Where did the regular season Dodgers go during the playoffs . . .
LEAVING FOR INDONESIA - We're in the final stages of leaving for our Reef Seekers trip to Indonesia to dive with our friends at Murex (in Manado, Bangka, and Lembeh). This is about as eclectic as you can get when it comes to assembling the group (18 divers all together). 2 people left a week ago to get in some extra dives there, 2 are travelling through Europe and will meet us in Singapore, 2 are coming in from Korea, 1 is flying in a day early from SFO, 3 people are on the morning Singapore Air flight through Tokyo (which was significantly cheaper),and 8 of us are on the late-night Singapore Air non-stop. Yikes!!! But it also underscores that you don't have to live in L.A. nor leave from LAX to travel with Reef Seekers. We can always figure out a way to meet somewhere along the way or even just meet at our final destination. But regardless of how they're getting there, I think everyone's looking forward to our 9 nights and 8 dive days at Murex to explore the fabulous sights that the waters surrounding that part of the world have to offer. Stunning vertical walls and corals reef mixed in with fabulous "muck" diving makes for a wonderful combination of diving opportunities and experiences.
DAILY PHOTOS - I am hoping that I'm be able to post my "Daily Top 10" pix through both the Reef Seekers and my own personal FaceBook pages. So check those out each day to enjoy what we're seeing vicariously. And, in theory, I should be able to issue next week's TWARS from the resort which will also include some pix as well as quick stories about how the trip is going.
NOVEMBER ZOOM SEEKERS CHANGES - There are multiple changes. First, when I originally set up the dates a year ago, it escaped my attention that November 8 was also Election Day. (Thanks to Alan Blaustein for the reminder.) So, thinking some of you may be watching election returns rather than Zoom Seeking, we're going to push it back a week to Tuesday, November 15. Second (and this is sad news), our speaker was scheduled to be 90-year-old diving pioneer Dr. Sam Miller III, who was going to talk about some of the early days of diving and how things have evolved to where we are today. Unfortunately, Sam died in early August. So that brings us to the third change . . .
NOVEMBER ZOOM SEEKERS SPEAKER IS CRAIG GELPI - Craig is a founding member of the Catalina Marine Society, which is chartered to advance the scientific understanding of the local ocean off Southern California. Craig will talk about the history, resources, projects, partners, parties, and accomplishments of CMS, and how you can be involved in this important research. You can find out more about the CMS before Craig's talk through this website:
CATALINA MARINE SOCIETY.
WHALE STRANDING IN NEW ZEALAND - Very sad. Almost 500 pilot whales died after stranding themselves on a remote beach in New Zealand. Mass strandings like this are apparently not uncommon in New Zealand, but the cause of this one remains a mystery. You can read more about this here:
WHALE STRANDING IN NEW ZEALAND.
RENAMING THE CASINO POINT MPA FOR DR. BILL UPDATE - I'm sorry to say that this past Thursday, the CA Fish & Game Commission voted 4-0 to deny our request to rename the MPA for Dr. Bill. They did emphasize that this in no way reflects on the merits of renaming the MPA for Dr. Bill nor the local diving community support for that effort. But the denial comes on what is essentially a technicality as they have a requirement that a person must be dead for at least five years before they'll consider renaming an MPA after them. (On top of that, they seem reluctant to rename an MPA for a person regardless.) Because Dr. Bill has not been dead for five years - not even a year yet - our petition was rejected on that basis. So at this point, the move to rename the MPA for Dr. Bill is moot at least until December, 2026.
AN OCEAN UNDER OUR OCEANS? - There's a school of thought - or perhaps curiosity/speculation is a better phrase - that there's actually a lot of water underneath the earth's crust. And recent discoveries have lent some credence to that theory. Read about it here:
THE OCEAN BENEATH US.
And that'll do it for now. Have a great week, I hope you'll join us vicariously/electronically while we're in Indonesia, and let's go diving soon!!!
- Ken
