Monterey Meet & Greet - 12 Jun 2010

[ae3753]

Even though viz wasn't spectacular, the company was!

It was really fun to dive with Nina, Doug, Kristina, Ben and Ted. And see a lot of familiar faces on the surface. Glad that Aaron saw us before his second dive and came by to say hi. Next time, we'll get in the water together too.

A day at the Barge and Metridium Fields, not too shabby

 

[lionessa]

Diving with and meeting everyone on Saturday was awesome! I learned a lot (scooters drown too), liked the way the BP/W feels in the ocean, saw a very beautiful tiny shiny pointy gold and purple snail chilling on a leaf.

Since, this Meet and Greet was "technically" for Spring. How about having another for Summer?

 

[pacificgal]

I vote August.

 

[dougchartier]

I vote August.

Fine with me.

 

[dougchartier]

It was great diving with you guys also... Ted and I didn't see the big Jellyfish... But we did run into it's tentacles... we were behind you guys a bit and as we were kicking saw the tail end of it... and was amazed by how long the tentacles were... we sat there and waited for that freight train to pass... and the imagination was going into overdrive about how big that thing must be!

Does anyone know what kind of jellyfish that was? In my dive log, all I have written is "big a** jellyfish." I'd like be a little more scientific. ;-)

 

[lionessa]

I thought maybe it was this Egg-yolk Jellyfish. There's a cool segment on these guys in BBC's Life: Creatures of the Deep and something similar in a tank at the Cal Academy of Sciences in SF to check out!

 

[pacificgal]

I think it was bigger than an egg yolk jelly, I'll keep looking

 

[dougchartier]

I think it was bigger than an egg yolk jelly, I'll keep looking

Wow, those egg yolk jellyfish can get big. Phacellophora camtschatica - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Do you recall if the one we saw had that egg yolk structure in its bell? I honestly can't remember much about its appearance other than its size...

 

[ae3753]

I thought it was a massive Pacific Sea Nettle. I'm normally not shy about nettles, but it was so large I didn't linger.

Nice spotting by Nina too. That's one guy we really didn't want to wear as a hat.

 

[ae3753]

Really short video:
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Some surface shots:

Ben and his happy hands

"Oxycheq made a pink wing?"