Date: Christmas Eve: 12-24-07

Time: 12:20

Location: Farthest South Kelp Beds of Pt. Loma: now named ‘Matt’s Reef’

Dive Purpose: Bottom Survey for Possible Sink Site for ‘Ships to Reefs’ Program

Dive Length: 35 mins

Mix: 31%

Max Depth: 103 ft.

Critters Seen: Where do I begin? Giant Spined Starfish, Bat Stars, Fragile Stars, Blood Stars, Rainbow Stars, Lacy Bryozoa, Volcano Sponge, Yellow Sponge, Orange Sponge, Macrocystis, Rockfish, Male and Female Sheephead, Blackmith, Lingcod,
Keyhole Limpets, Chestnut Cowries, Wavy Turbansnails, Kellet’s Whelks, Senoritas, Strawberry Anemones, Aggregating Anemones, Zoanthid Anemones, Urticina mcpeaki, Cup Coral………..sheesh……the list goes on [and on and on and on....]: how much can you remember?

How many people can say that a dive was worth it after: their dry suit became flooded with icy cold sea water, a flooded SPG and an episode of major vertigo at 100 ft? I can, after today.

The day started off auspiciously enough when NOAA JIm met me at the dock at 9 am with a young 16 yr. old in tow, whom he presented to me as ‘Matt’ with the words: “This guy can drive a boat.”

Apparently, his parents own a boat and he’s been around boats all his life and, as we were to find out, knew what he was doing around boats. That was all I needed to hear: I handed him the keys and we never looked back.

[I guess this was Jim's way of telling me he was done with swimming around the dock with his clothes on--who knew?]

So, we stopped for some gas and then were on our way to the first dive site.

The purpose of today’s diving was to scout out some suitable sites to sink warships and/or battle tanks for the San Diego Ships to Reefs Program. As Chair of the Sink Site Committee, it’s my job to recruit smart guys like NOAA Jim to do some of the legwork. Working for NOAA doesn’t hurt either, when it comes to access to bathymetric maps.

First stop was a site directly West of the Mission Bay Channel, about 2 miles, where Jim wanted to survey a site he had seen on his GIS maps, a spot that looked like it had a possible wall which dropped from 85 ft down to 100 ft. which looked promising for a warship.

Because I had felt a virus coming on this morning, but had successfully nuked the congestion with Sudafed, I decided to make only the second survey dive and send Jim and his scooter down to do the first one.

So, with Master Capt. Matt at the helm, we took Jim out to the spot, did a bit of reconnoitering on the surface, and using the GPS, decided on a spot and did a ‘live drop,’ meaning we dropped Jim off at the site, and rather than drop anchor, simply followed his bubbles with the boat and awaited the pre-agreed shooting of the lift bag to locate his position and pick him up.

He made pretty good time with the scooter, with us following behind his bubbles at about 2-3 knots, finally came up to report that it looked like a good site, so we marked it on the GPS and moved on.

I had heard of this second site, in Pt. Loma, which Jim called The Fingers [not to be confused with Three Fingers, which is quite a bit North] before: Jim had been ranting and raving about it for a couple weeks now, but nothing could have prepared me for what a spectacular site it really was.

Capt Matt wove the boat masterfully at 25 knots or so, back and forth between the kelp beds in Pt Loma, until we came to the site, at the very Southern tip of the peninsula. The only thing you could see South of here is the Coronados Islands.

We dropped anchor at the spot as Jim remembered it, using lineups on the hill high above us, and suited up.

After briefing Matt on our diving habits and proper protocol with the marine band radio in case of emergency, we dropped into the 52 F. water, knowing the boat was in good hands.

No sooner had I begun descending than I felt the dreaded trickle of ice cold water down my leg and into my socks. This suit had a leak and a bad one at that. Ironically, I had borrowed it from Barb, forgetting that this had been the suit which we called the ‘Hole in the Butt Suit’ because of the hole that had been burned into it by a halogen light head a few months back.

CRS is getting worse, I see.

Anyway, I remember thinking to myself: “Jim: this site had better be good, because I’m making the decision not abort and to dive in a wet ‘dry suit’ to check it out with you!”

I was not disappointed.

So, with the stream of ice cold water still trickling down my leg, we hit the bottom of the kelp forest at around 70 ft. and headed South on our predetermined route.

The bottom here was classic kelp forest flora and fauna, with all the usual suspects, Senoritas, Sheephead, Rockfish and lots of huge kelp fronds, but nothing really spectacular.

But, we continued heading South, with Jim zooming up ahead on his scooter and the doubling back to make sure I was still following.

Soon, we came to what appeared to be the Southern tip of the reef and it became sand at around 100 ft……….all the way to the Coronados Islands.

I was like: “This is it?” “This is what you brought me down here for in a flooded dry suit for?”

Dude…….

Then, Jim zoomed around me and, with a twinkle in eye, beckoned me to follow him back the way we came, this time on slightly NW heading.

This time we arced around in a slight curve back the way we came and headed back towards the kelp forest.

Next thing I knew I was approaching a wall: a VERY BIG wall: it towered above me as far as I could see in the 20 ft. viz.
I couldn’t believe it…….I had never seen anything this big in Pt. Loma. It dwarfed the pinnacles in Broomtail Reef.

We literally could not see the top of this wall from the bottom at 100 ft.

Unfortunately, because I had made the decision [against my better judgment] to take Sudafed to mask my cold symptoms and dive, the second I looked up to try and visually scale the height of this thing, I was immediately hit with massive attack of vertigo and the entire universe began spinning clockwise at extremely high speed.

Ye olde stomach let me know in no uncertain terms that it wanted to evacuate its contents, like…….RIGHT NOW.

This can be quite unpleasant at 100 ft., especially when combined with a bit of narcosis.

I immediately reached out to grab the wall, looked down and the spinning stopped. Whew! Take my advice: don’t dive with a cold, especially if you’ve taken cold medication for it.

Once I got everything to stop spinning and stopped looking up, I was able to take notice of the wall.

It was the largest thing besides the Yukon I had ever seen underwater: it was alive and glowing with color and just teeming with life.

Giant Spined Starfish, Bat Stars, Fragile Stars, Blood Stars, Rainbow Stars, Lacy Bryozoa, Volcano Sponge, Yellow Sponge, Orange Sponge, Keyhole Limpets, Chestnut Cowries, Wavy Turbansnails, Kellet’s Whelks, Senoritas, Strawberry Anemones, Aggregating Anemones, Zoanthid Anemones, Urticina mcpeaki, Cup Coral…..with Rockfish, male and female Sheephead and schools of Blacksmith patrolling about………it was absolutely gorgeous.

Now I could see what Jim had been ranting about for the past 2 weeks.

It had been worth it.

But, now our problem became how to get around this thing. Obviously, the only way was up.

So, we slowly glided up: 90 ft., 80 ft. 70 ft. and this thing just kept coming.

Finally, at close to 60 ft., we came to the top, which was covered in huge kelp fronds reaching up to the surface, far above.

Just as we crested the top, we saw a huge Lingcod just sitting there, eyeing us warily.

This guy was nearly a meter long.

Jim arced around in his scooter and came straight at it, video camera running…..whereupon, it seemed to leap up and zoom off into the distance, with Jim in hot pursuit…….I had to laugh. Good luck catching him!

Unfortunately, by now the leaky butt in my dry suit had become nearly a flood, and both feet were now filling up with ice cold water, hampering my ability to fin forward and I realized it was time to begin heading toward the boat and end the dive, so I signaled Jim with my light that I was heading back to the boat.

I made the mistake of taking a final look upward towards the surface, to gauge where the boat might be, and once again was hit with massive spinning and vertigo. This time, had nothing to grab onto, except the kelp fronds around me.

This time, I decided enough was enough, and when the spinning stopped, I headed back on original course we were on towards the boat. It was a shame I couldn’t linger in this underwater paradise, but I had issues to deal with and I had already decided we would return later in the week.

Luckily for us, our heading led us right back to the anchor chain and I was able to complete my safety stop without further incident–by being careful not to look up!

Back on the boat, Jim and I ranted and raved to Matt about how beautiful the wall had been and agreed we would name it in Matt’s honor, for having done such a good job as boat capt.

Once back onboard, I saw how badly my suit had been flooded: the feet made the dreaded ‘sloshing’ sound when I walked and when I took it off, about a quart of cold sea water came pouring out of the feet. Whew! It sure felt good to get out of that suit!

Naturally, back at the marina, Matt made a perfect entry with the boat into the slip [backwards]….first time……. and then looked over to us as if to say, “What was so hard about that?”

I can’t stand it.

But, minor mishaps aside, it was truly a gorgeous day in paradise, both underwater and above, with sunny skies and glassy flat seas and we plan to return again as soon as we can.

Happy Holidays, all……….and dive safe……oh, and, please……..take it from me: don’t dive on cold medicine when you have a cold!

Mikey