Video: Back to the Two Towers (McAbee)

[Gombessa]

Whether it was time to expand beyond our regular Point Lobos boundaries, or the fact that we missed out on grabbing reservations, we pulled up at McAbee beach on Saturday. Conditions were mostly calm, and surprisingly, quite sunny.

Our plan was to head out to Hopkins out in front of the Aquarium, and revisit the Two Towers, the MBA seawater intakes; and afterwards to head north to about 70' depth to check out a small reef covered in metridium.

It was a pretty spooky dive, with viz going from 10ft to 25ft and back again, often quite abruptly. This really makes the Towers a spooky place to visit, but it's really quite atmospheric. To add to it, we swam past a few drawn-and-quartered molas, and were repeatedly dive-bombed silently by big, big sea lions.

On our way back, we were greeted by an extremely playful harbor seal; the little guy went straight for the scooters and pawed all over them. It was pretty amazing, and quite obvious where his entire attention was. The encounter is at 1:30 if you want to skip ahead:

[video=youtube;1ENOlGZJ7Dc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ENOlGZJ7Dc&feature=g-crec-u[/video]

 

[g1138]

Bunny!!!!!
Also what's a pola?

 

[Gombessa]

Bunny!!!!!

I feel we are kindred spirits, you and I.

Also what's a pola?

Drat, I did say pola. I meant ebola. Or Saffola. Mmmmmm, sunflower oil...

 

[andrewy]

I really i mean really want a seal for a pet.. can i have one from this movie? Every time one plays with me i never have camera.

 

[fdog]

Very nice as usual!

My 650 has the "P-40 sharks teeth"; seals will see these and bare their own teeth at the Cuda, and occasionally blow bubbles at it! Too cool.


All the best, James

 

[TSandM]

What a memorable encounter -- I'm glad you had the camera and could share it with us.

We simply have to get back down to Monterey. Every time I see video from there, I wish I were there, diving.

 

[Drewpy]

Nice..just like a kitty kat with a scratch under the chin. I have never been able to touch one...
Look forward to more with the new "x-mas" present!

How far out are the towers Ken?

 

[Gombessa]

Very nice as usual!
My 650 has the "P-40 sharks teeth"; seals will see these and bare their own teeth at the Cuda, and occasionally blow bubbles at it! Too cool.

Now that's a great reason for scooter graphics. I now have an idea to draw a seal face on a plastic plate and stick it on the front of the scooter!

We simply have to get back down to Monterey. Every time I see video from there, I wish I were there, diving.

Just avoid this weekend, it looks like we're due for 20ft swells!

Nice..just like a kitty kat with a scratch under the chin. I have never been able to touch one...
Look forward to more with the new "x-mas" present!

How far out are the towers Ken?

I've been touched by the seals plenty of times, but honestly I'm afraid for my fingers so I don't extend my hand towards them. Steve and August are far more bold.

The Two Towers are out at the end of Hopkins Reef, directly out from the Aquarium. If you go out to McAbee and look west at the two small white buoys, they're just about there at about 50ft depth (you'll run into the two huge pipes along the ground that head back into the Aquarium, I think they repurposed sardine loading pipes for the towers. It's a long but doable kick in doubles.

 

[g1138]

Hopkins is the best site to get cuddly harbor seals. There's sci divers from the marine station that frequent Hopkin beach all the time, so the seals are well used to us. I don't know of a single dive I've had there where I haven't encounters a friendly seal; and that's 8 for 8. Entering from the beach you can usually get a captive audience to escort you in and out. But you have to be affiliated with the station to dive off the beach.

You can sneak in with scooters or off one of the dive boats if they anchor @ Hopkins Middle Reef. Just don't touch anything that remotely looks man-made, it might be an experiment or recording device.

 

[Gombessa]

While I'm a little hesitant to suggest it, Hopkins is easily reachable with doubles if you're kicking from McAbee (easy only because the approach is quite shallow, and if you plan you gas reserves, you can have a 2.5-3 hour dive with a 30ft avg depth). We've also kayak-dived it from Breakwater, anchoring outside of the boundaries, which is a bit of a paddle but super-mellow. In fact, every time we ascended during this dive, we ran into curious kayakers who wanted to know what was underneath them.

The entire stretch from McAbee to Hopkins is fantastic for seal encounters. I don't recall if we have a 100% hit rate, but it's certainly more-often-than-not, and if anyone comes around looking specifically for harbor seals, McAbee Beach is where we point them every time.