OP
MSP Rescue Diver
Contributor
Sorry the rest of you called it off. I go there and the surf didn't seem all that bad to me. It wasn't as bad as the day I outlined in the infamous Why I Don't Like Beach Dives thread. I got in and out without getting knocked over or losing any equipment.
The dive had it's highs and lows for me.
I wanted to checkout some new equipment this dive, however in retrospect I shouldn't have done it all at once. I have new neutrally buoyant tanks that I was testing, which also meant I needed to drop weight and find the new amount I need. Also these tanks are weighted on the bottom, which means my trim changed from where I normally put my strap. And the tanks must be slightly smaller in circumference from my current tanks as it did slip a bit during the entry/exit walks on the beach. So I was fighting trying to keep horizontal in the water and maintaining my buoyancy. The problem was exacerbated by the surge closer in.
On top of this I had a brand new mask which kept leaking, so I was constantly clearing throughout the dive. And though I did clean it with toothpaste and used Sea Drops prior to the dive, it started fogging pretty badly at the end of the dive.
All was not lost though.
As Mike noted - we saw some pretty interesting stuff down there. I haven't dove that sections of reef before, and the "honeycomb" offers shelter to some pretty neat things. The coronet fish was the biggest one I have seen, and it allowed us to get pretty close. The squid were cool, and there shrimp all over the place including a cluster of a couple of dozen in one of the holes. They were easy to spot by the way their eyes glowed when the light swept over them. And I did see that huge lobster, but he was in a honeycomb hole at least four feet deep that had ledges all around the bottom. He was safe and he knew it!
I also saw two other "shorts" and a couple of crabs.
There were other divers in the water as well further out, and it was interesting to see how their lights glowed underwater from the suface.
The other interesting experience I had was during the swim in. With the surf up, the bottom closer to shore was pretty stirred up and viz dropped to zero. Even with our lights I lost sight of Mike even though we were right together and bumped a couple of times. I even swam into the sandy bottom once face first. A very different feeling for someone used to 40 foot or better viz.
All and all an experience.
Marc
The dive had it's highs and lows for me.
I wanted to checkout some new equipment this dive, however in retrospect I shouldn't have done it all at once. I have new neutrally buoyant tanks that I was testing, which also meant I needed to drop weight and find the new amount I need. Also these tanks are weighted on the bottom, which means my trim changed from where I normally put my strap. And the tanks must be slightly smaller in circumference from my current tanks as it did slip a bit during the entry/exit walks on the beach. So I was fighting trying to keep horizontal in the water and maintaining my buoyancy. The problem was exacerbated by the surge closer in.
On top of this I had a brand new mask which kept leaking, so I was constantly clearing throughout the dive. And though I did clean it with toothpaste and used Sea Drops prior to the dive, it started fogging pretty badly at the end of the dive.
All was not lost though.
As Mike noted - we saw some pretty interesting stuff down there. I haven't dove that sections of reef before, and the "honeycomb" offers shelter to some pretty neat things. The coronet fish was the biggest one I have seen, and it allowed us to get pretty close. The squid were cool, and there shrimp all over the place including a cluster of a couple of dozen in one of the holes. They were easy to spot by the way their eyes glowed when the light swept over them. And I did see that huge lobster, but he was in a honeycomb hole at least four feet deep that had ledges all around the bottom. He was safe and he knew it!
I also saw two other "shorts" and a couple of crabs. There were other divers in the water as well further out, and it was interesting to see how their lights glowed underwater from the suface.
The other interesting experience I had was during the swim in. With the surf up, the bottom closer to shore was pretty stirred up and viz dropped to zero. Even with our lights I lost sight of Mike even though we were right together and bumped a couple of times. I even swam into the sandy bottom once face first. A very different feeling for someone used to 40 foot or better viz.
All and all an experience.
Marc
