Date: 7-29-09
Time: 8:30 pm-ish
Location: La Jolla Shores, North Lot
Surface Conditions: 1-3 ft. surf; nothing unmanageable
Viz: 12-15 ft at depth/~8 ft. in shallows
Temp: Warm on surface: +/-70 F/ +/- 55 F at depth [sorry: forgot to look]
Mix: 27%
Max Depth: 118 ft.
Dive Length: 56 mins
Current: noticeable Northerly current
Overall Group: Prof. Charles, Merrianne, Dave H.
Dive Buddies: Prof. Charles, Merrianne, Dave H.
Marine Life Seen: Numerous Octos, Scorpionfish, Bat Rays, Round Rays, Decorator Crabs, Spotted Cusk Eels, Sea Pansies, Sea Pens, Lizardfish, Thornback Rays, Macrocystis
Inanimate Objects Seen: lots and lots of trash, plastic bags, cups and two golf balls retrieved
Photos: pending upload by Dave H
Highlights:
–due to having been cold on a recent Yukon dive, I stupidly ‘overdressed’ last night under my dry suit, adding a vest to an already thick liner and spent most of the dive sweating and fighting off the urge to crack a wrist seal ‘just a tiny bit’ to let in some cool water….
–as mentioned above, we ended up in some sort of ‘trash dump’ in our unsuccessful search for ‘Secret Garden’ and naturally, I had forgotten to bring my ‘trash bag,’ so I ended up futilely trying to pick up every Styrofoam cup and piece of plastic by hand, before finally giving up and settling on the two golf balls I had come across. I really hate coming across these underwater trash dumps at 115 ft.
–oddly, the flat layers Macrocystis here were covered with a strange white fungus—I need to contact someone at SIO or Birch and find out what this white stuff is. The flat layers of Macrocystis provided a thick, layered home to lots of marine life, such as Coonstripe Shrimp and Octopi…..
–on the way back up into the shallows, came across a really cute little Decorator Crab, complete with green algae and barnacles growing out of him—am hoping Dave’s photos of him came out
–spotted 2 Bat Rays: one large adult and one juvenile, on our way back into the shallows
Summary:
Despite the overheating and the omnipresent trash, nonetheless, it was an excellent dive!
Dive safe, everyone……
