - 30 feet, but very clear close up - maybe out to 10 feet - and in the shallows. Both dives were 40+ minutes; depths about 50 and 60 feet.

First dive we were closer to the rocks on the left and encountered some urchin barrens, but sea life improved when we got deeper. Second dive we swam out to the kelp bed and followed a heading of about 330 deg. Took us out along the intersection of the sand and the rocks/kelp and we followed that line for most of the dive. Awesome!

I can't recall when I have seen so many different types of crabs on a Monterey dive (and I've done hundreds). And different types and colors of anemones! Lots of fish, feather duster worms and nudibranchs. And I saw a little abalone with yellow-greenish tentacles! So maybe a white or a flat abalone? Definitely not one of the usual red ones.

It was a beautiful day and there was even a wedding on the beach! So happy I live close enough to dive every month in Monterey!

 

[uspap]

North Monastery today had 40ft vis. Very calm. Beautiful topside conditions. Epic. I hope this is the start of a very good winter diving season.

 

[MichaelMc]

Otters Cove Monday, high tide, great sun lit boulders covered in strawberry anemones. Ten or so large giant spined sea stars. Otter Mom and baby on surface. Not many fish. 20'+ vis, mild surge ~10', warm 60 degrees. Great site. Swam 60 degrees out from beach, ducked then dove under canopy to outer edge, then dove reciprocal. 38', 96 minutes.

 

[stilldivin]

10-26-18
It was foggy when I first arrived at Breakwater but it soon cleared and it turned into a nice, a sunny day. I had to swim past the small waves and surge, but is was no problem. Nice vis and lots of fish. Watch for a couple of sea lions buzz me at the beginning. Beautiful shots of kelp are seen too. Towards the middle of the video listen for the clicking sounds the shrimp are making. I had fun swimming through a school of blue rockfish, plus I got close to striped surf perch that could care less I was filming them. I got a nice shots of an Ochre starfish and other stars, an abalone, a keyhole limpet, crabs, and scallops. Water temp. was 55-57 degrees. Max depth reached 43 feet. 15-20 foot of vis. My new fill light by Suptig worked great. ($30.00!)

 

[KRL1973]

10-26-18
It was foggy when I first arrived at Breakwater but it soon cleared and it turned into a nice, a sunny day. I had to swim past the small waves and surge, but is was no problem. Nice vis and lots of fish. Watch for a couple of sea lions buzz me at the beginning. Beautiful shots of kelp are seen too. Towards the middle of the video listen for the clicking sounds the shrimp are making. I had fun swimming through a school of blue rockfish, plus I got close to striped surf perch that could care less I was filming them. I got a nice shots of an Ochre starfish and other stars, an abalone, a keyhole limpet, crabs, and scallops. Water temp. was 55-57 degrees. Max depth reached 43 feet. 15-20 foot of vis. My new fill light by Suptig worked great. ($30.00!)

Thank you very much StillDivin for this Friday report. These are very much appreciated for those of us trying to decide whether to make the trip out or not. I'll be diving Monterey tomorrow and look forward to sharing some video as well

 

[uspap]

Checked out Monastery this morning and it looked doable but surgey and greenish. From shore I'd say greenish 20 so I didn't want to work that hard. Went to Breakwater. Kelp was 10ish vis. Second dive was wall and it was 20 +/-. Very long swell. You would be over waist deep and then standing in ankle deep water. Kelp seemed a little sparse. Somebody said they had 40 ft vis but I think they were counting both eyes.

SD- Where were you parked? I was about 4 stalls over from the ticket machine as you first enter the lot. Probably saw you and didn't notice.

 

[stilldivin]

Thank you very much StillDivin for this Friday report. These are very much appreciated for those of us trying to decide whether to make the trip out or not. I'll be diving Monterey tomorrow and look forward to sharing some video as well

thanks! Here are some helpful websites.

Webcam of Breakwater;
Taste of Monterey - Live Webcam

Website for conditions;
Models Home

Whalers' cove webcam (Pt. Lobos.)
Whalers Cove Live Stream

Pt. Lobos swell forecast;
Point Lobos Swell Forecast, CA - WillyWeather

 

[KRL1973]

Breakwater was nice topside today. knee high surf entry, my son and I dropped next to the pipe and followed out to metridium fields. Some surge and 10ft vis down to about 30fsw where it opened up to 20-25 vis. Lot's of brittle stars, snails and shrimp along the sand, noticed shimp liked to perch on the backs of sea stars. By the way very nice to sea the sea stars making a comeback, however still not seeing any of the sunflower stars that used to be so common. At the fields had a nice cabezon swim up and perch itself up high on a metridium covered rock and pose for video. Will post a link when I get around to editing. Fun time