Dives 2008
Dives 2007
Dives 2006
Dives 2005
Dives 2004:
Okinawa, Japan 12/20
Poling and Burnham Ledge 12/18
Burnham and Saturday Night Ledges 11/21
Magnolia Rocks 10/10
The U-853 10/02
Wreck of the Pinthis 09/26
Poling and Burnham Ledge 09/11
Gun Rock Beach 09/01
Pebble Beach 08/29
Night wreck dive on Poling 08/18
Sandwich Town Beach 08/01
Canoe Beach 07/24
Tri-state wreck rodeo 07/16-18
Folly Cove 07/18
Nubble Light 07/10
Wreck of the Romance, redux 07/03
Wreck of the Romance 06/26
Gloucester night dives 06/19
Folly Cove night dive 06/16
Paddock Rock and Kettle Island 06/12
Monterey, CA (June)
Magnolia Rocks 05/16
Pebble Beach night dive 05/13
Halibut Point 05/01
Folly Cove 04/19
Winter wreck dives 02/22
Magnolia Rocks 01/11
Dives 2003
Dives 2002
Dives 2001
Dives 2000
Dives 1999
Okinawa, Japan
Divers:
Location: Okinawa, Japan
Just a few days before Christmas, I went diving in Okinawa, Japan. In
Okinawa is still warm during December with an average air temperature of
20 C. The water is also very warm and one can easily dive with just a 5mm
wet suit. The diving spot I went was located at the north west of the
island Okinawa-honto, the biggest island of the complex. My diving buddy
was a very friendly Okinawan guy called Nema. We went for a late afternoon
dive in a windy and cloudy day. We entered very easily from the sandy
beach. The visibility was quite low because the wind was agitating the
sandy bottom. On our way to a coral reef we saw huge algae and sea
cucumbers that Nema could not help but point out with hand sign that were
delicious to eat! After wandering around for a while we reached the coral
reef. I was captivated by the amazingly beautiful fish with bright colors,
bizarre patterns, and funny shapes. Some of the fish we saw were: emperor
angelfish, big-whistle long-nosed butterflyfish, long-fin bannerfish,
reed-screen oriental betturflyfish. Schools of redfin fusiler and pyramid
butterflyfish were passing by as well. There were also many soft corals,
and sea anemones inhabited of course by cute little clown fish. It was a
very enjoyable moment to be surrounded by all these gorgeous fish and feed
them fish sausage (I have to admit, very typical of a tourist). Having
been diving for four years just in the cold waters of the North East US
Coast, off New England, this dive was quite a different experience. Diving
in Okinawa was absolutely fun and I highly recommend it if you happen to be
around there.
- Effie
Poling and Burnham Ledge
Divers:
John Armstrong, Chris Russo, and I went out on the Cape Ann Divers boat
last Saturday for our "start-of-winter" dives. I thought we'd have a roomy
trip on a near-empty boat, but there were a total of 10 divers, so we
couldn't sprawl out much. We picked a good day, with brilliant sunshine,
no wind, and absolutely dead flat water. Air temperature was around
freezing, and the water was 6 C (43 F). Our first dive was on the wreck of
the Poling, followed by nearby Burnham Ledge. Chris and I were diving on
single tanks with pony bottles, and John had his gargantuan double 120's.
(When John gets these filled, the global atmospheric pressure actually
dips.) Everyone on the boat was diving dry, and one diver even had a
closed-circuit rebreather.
When we got to the Poling, the captain hooked in to the stern mooring after
noting that the other mooring (near the broken end) was missing. Someone
beat us into the water this time, so when we got down to the deck, we found
a thick silt cloud obscuring everything, and a wreck reel line heading
toward the bow. We had been planning to make a short penetration into the
engine room at the start of our dive, but decided against it due to the
obscured visibility. Instead we headed along the starboard gunwale up to
the broken end, where Chris and I had devised a plan to try and dislodge
the lobster that lives in a broken pipe there. Chris confirmed that the
lobster was there, and then I took out my knife and used the butt end to
bang on the pipe. We were sure that the dumb crustacean would just pop out
into our clutches, but I guess he's not so dumb. We succeeded in turning
the pipe's interior into a thick silt brew, with no lobster in sight.
Curses, Red Baron. Wait until next time. We swam back toward the stern,
me along the port gunwale, and Chris and John along the central catwalk.
When I got to the area in the stern with the hatches into the engine room,
I found the silt had abated, and I thought maybe we could try a very quick
penetration. I turned around and saw John and Chris fiddling with
something, and then for some reason they started swimming along an existing
reel line toward the bow. Chris and I, being on single tanks, were nearing
the end of our dive, so I couldn't figure out why they were heading away
from the ascent line. I followed right behind them, all the way back to
the broken end. They were swimming really fast, and seemed to be
disoriented. Then I saw Chris point out the forward mooring line to John,
and they headed over to it. But this was not the correct line, and
somewhere along its length it was broken, because the captain hadn't been
able to find it on the surface. But I knew that John had a lift bag, and
the surface was dead calm with no wind anyway, and with all their
experience, they would be fine. But did I want to go up the wrong ascent
line too? Well, let's see. I have 1200 psi left in my Alum 80, and I'm
completely at the wrong end of the ~180 ft long wreck. But I have swum
the length of the deck a zillion times, and I know exactly where the stern
mooring is, so I headed to that line. I still had 1000 psi when I get
there, leaving plenty for a good safety stop. I surfaced at the same time
as John and Chris, who had an easy swim back to the boat. Back on deck, I
found out that John had experienced a leak in his primary reg, and he and
Chris might want to write up another e-mail with more details.
The second dive was at Burham Ledge. I had just been here the previous
month (for the first time), and at that time I had found a monstrous, but
dead lobster with one giant claw. So we took some lobstering gear with us,
just in case. I attached a wreck reel line to the end of the mooring chain
just under the big boulder, and we headed off toward the east along the
narrow canyon. I pointed out some of the 13-armed sun stars. (John
insists they had only 12 arms). We also saw some small lobsters and a
number of sleeping/comatose sculpin. We got down to 33.5 m (110 ft). Last
month in these canyons I ended up with a decompression obligation, and I
wanted to avoid that. So we turned around a little early and I began
reeling up the line. I got it all reeled up with no snags...I'm getting
pretty good at this. Back at the boulder we found the missing giant claw of
the monster lobster. John made some precise measurements, and then we
threw it in Chris's bag. I took it back up to the boat to show everybody.
Although they were duly impressed, the stench was overpowering and the claw
was quickly returned to the depths. Chris and John continued exploring the
canyons for a few more minutes before joining me on the sunny, calm deck.
After getting back to the dock, we all headed for some chowda' at the
restaurant across from the marina. What a great way to relax after a day
of diving, warm up, and shoot the breeze!
- Robert
On the first dive, while we were making our way back to the stern, I had
stopped above the stern-most set of engine room hatches, and after shining
my light inside and seeing that it looked pretty silt-free down to the
second level, I decided to duck in for a few minutes. Just then, John got
my attention and pointed out a problem with his primary second-stage - it
seemed to have developed a leak between the hose and second-stage. Through
a remarkable coincidence, I had just swapped my old primary hose for a
5-foot hose, so I wasn't worried about sharing air if need be, but while I
kept an eye on John he fiddled with the reg for a minute and eventually
shut down his right post first stage, which surprised me as I thought that
he would just close his isolator valve, but the problem seemed to be
contained. In any case, I figured that since we didn't know if the problem
would return, we'd just as soon get to the surface. While John was fixing
his reg, we had gotten turned around a bit, so I was a little mixed up as
to where we were. In any case, when I saw a reel line, I knew it probably
had to go back to the mooring, but when we followed it, we wound up at the
break instead (we'd followed it the wrong way), and at that point, I
pointed out the mooring on the port side aft of the break and suggested we
just go up that one. I had a bag and reel with me as well, and I had
thought about shooting an upline from the deck, but the problem didn't seem
to be immediate enough to warrant that. Besides, I knew with the surface
conditions as benign as they were, a short swim back to the boat would be
easy.
John and I ascended that line up to about 40 feet, where we found that the
line didn't go all the way to the surface, so we grabbed the old float line
and did a Jack and the Beanstalk impression to the surface and had a short
swim back to the boat. So, in retrospect, I should have been aware a bit
more of exactly where we were on the wreck. I had been coming off a bad
cold that day and had generally felt a little discombobulated
underwater. I was not, as they say, ready for the varsity last Saturday.
The second dive was a bit less eventful, although the visibility at Burnham
wasn't as good as I remember it being in the past. Robert's story about
Lobzilla was no lie, as I saw the claw with my own eyes. I decided to
extend my dive a bit with John, and ended up incurring a few minutes of
deco time, which extended by a few minutes to be on the safe
side. Overall, a couple of good dives to end the year. I was also glad
that I had put a long hose on my second stage - it certainly made me much
more comfortable about donating my reg and still being able to maneuver
underwater.
- Chris
Burnham and Saturday Night Ledges
Divers:
This past Sunday I went out with Cape Ann Divers to two sites that I hadn't
done previously. The weather was heavily overcast and dark, a little
chilly on deck (low 40's F), with long swells rocking the boat. Despite
being late November, the boat was packed with 12 divers, including several
police divers. (Maybe it was crowded because the previous weekend's
charters were all cancelled due to the snowstorm.) Looking around the
boat, there were plenty of doubles, argon bottles, and HID canister lights.
I was diving on air, with a pony bottle, the club's dive computer and
wreck reel, and I was doing my first drysuit dives since last spring. All
the others were diving dry as well. You could tell that everyone was very
experienced because all 12 were ready to jump into the water even before
the boat had finished tying up to the mooring.
The first dive was on Burnham Ledge, which is a few miles south of Gloucester
harbor, not far from the Poling. I had first heard about this site from
dive reports by Mike Hobbs and Peter Kerrebrock a couple of months ago.
It's a narrow "canyon" in the rock shelf that's oriented east-west,
with other spur canyons running off of the main crevasse, which are easy to
get lost in. If you follow the canyon to the east, the depths can go pretty
deep. I came down the mooring line to a big boulder, and I tied in
my wreck reel line to the base of the chain under the boulder. Under that
rock I spotted an absolutely MONSTROUS lobster. Easily 3 feet long, with
massive carapace and claw...the kind that you see mounted on the wall of
seafood restaurants. I wasn't lobstering today (not easy to do with
a wreck reel and light), but I wanted to hold it anyway, so I carefully
grabbed onto it. It's lack of response told me that it was dead. It
couldn't have been dead for long though, since nothing had started eating
it. Anyway, I put it on top of the boulder to give the other divers a
thrill, and then I starting to explore several side canyons and eventually
went down the deep end of the main canyon. The wreck reel ensured that I
would be able to return to the mooring line. I've been practicing my reel
skills and I had no problems at all with entanglement of the reel or
myself. The most amazing sight were numerous large starfish with 13 arms!
Yes, 13 arms. These are called sun stars on the west coast, but I have
never seen them on the east coast until now. There were also several
fish that I'm still trying to identify in my sealife books, as well as some
pretty good-sized (live) lobsters. My max depth was 29.2 m (96 ft), and
the water temperature was 8 C (46 F), so a drysuit wasn't really necessary,
at least underwater. Visibility was pretty good, maybe 20 feet, even
though the skies were really dark.
The second dive was just a few minutes away at Saturday Night Ledge. This
site is very similar to Burnham Ledge, with a canyon that goes even deeper.
This really should have been the first dive. I made my descent after a
60-minute surface interval, and I started exploring the deep end of the
canyon. The sealife was very similar to Burnham Ledge. Max depth was 36 m
(118 ft), and the same water temp as before. Even at these depths, with
the dark skies, I could still see fairly well without having my light on.
I had to keep an eye on my dive computer to avoid building up a significant
decompression obligation. Because of that, I had to start my ascent even
though I had a good amount of air still left in my tank. So I did an
extra-long stop at 5 m on the hang bar. Back on deck, we noticed two
groups of divers who surfaced some distance away from the boat. They had
not used wreck reels while they hunted around for lobsters, and
consequently they got lost, couldn't find the mooring line, and had to do
free ascents. I'd like to go lobstering the next time I do these ledges,
but I'd definitely want a buddy with a wreck reel.
- Robert G.
Magnolia Rocks
Divers:
Louie and I arrived at Magnolia Rocks around 9am and observed relatively
calm conditions. It was our first time diving the site. High tide was set
for 9:19am so we took a fair bit of time to study the dive site and figure
out the best entry point. We decided to enter just to the left of the
footpath. Louie and I went in first and wisely counseled a quick swim
beyond the surf line. At bit challenging getting in but given the very
short surface swim it was worth the effort. Overall we think we chose a
wide entry and exit point.
Louie and I went down about 30 yards off the rocks and proceeded to start
our tour of the dive site. Visibility was excellent at about 20 feet and we
were able to have a very comfortable dive without being on top of each
other. There was a tremendous amount of life. Very large crags, stripers,
and a variety of other assorted fish. We brought our bags and tickle sticks
so spent a fair bit of the dive hunting for lobsters. Overall the haul was
very successful: five keepers with three of them being of above average
size. We also had to throw back 2 huge females due to eggs not to mention
many more 'close ones'.
Our lessons from this dive include:
- Go at high tide. Louie and I went to Magnolia rocks at low tide last
weekend and were dissuaded by the entry.
- Don't stray to far from a successful lobstering area. We caught all our
keepers within 15 minutes of each other.
Dive time: 72 minutes
- John P. Hebert
Wreck of the U-853
Divers:
This past Saturday morning Carl Stjernfeldt, Chris Russo and myself made a
trip out to the U-853, about 9 miles south of Point Judith, RI. We all
agreed to write it up, so while my memory of the dives is still clear,
here's what I saw:
This promised to be one of the highlights of the '04 wreck diving season,
and it was. The U-853 is one of the last German submarines sunk in combat
in WWII, actually being destroyed after the official cessation of
hostilities in Europe, and within hours of Germany's surrender. It is a
fascinating and tragic story well worth reading up on (there is lots to be
found on the web).
The day before the trip, the boat operator let Chris (the organizer) know
that a rival boat would also be going to the U-boat that morning, with a
6:00 am departure from New London CT. Determined to get there first (so
the inside wouldn't be silted up), we set off from the Boston area around
4:00 am, Chris and I car pooling and Carl driving down alone. Carl's
frequent cell phone calls kept us awake (fortunately) as we discussed the
heavy fog on the drive down. We arrived in Quonochontaug on the south
coast of RI at 6:00 am and began loading the boat in the dark. As the sky
began to brighten we could see we were in a salt pond ringed by marshes
full of herons, cormorants, and bait fish splashing about on the flat calm
water. Wisps of the morning fog still hung in the marshes, but it looked
like it was going to be a clear day. Departing the dock about 20 minutes
later we crossed the salt pond to a breachway into Block Island sound. The
sea was nearly calm with only a gentle swell from the south. The ride out
looked to be about an hour to the south east, so we set up our tanks and
napped for a while. With a mile to go, we could see the rival boat about
two miles back and coming fast, so we picked one of two moorings, and got
ready for the first dive. It wasn't even 8:00 am yet. Chris and I were
diving dry on air, Carl was semi-dry with nitrox.
We figured the mooring attached somewhere around the conning tower, so the
plan was for Chris and I to enter the blast hole forward of the conning
tower, and travel aft to the blast hole in the aft torpedo room, where we
would meet Carl who would swim over the outside, then see the rest of the
stern before going back to the mooring. Planned bottom time was 15
minutes, with a maximum depth of 130 ft. The mooring ended up being tied
off to the aft gun mount, so we had to swim forward around the conning
tower before Chris and I entered. Carl turned around and swam aft. I was
immediately struck by the deterioration of the wreck on the inside and out,
comparing it to the way it looked to me 18 years ago when I first saw
it. In the control room the planesman's wheels have completely rotted
away, and what was once a wall of valves is now a lumpy mass of
rust. Passing into the engine room the diesels are badly corroded, and
everything is losing definition as a recognizable piece of machinery. The
same can be said of the motor control panels in the next compartment
aft. In the aft torpedo room we saw Carl's signature blue beam of light
coming down on us through the hatch, so we knew he'd arrived. Together we
swam aft over the stern to see that the last 10 feet or so of the wreck has
broken off and is laying on the bottom. Descending to the sand, I could
still see the twin rudders jabbing into the bottom behind the twisted metal
of the stern, and was surprised to see the aft torpedo tube shutter doors
are missing, as is the port tube muzzle door. Poking from the muzzle end
of the tube is the warhead of a torpedo, with the exploder mechanism
missing! It clearly was removed by a diver, and I have a hunch it was
Billy Palmer (something of a legend in the context of this wreck). With
time running out, we swam back to the mooring, and made our obligatory stops.
During the 1 1/2 hour long surface interval several other boats pulled up
and tied off, with divers of varying experience levels (Chris can tell that
story). For our second dive we descended to the gun mount and swam forward
around the starboard side of the conning tower to see the snorkel mast
where it is still folded into the deck. From there we swam over the deck
toward the bow, to find the second big surprise. The forward deck of the
bow has partly collapsed and slumps to the port side, partially covering
the torpedo shutter doors on that side. And the last 6 feet or so of the
bow is broken off completely and laying on it side on the bottom. Chris
had been anticipating the "Das Boot moment" of viewing the profile of the
bow while standing on the bottom, and was disappointed. Swimming around to
the starboard side of the bow I saw the anchor is now missing, but the
torpedo tube formerly named "Hannelore" (the name painted on the breach
door by the sub's crew until Billy Palmer took that, too) is still open and
empty...did it fire the torpedo that sunk the Black Point? With time
running low, we headed back along the bow, but I couldn't resist trying to
squeeze into the square hatch above the crew's quarters to see if I could
still fit. I did get in, but a stern look from Chris reminded me of the
time so I came back out the same way I went in, and we swam back to the gun
mount. The hang was longer this time, with Chris and I doing 14 minutes on
oxygen at 10 feet, Carl got to go up early. Sometime during this hang
Chris saw something go amiss with one of the other groups using that
mooring, but since I was facing the other way, I missed the whole
thing. As a treat, a tropical fish with black and white stripes kept us
company during the hang.
The water temperature for both dives was in the high 50's on the bottom and
in the 60's on the surface. The vis was in the 20 foot range but a little
better on the second dive, since it was approaching high water. This was a
really enjoyable dive!
- Peter
As it turned out, we left at the right time, since as we arrived at the
wreck, we saw the other boat at full throttle about a mile off our
stern. Just beat them there! We grabbed the mooring at the aft gun mount
and suited up. Conditions, especially given the stories I'd heard, were
just about perfect. Almost no chop, only a slight current, and good
visibility. We suited up, diving as a threesome, and dropped down the
line. We hit a layer of bad vis on the way down, but it opened up to about
20 feet by the time we hit the deck at 109 feet. For me, one of the best
parts of diving is falling down the line, and seeing the wreck finally come
into view beneath me. We got our bearings, and we swam around the conning
tower to the forward blast hole above the captain's quarters. (Note: I
would not have even considered doing a deep penetration on my first dive on
the wreck had I not studied the boat's layout from plans and an extremely
helpful video that Peter had shot years before - I even memorized the
shapes and positions of every hatch and compartment on the way through the
wreck.)
We dropped into the captains quarters and headed aft into the circular
hatch into the control room. My first thought was that I was amazed that
fifty men lived in such a small space for months at a time - it's really
quite cramped. The control room has really decayed from the time when
Peter shot his video - I saw and the helmsman's wheels are missing,
although I did see a length of hose that appears to be recent and might be
from a dredging operation. The periscope well is quite large and requires
a trip to one side or the other, and I swam around the port side of the
tower into the engine room. The valve trains on the diesels are exposed,
and give a narrow passage in between. I saw the toolbox on the ground as
well. This was probably the only area that felt a little cramped - there
were about a million things on the diesels on which to catch hoses and
such, but I continued on to the electric motor room. I had a bit of a
silt-out following Peter through there, but it wasn't too bad - I just put
one hand on the switches on the wall (which had lost their handles) and one
hand in front of me and swam using the braille method of diving into the
torpedo room, where we saw an old air compressor that was still
recognizable. Carl also helpfully shone his HID light as a beacon for us -
thanks, Carl! (One side effect of diving with these two guys and their
lights was that I would get retina burn every time they accidentally turned
their lights in my direction...)
We continued to the stern, which unfortunately had broken off, and at that
point we had used up our bottom time of fifteen minutes and headed back to
the gun mount for an uneventful ascent. I deployed my jonline during the
hang, but I think Carl was getting annoyed as he kept getting caught in it,
so I reeled it back in. Depth was 122 feet, at a balmy 55 degrees.
On the second dive, we headed for the bow, which had broken off,
unfortunately depriving me of my "Das Boot" moment looking up at the bow
from the sand. Much of the latticework underlying the decking has become
exposed and is now exposed. We swam around the torpedo tubes and the
diving planes where we hit a max of 125 feet. On the way back, Carl headed
to the tie-in, which Peter and I hovered around the enlisted quarters
hatch. He began to try to squeeze in, at which point I tried to
telepathically convey the message that we _really_ needed to get going, as
our deco time was building rapidly at this point, but I remembered Pete
mentioning that he had wanted to see if he still fit, which he did. Once
we got back to the line at about 16 minutes, we were about ten feet off the
deck, when I saw two wetsuited (who obviously were in over their heads)
divers from the boat that had tied off to our stern dropping like a rock
onto the deck, both sculling madly with their hands and not holding on to
the line. Uh-oh - that looked like a situation that was going to end badly...
I didn't have enough gas to stick around and help, so we continued up to a
20 foot stop, at which point we saw an enormous cloud of bubbles coming
from the wreck. I thought of the fatality on the Poling a few years ago
where a reg freeflowed at depth, and thought this might be a similar
situation. A few minutes later, as we were ending our 20 foot stop, one of
the wetsuited divers went absolutely _flying_ up through the water column,
off the line, about 12 feet to Peter's right, although Peter was looking
the other way and didn't see him. I figured that the diver was going to
embolize or go for a chamber ride, a fear that I thought was coming true
when I heard two boat engines start a few minutes later. We still had 15
minutes to sit out at 10 feet on pure oxygen, during which I saw some neat
ctenophora. As it turns out, our captain had hauled in this panicked diver
(like "a giant tuna" was the phrase he used) and administered oxygen, and
the gods smiled on this knucklehead and he managed not to get bent or worse.
In any case, barring some last minute dark-horse candidate, these two dives
are probably in the running for my best dives of the year. We'll have to
do it again soon!
- Chris
Wreck of the Pinthis
Divers:
We headed out from Scituate (have I mentioned how nice it is to leave a
dock near my house?) on Sunday morning to dive the wreck of the Pinthis, a
coastal gasoline tanker that sank in a collision in 1930 about four miles
off shore. Conditions were just about perfect, and we had a nice ride
out. After finding the mooring on the wreck missing, the captain dropped
his anchor on top of the wreck and we suited up. Since we weren't 100%
sure that we were actually on the wreck, Robert and I splashed first and
Peter followed a few minutes later. Our plan was to ensure that we were
indeed hooked, or if not, to run a line to the wreck from the anchor, or,
failing that, come back up and yell at the captain.
The water was a little murky near the surface, but the wreck came into
sight as we dropped down the line and we hit the wreck at about 85
feet. As it turned out, we were hooked in right at the bow, so I used the
old trick of bringing a small plastic bottle that I released as a surface
marker to signal the boat that we were hooked.
While we waited for Peter to descend, Robert and I poked around the bow for
while and found visibility as good as 30 feet, and a turtled wreck that was
fairly intact. There were some huge holes caused by hull plates rusting
off that we swam into and found ourselves inside some huge interior spaces
that my lights didn't have a chance of filling. Near the bow, we found one
of the massive anchor chains in the hawse and chain locker. Peter came
down the line, and we headed along the port side of the wreck to the
stern. About amidships, Robert had to turn back to the line, but Peter and
I were doing one long dive on doubles, so we continued on. RSG will have
to report what else he found. We made it to the stern, where we found what
was left of the rudder and the intact prop shaft, although the prop itself
had been salvaged. The stern was in worse shape than the bow. Continuing
on, we poked around inside the tanks, which were some of the largest
interior spaces I've seen on wrecks. There was a fair amount of
monofilament around, and at least once I managed to get my light caught but
was able to free it without any cutting. Inside the wreck there were a
number of spare parts, including some massive valves.
Continuing on to the bow along the starboard side, we found the other
anchor chain leading out into the sand, and after following the "chain to
nowhere" for a while, we realized that it was turning into a really long
swim and headed back to come up the line. (One theory was that this was
the other end of the anchor chain in Woods Hole - it certainly seemed long
enough.) We came up the line, and after a 15 foot deco stop, during which
I saw Mike and Linnea ascend, came back onto the boat. Total dive time
for me was 61 minutes at 105 feet, with probably a little more than 30
minutes of bottom time. A good dive, and one I certainly wouldn't mind
doing again, although I don't think I'd make this one a "regular."
Robert and Dan were the only ones who did a second dive, during which I
think they made a beeline for the stern, and we all enjoyed a nice boat
ride back to Scituate.
- Chris
I was diving with a single 80 ft3 tank (plus pony bottle), so after
we explored around for a while inside the wreck, I only had enough nitrox
left to make it halfway to the stern with Chris and Peter (both of whom had
double tanks). So during the surface interval I listened carefully to
their reports about the stern area, and on the 2nd dive, Daniel and I
immediately made a beeline along the keel all the way to the stern. The
ship is somewhat longer than the Poling. When we got to the stern, we
dropped down to the sand and found the rudder, but I couldn't identify
anything that looked like a propeller driveshaft sticking out of the stern
area. We traveled back towards the bow along the port gunwale/sand
interface, checking under all the dispersed hull plates for some lobsters
that Peter had reported seeing, but we didn't find any. There were,
however, lots of flounder all over the wreck. I even saw a flounder inside
the wreck that was in the act of chewing on some food.
Back at the bow we relocated the anchor/ascent line (the visibility was
incredibly good). Since we were the last divers on the wreck, the captain
had asked us to make sure that his anchor would come free easily. So by
hand, I unhooked the anchor from the wreck, and then put it back. It was
so loose that I figured there's no chance that it won't release again. But
after we got back on board, the captain performed some maneuver to retrieve
the anchor, but the anchor line ended up snapping and we lost the anchor.
I'm wondering if I should have just unhooked the anchor and left it free,
but I don't know if it would have made our ascent and safety stop more
difficult.
- Robert
- Peter
Poling and Burnham Ledge
Divers:
A beautiful Saturday afternoon on the water with Cape Ann Divers, sunny,
air temps in the low 70s. The captain/divemaster had mentioned some big
swells early in the morning and it was the same in the afternoon, I
pretty much spent the entire time on the boat leaning over the side, I'm
sure you all know what I was doing. :-) Next time I'll take some
medication long before I get on the boat.
The first dive was to the Chester Poling, my guess on visibility was
10-15', water temp was low 50's. Lisa, David and myself were diving wet,
everyone else was diving dry. We descended down the mooring line that
brings you to the section of the ship where it broke in two. I haven't
checked my dive computer, but, it was around 80' to the deck. Lisa and I
went along the top of the deck/catwalk and back, while Nikolai was taking
pictures and Peter and Chris went inside. I'm not sure where David was
at this point. This was my second time at the Poling and there seemed to
be a lot more fish than I remembered, maybe I was just swimming slower
and not scaring them all away. As I'm not up on my Marine biology I
really can't say what we saw, but you can see some of Nikolai's pictures
here:
http://ase.tufts.edu/scuba/reports/2004-09-11/
As I'm still a new diver and I was trying to take pictures myself, I
sucked my air down a lot faster than my dive buddy (sorry Lisa) and had
to surface after making one full pass of the deck. After getting back on
the boat, I spent the rest of the time hanging over the side and waiting
for the rest of the divers to come up. My bottom time was 21 minutes.
The surface interval was a little more than an hour and then we went back
in for our second dive, this time at Burnhams Ledge (about a 10-15 minute
boat ride from the Poling). This site is a little deeper and a little
colder than the Poling. Burnhams Ledge is a canyon that runs East-West
with other canyons that break off of the main canyon, unless you have a
wreck reel I don't recommend wandering to far off as it's easy to get
lost. The mooring line brings you to 80'-85', you then can start to swim
East or West. I could have this wrong, but I think the divemaster said
East brings you to about 55' and West to 140', but it could be the other
way around. I got a max depth of 91' on this dive. Visibility about the
same as the Poling, certainly not as good as when Nikolai and I dove this
site the first time, we had a vis of about 40', of course no one believes
us. ha ha ;-) I didn't see as much sea life this time as at the Poling
but overall it was still a nice dive. Lisa and I returned to the mooring
line just as the rest of the group was coming down. We went up to the
boat, I went to my usual position leaning over the side waiting for
everyone to return, and it was a long ride back in, at least for me.
Other than getting sea sick both dives went well and I look forward to
getting back to the Poling again soon. I'm not sure how Peter and
Chris's wreck penetration went so I'll let one of them give the details
on that.
- Mike
Gun Rock Beach, Hull
Divers:
On Wednesday night, we were both itching to get in the water, preferably
somewhere local, so after meeting at Peter's house, we decided to try Gun
Rock Beach in Hull for a night dive, a place that neither of us had been
before.
After we found the site, it looked like a perfect spot for a night dive
(lights of Boston in the distance, easy entry, calm water, etc.) except for
the fact that it seemed like all the parking was resident-only. After a
local generously offered to let us park in his driveway (Don't know what
planet he was from, but we need to find more people like him!) we suited up
and headed in. We were both diving dry, and with the water temperature a
balmy 63, I was even a little too warm, even with my thinnest undergarmet.
We got in the water around 8:45 and started out swimming north towards Gun
Rock, and the dive was, for a short time, a candidate for Season's Most
Boring - just about 10 feet of water and sand. Once we hit the rock
though, we were able to drop down to about 20 feet and begin
circumnavigating the rock, which was much like a bona-fide wall dive, and
which had a circumference of about 150 meters. Two words: Bug
Central. Even though lobsters are nocturnal and you always see a lot more
at night, this site had to have had one of the highest concentrations of
them in one place that I've seen in some time. Plenty of ones that would
have been legal, if only it had still been daylight. Several Lobzillas
that were probably over the legal limit as well. I also ran across several
lumpfish, a dogfish off in the distance and some smaller orange fish with
dark-grey spots. (Should really know what those are...)
After swimming around for a while, we had an underwater disagreement about
just where exactly we had ended up, and surfaced to find that we had gone
around Gun Rock 1 1/2 times. We finished the loop around, and came back
shore to load up the car and head out. Wish we could have brought the guy
who loaned his driveway a lobster, but maybe we can do that during daylight
hours one day. A nice departure from our normal diet of wrecks, and
certainly very nice to have such a short drive home for both of us. Even
after washing my gear, I was still in bed by 11. If we can solve the
parking issue, this may be a site to return to.
- Chris
Pebble Beach
Divers:
Originally scheduled to be at Folly Cove, Saturday's dive
morphed into a dive at Pebble Beach to accommodate half the
divers who wanted an easy sandy entry and sightseeing with
the other half looking to find lobster in rocky reefs.
We met up at 9am, and found that the 'free, ample parking'
described in the site listing is a little exaggerated - no
problems before 9, but by 9:30am, it was difficult to find
a spot along the single strip of non-resident parking by
the water. (Unless you were like the jackass who parked
diagonally with his ass sticking out).
The first dive was at peak high tide, which involved a
pebble entry, then a relatively long surface swim due south
from the center of the cove out about 300m before we were
over the reef. Dropped down in two groups: John & Kirill,
Chris and myself. Water temp was surprisingly cold, ~53 F
despite being no deeper than 25'. This is probably due to
the facing of the cove and lack of protection. However,
the vis was a treat at ~25' or so. My first priority was
to recoup my $40 lobster license, and the first dive was a
step in the right direction, with two bugs and two flounder
volunteering themselves to the catch bag. Caught
everything by hand, but realized later that I really should
have been flushing the lobsters into an open catch bag
instead of attempting the hand grab. This being his first
exposure to the joys of 14mm neoprene, Chris, meanwhile,
realized that he was underweighted and needed some more to
finish the dive.
Kirill and David took the next dive while John graciously
played 'Uncle John' to David's son. Despite his thorough
prep (complete with multiple lobster ticklers of different
lengths and materials), David came up empty on this one,
but got in a good dive anyhow.
The three remaining divers went in again, with the purpose
of reaching the second, outer reef (apparently, there are
three reefs running parallel to shore). By now (about
2pm), the tide was out and entry consisted of a painful
walk across larger, fist-sized pebbles and then a sandy
entry. I'd recommend rock boots for this site. Skates and
flounders were plentiful and Chris picked out a 2.5' stone
fish (possibly monkfish) camoflauged in sea debris and
wearing a rather tasteful purple starfish on its nose.
Lobsters seemed to be under every other rock on the second
reef, but most were undersized and we caught and released a
half-dozen before Chris nabbed his first of the day. Max
depth was only about 18', but there was very little, if any
current or impact on vis. We returned straight back to
shore, Chris and John managing to avoid a surface swim.
All in all, Pebble Beach is a good alternative to Folly
with rock reefs, easy access, free parking, decent
lobstering, and a nice little beach for the non-divers.
Given the time of the year, diver traffic was relatively
low (two rescue classes and several other lobster divers
was it). Navigation is also very easy, as you can shoot
180 degrees straight out, use the sand current lines as a
guide, and use the reefs as indication of your distance.
Surface swim is a good idea if you're trying to get two
dives off one tank.
As a bonus, I learned that the best way to keep lobsters
alive on the way home is to keep them in a bit of seawater,
and the best method to keep them in the fridge is on top of
damp newspaper in a paperbag in the crisper.
- Louie Cheng
Night wreck dive on Poling
Divers:
Three tired guys with elevated blood nitrogen levels stood in a parking lot
last night doing rock-paper-scissors trying to figure out how to determine
who was the loser (and would have to write the dive report). When no
clear loser emerged we all agreed to write a draft, so here goes...
Last night Robert Granetz, John Armstrong and I took the night off to dive
the stern of the Chester Poling, with Cape Ann Divers. With a total of
only seven divers on board, the big boat had lots of room to spare. The
weather was fine, with a moderate SW wind, but there was a good chop
running, and the boat was rolling quite a bit at the mooring. We were
treated to a nice sunset while suiting up, and dusk came around 7:45. John
and I were diving dry with doubles, and Robert was diving wet with a single
and pony. Robert was in good company since the other four people not from
our group were diving wet, also. John had his UK light cannon, I'm not
sure what Robert ended up with for lights after a bit of reconfiguration,
and I had probably more light than I needed (could that actually be so?)
with two 30W UK's and two 50W halogen "project lights".
Robert was the first to hit the water, next went John, and I waddled to the
stern platform last. Cape Ann has a nice arrangement of hang bar and lines
that guide you to the mooring. The mooring itself is chain up to about 40
ft where it is supported by a slimy float, and rope above that. The guide
lines take you from the hang bar to the float, and you descend the chain
from there. The chain is secured to the port side of the wreck about 20 ft
aft of the break in the hull. We grouped on the deck and then headed the
short swim aft to the living quarters and engine room. The vis was pretty
good, perhaps 25 ft, and the water temperature was in the high 40's. I
descended into the scuttle (staircase) and turned right at the bottom of
the stairs to enter the starboard stateroom. The room is pretty full of
silt, but I did see an old sea boot that must be a plant, since I don't
recall it from earlier dives. The deck above this room is beginning to
collapse, bulging downward in places. When I turned around to come out,
John was at the base of the stairs managing a "reel malfunction" that took
a few minutes to get untangled. John then proceeded forward through an
opening that didn't used to exist into the aft end of the engine room where
all the compressed air cylinders are stored. I exited the scuttle and
swam forward and then descended through the engine room skylight into the
upper level of the engine room. A cloud of perhaps 100 small cod swam in
circles around the engine room. With all lights on, the engine room was
pretty well illuminated, and all the silvery fish swimming in such a
confined space made for a really neat sight! I checked in a place where
the ship's store of light bulbs had once been bobbing against the ceiling,
and it seems they're all gone now. Gone, too, is the railing around the
engine room mezzanine. The lower level of the engine room looked really
silty, so I didn't drop down lower. Returning back on deck, Robert was
pointing out a very large sculpin. I peered into the galley skylight, but
didn't descend, since John was just emerging from the engine room
skylight. We then swam back along the port rail, and looking over the edge
I spied a lift bag lost on the bottom. Robert could have beat me to it,
but he let me scoop it up (it had a name on it that the boat's crew
recognized as a frequent customer, so it was given to them to return). At
the mooring, Robert was out of bottom time (21 minutes) so he waved goodbye
and headed up. John and I swam forward to the break and descended to the
bottom and our maximum depth of 90 ft. There I found a lobster living in a
pipe that Robert had told us about from his mid-winter dive. Maybe it was
even the same lobster?! He was too far in to grab, in any case. Returning
to the mooring we swam around the deck for a bit using our last 6 minutes
(30 minute bottom time). John found a wrecking bar on the deck and passed
it to me. With one broken tine and no loop to clip it off we both decided
to leave it there. Then it was back up the mooring chain for a brief hang.
Back at the dock John went in pursuit of a late dinner and Robert and I
went for an ice cream and story swap. On the whole, it was a very pleasant
evening.
- Peter
The other thing I want to add is that I have become very envious of Peter's
and John's double tank setups. Yes, it's an incredibly heavy load to hoist
around on the surface, but they give you another 10 minutes on the wreck
and afford a greater margin of safety on penetration dives. I think I'll
be looking for tank bands and another console in the near future.
- Robert
All in all a great dive, certainly enhanced by its being a night dive.
The only sour note - as I headed to the surface, I heard/felt my Light
Cannon strike the hang bar which was pitching up and down due to the
surface chop. When I looked down, the light was out and it would not
re-strike when I reached the surface. It is entirely likely that the
lamp, which is known to be somewhat fragile, did not survive the trauma.
This, unfortunately, is a ~$100 fix. Oh well . . .
- John
Sandwich Town Beach
Divers:
We got to the beach and found it almost crawling with divers from east
coast divers. It was close to low tide, we saw a lot of color
subsurface, swam through a seagrass forest while searching for lobster.
On the way back in, we found a ridge with a lot of life. On the second
dive, we went out and followed that for a while, observing the holes
where crabs had dug themselves into the soft rock. There were a lot of
jellies out, all I remember were lady's combs, but there may have been
others. You'd look right through them and not realize it until you
refocused your eyes to find that they were right on your mask.
- Jordan
Canoe Beach, Nahant
Divers:
Since one cannot park in Nahant we met at 8:30 am at the parking lot in
front of the Tides Restaurant, which is right before entering Nahant
[(see below for an aside on diving logistics at Nahant)]. All previous
weather forecasts showed rain and T-storms for the entire week. They were
wrong, EXCEPT FOR THIS DAY. It was an absolutely miserable day so we
decided to wait it out in a Dunking Donuts café. It turned out that Bill
and I share the same hobby: aquariums. So, after about an hour of
sipping coffee I guess John must have become an expert on all sorts of
aquariums. Unfortunately the weather did not improve, but we decided to
go on anyway and at least make it a moderately exciting day. My
girlfriend Lena dropped us with the gear at the Canoe beach, where there
is a small parking lot and easy access to the ocean. By the time we
unpacked the gear we were all completely soaked (does it count for the
extra dive?).
At about 11 we started our first dive. The beach was pebbly, the tide was
low, and the entry was very easy. I immediately noted a problem with a
leaking BC valve. We had to go back and Bill tightened the valve. The
cove of the Canoe beach faces North-East and is well protected. There was
a slight wind from the ocean but the surface was OK. So we swam at the
surface for a while, then dropped down and headed North-East straight to
the ocean. The water temperature was 61 and the visibility was great. At
the maximum depth of 23 feet I could clearly see our dive flag. We tried
to stay inside the cove and circle there. The dive site there is GREAT!
The cove has everything: both rocky and sandy bottoms, several huge rocks
with nice walls and something that resembles tunnels and chimneys (we
later found out that this formation is called 'the chimneys'). We saw a
lot of lobsters, several flounders, skates, tons of crabs (1 with very
long legs: up to 3 ft), stars and sea urchins as well as small fishes.
When we came to the sandy bottom John spotted a SHARK! and we chased it
for a while. It was pretty small (not more than 3 ft long) and we think
it was part of the dogfish 'shark' category. On our way back my
regulator pulled out off my mouth. I found it but for some reason could
not retrieve it (I believe it got tangled by the flag line). I found the
octopus but could not take the regulator out of the BC pocket (another
good reason to have your own gear). Fortunately for me, Bill was close
enough and we practiced air-sharing ascent in real life (same thing we
did in the pool during the refresher session). The total dive time was 39
min.
When we came out of the water we found that rain had stopped. After a ~50
min break we stared our second dive. The tide was coming, the wind
weakened, and the surface became calm. This time we traveled further out
of the cove. The maximum depth was 30 ft. We hit thermocline at 22-24 ft.
The temperature varied from 61 to 56 F. Further out in the ocean the
visibility was a bit worse and we saw lots of tiny jelly-fishes. This
time we did not see as much marine life but we spotted several schools of
small fishes with few larger ones (up to 1ft, carps?). On our way back I
saw a couple of striped bass: one small and one of ~3ft. It turned out
that this time we went out of the cove and turned around the corner. So,
when we surfaced it took us few minutes to figure out our way back to the
cove and to the beach. The total dive time was 45 minute for this dive.
When we came out of the water we found out that Lena had brought us some
bagels and hot tea!! That was exactly what we needed.
All in all, even though the day started pretty bad I think it was a great
dive in the end, definitely my best so far.
Bill's comments: Note on those going to Nahant in the near future -
Logistics - On the up side, Nahant is a quick (<30 min.) drive from
Boston. The hitch is that there is absolutely no non-resident parking on
the 'island'. There is, however, free parking at the Tides restaurant
on Little Nahant just prior to reaching Nahant proper. We were lucky
enough to have Kirill's girlfriend, Lena, drop us at the dive site so
John and I left our cars at the Tides and hitched a ride. The trip from
the Tides to Canoe and 40 Steps beaches is only a couple of miles so
another option would be to bring a bike; it would be easy to drop gear
and people at the dive site, shuttle the car back to the Tides, and then
bike back to the dive site.
- Kirill
Tri-state wreck rodeo
Divers:
Last weekend was the heralded Tri-state Wreck Rodeo (or least the first
two-thirds of it), masterfully conceived and organized by John Armstrong.
I'll describe the first day of diving, which was in the renowned Dutch
Springs quarry in northeastern Pennsylvania, and Chris Russo will write
about our wreck dives on the USS San Diego off of Long Island, NY. The
third leg of the rodeo, the wreck of the Algol off of NJ, was canceled by
the charter boat captain due to bad weather on Sunday.
I should begin by saying that John Armstrong, prior to arriving at MIT a
year-and-a-half ago, lived for 5 years in Hoboken, NJ (that explains a
lot), which is situated right across the Hudson River from lower Manhattan.
The hub of Hoboken is undoubtedly the Hoboken Dive Center (HBC) shop, which
John became a fixture at when he lived there. Do you remember the TV show
Cheers? Whenever Norm came into the bar, all of the regular customers
would yell "Norm !". Well, that's what the HBC shop is like. Even though
John had been gone for 1.5 years, when he brought us into the shop,
everyone there shouted "John !" and greeted him warmly. We got to meet all
the regular staff and clientele. In fact, John even had a key to the shop!
Anyway, we visited the shop numerous times over the 3-day weekend to get
nitrox fills and pickup/dropoff the extra large tanks and pony bottles that
we rented.
John and I drove down from Boston on Thursday night and stayed in beautiful
Jersey City, right next door to Hoboken. The next morning we headed across
northern NJ to get to the ever-popular Dutch Springs quarry, where we met
up with Chris and Keith, who drove directly there from Boston. (Peter and
Carl met up with us later that night back at the hotel.) This is the first
time I have ever dove in fresh water, and it was quite a treat. The
flooded quarry has been turned into a dive mecca, with an air/nitrox
filling station on site, and picnic areas alongside the quarry. There are
several submerged wooden platforms to accommodate the numerous
certification classes that use the quarry. The owners have also sunk a
number of unusual objects for divers to explore, including a school bus, a
small plane, a trolley car, several boats, a helicopter, etc. All of these
are well-marked with buoys, and connected together underwater by rope,
which makes it easy to traverse from one to the next. The water is bluish,
very warm, and incredibly clear (40 ft vis) due to the invasive zebra
mussels, which are filter feeders that eat the plankton. There's no
current, waves, or tides, so entries and exits are trivial. On the first
dive, the four of us were joined by a diver from the SeaLife camera company
(Bjorn?), whose job it is to test out their photography products. He had
five cameras to test on this outing, and they all were floating up from his
arms on lanyards, so he looked a little like a balloon salesman at a
carnival. Meanwhile we all had a lot of fun swimming around and through
the various sunken structures, and doing things like sitting in the
driver's seat of the school bus. At our max depth (21.6 m/71 ft) we
explored a tanker truck that was leaning precariously sideways. There was
a distinct thermocline at about 10 m separating the 26 C bath water from
the 10 C bottom. From there, we turned around and headed back to shore.
Our total dive time was 52 minutes.
Our second dive was devoted to practicing our wreck reel skills in
anticipation of the next day's wreck dives. We took turns penetrating and
traversing the length of the trolley car, unreeling the line inside and
reeling it back up as we went. I did pretty good on my turn, but as soon
as I handed the reel to Keith, it turned into a knotted rat's nest. Keith
has come to hate the wreck reel. We then headed back to one of the
underwater wooden platforms. I practiced walking upside down on the
underside of the platform, and Keith and Chris couldn't resist trying it
too. Finally, we all settled on the platform, where John decided that he
was going to prove to me that I was overweighted. (I had 25 lbs of lead in
my belt.) So he told me to hold on to something, and then yanked off my
weight belt. I was upside down, holding onto the wooden planks as best I
could. Do you remember those Roadrunner cartoons where Wiley Coyote is
hanging on to the edge of a cliff while the branch he is holding onto is
slowly bending and cracking? Well, I swear the plank was starting to bend
and the nails were beginning to pop out. John removed 10 lbs and put the
reduced weight belt in one of my hands, but I was still buoyant.
Reluctantly he put the 10 lbs back in and I managed to get the weight belt
securely back on. Well, it was good skills practice anyway. We surfaced
shortly thereafter, ending up with a 50 minute 2nd dive.
The four of us drove back to the Hoboken Dive Shop to get fills and
equipment, then to the Jersey City hotel, had a late dinner out, and
finally got to bed very late, considering the early morning start we had to
get the next day.
http://www.njscuba.net/sites/wreck_uss_san_diego.html
After rising at an obscene hour, we made it without event to the boat, and
loaded up. I think there were 12 divers total on the boat, and the mates
claimed that the boat was "practically empty." Scary thought, since most
divers had brought two sets of doubles each and the back deck soon looked
like the contents of a dive shop had exploded all over it. The captain,
his prior reputation for being crotchety notwithstanding, was pleasant, and
we motored out of Freeport harbor at 7.
After about two hours, we arrived at the site and hooked in next to the
Wahoo. The Wahoo had gotten there a little earlier, so it set up on the
stern and we grabbed the bow. The gear setup chaos was in full swing, and
somehow, Peter and I were one of the first teams in the water. We were
both diving dry on air, Peter with 80 doubles, and me with a 120 and a 30
pony, and, after the mates gave Peter some ribbing about the growth
protruding from his head (those of you who have seen his light setup know
what I mean), we splashed and made our way down the line. Robert splashed
with Keith, and Carl and John splashed together slightly after us.
Bottom vis was about 15 feet, and I saw 46 degrees on my computer when we
arrived at the top of wreck at about 65 feet. We had hooked in almost
exactly at the bow, and my first impression was that this was a big wreck -
more impressive than the Poling, to be sure. I had heard that there was a
light side and a dark side, so I was expecting more a list (can a ship have
a list if it's upside down?) but it wasn't as severe as I expected. Peter
and I ran a reel and swam along the keel for a few minutes before coming to
a large opening that was almost right at the keel line. We headed in, not
very far, and after poking around for a while (I had my eyes out for some
artifacts, but my impression was that finding anything good required some
deep penetrations), reversed course and headed back out along the hull. We
came across some of the large guns that you see in the sketch, and they
were, I have to say, pretty impressive. (Not as impressive as the Yukon's,
but hey, this was a WWI wreck.) One other impression I had was that
there's a lot more sea-life (at least of the non-crustacean variety) on
these wrecks then back in NE. We saw some enormous Tautog and several
other fish that I wasn't able to positively identify. As we were heading
back to the anchor line, I saw several bubbles escaping from the hull under
us, so I guess that others had found penetration spots as well. At the
line, Peter continued for a few more minutes while I headed up the line
just as my computer was about to go into deco mode. From what I hear, he
continued onto the other side of the bow to see the anchors, which I would
see on the second dive. I headed up the line, deployed a jon-line at about
15 feet and waited out a nice long stop. Getting back up to the boat, I
discovered two things - 1) this boat really needs a new ladder design, and
2) even if one isn't prone to sea-sickness, climbing a heaving ladder with
lots of gear when you're tired and O2-deprived onto a deck that smells of
diesel fumes makes you want to spew. Total dive time was 43 minutes
(including a 10 min stop) at a depth of 101 feet, with 700 psi still in the
tank.
We had a nice, relaxing SI, and Peter decided not to do the second dive, so
I dove with John and Carl on the next dive. We dropped down the line on
the wreck again into pretty much the same conditions, although I noticed a
bit more current. John's been on this wreck several times before, so we
followed him, and found a nice little compartment near the bow that we
could squeeze into. After finger-walking around for a while and trying not
to stir up silt (this wreck didn't seem as silty as some), we exited the
wreck again and dropped near the sand where we hit our max depth of 110
feet. Swimming back, about 20 feet from the wreck, we came to the bow
anchor, where we got a great view of the anchor and the bow - very cool,
and it gave us a nice sense of the scale.
Unknown to us, Robert was having problems of his own during the dive, when
his BC power inflator stuck open (a problem that he had had the day
before). Fortunately, Robert's propensity for vintage equipment (the
phrase "like diving with a ragpicker" may have been bandied about on the
boat) means that his fingertips protrude from his gloves and he was able to
disconnect it before it got too out of hand. All kidding aside, it was a
serious problem, and an uncontrolled ascent from that depth is a great way
to get bent - disconnecting a BC or drysuit inflator, and emergency air
dumping, is a good skill to practice.
We came back up the line, had a nice stop, and got back on the boat with a
total time of 38 minutes.
While we were shooting the breeze on the bow, we saw a diver surface
roughly amidships on the wreck between us and the Wahoo. Turns out that
she had been blown off the wreck, lost her buddies, and decided to do a
free ascent. Probably should of had a safety sausage, or shot a line on a
lift bag, but after some cursing from the captain, one of the mates swam a
line out to her and we pulled her in. On the way back, we were all pretty
happy with the nitrogen percolating in our bloodstreams, and had a nice
view of Fire Island and Jones Beach. (Robert was unable to see the blimp
circling over NY, but that's another story entirely.) Our dive for Sunday
got cancelled because of the weather, but we still got in some great dives
on Saturday. Anyone up for Wreck Rodeo II?
- Robert and Chris
Folly Cove
Divers:
Mike Hobbs and I met up with Nick Schwertner (and his open water class) on
Sunday, 7/18, to dive Folly Cove. After getting tank refills for the
students, we got to the beach around 10 (I think). There was only one other
group of divers at that point and things were nice and quiet. Later in the
day, the beach got more crowded.
Conditions were almost perfect. Flat seas, partly sunny, air temps upper
70's to 80, and water temps from mid 60's to upper 50's (we stayed
shallow). In the afternoon, a slight swell developed (<< 1') that could
barely be felt below about 4'. Visibility was variable but as good as
10-15' at times (but I'm a terrible judge of this). Mike and I did two
dives; one to each side of the cove.
On our first dive, Mike and I accompanied Nick and the OW divers on the
traditional surface swim to the gazebo. Saw lots of little jellies (Sea
Gooseberries?) at the near-surface. Mike and I dropped down the wall to a
max of 28' and then we headed off to explore on our own. Lots of green
urchins and stars (mostly Northern Sea?) and I think I saw a Forbes (are
they the only ones with the 'tube feet' at the end of their arms?). More
snails than you could shake a stick at. Also found some siphon holes from
either Surf Clams or Razors but I don't know enough to tell them apart
simply by the hole. There was the usual array of Hermits, Jonah and Green
Crabs. A couple of small lobsters on this side but not many. Saw a couple
of nice (~ 2' in length) Striped Bass. One of them was pretty bold and
would come within a foot or two of us. He didn't seem to mind us being
around so we hung out for several minutes and watched him scoop up those
little swarming shrimp that hang out near the sandy bottom (are those Mysid
Shrimp? They were everywhere). At about 30 minutes, we started back along
the wall for a total dive time of 45 minutes.
After a 1 hour surface interval, Mike and I headed out to check out the
east side of the cove. Again, we didn't drop below 30' and just kind of
hung out in the shallows. There were quite a few lobsters in a range of
sizes, some definitely there for the taking. One guy had claws approaching
4" but he was pretty well protected under a rock so it was hard to see his
true size. Mike found a couple of Gunnels and we also saw what was either a
Grubby, a Sculpin, or a Lumpsucker. Not sure which it was but I like the
names so I figured I'd list 'em all. Also some pretty good sized Jonah and
Green crabs over here. We paddled around this side for 45 minutes and then
headed back to dry land.
As an aside, I had a very pronounced chatter in my second stage on inhale
when tested out of the water. This is a Scuba Pro MK2/R190 set and was
recently overhauled by United so they should be fine. However, consensus
around was that it didn't sound good (the octo breathed fine) so I switched
the primary out with my old Mares, which performed well. When I dropped my
tanks off at United later, it didn't sound quite as bad but it still
chattered a fair amount on inhale (I suspect these things always sound
worse when you're actually faced with using them as opposed to when you're
just hanging out at the dive store) and the folks there felt it was
normal. Anyone have any input? I probably should have taken the thing into
the ocean to see how it breathed under H2O but I decided not to mess
around. Any guidance would be appreciated.
All in all a nice, mellow, uneventful day under water. Thanks to Nick for
letting us swim around under his flag. I apologize for any mis-identified
creatures. Also, the use of masculine pronouns for the critters is simply
for convenience and not meant to infer any bias!
Cheers,
- Bill
Nubble Light, ME
Divers:
Better late than never! Nearly three weeks ago we had our club dives at
Nubble Lighthouse in York, Maine. This is a very picturesque site,
particularly with the sunny skies and ~70 F temperatures that we enjoyed
in the morning. The park was a pretty busy place, but we found plenty of
space on the rocks to spread out all our gear. Luisa also brought along
a canine friend (John Armstrong's dog, King), who immediately befriended
all of us. Many in our group had never dove at Nubble before, so I
described the site to everybody, then joined up with a group consisting
of Keith, Catherine, Peter, and John. We briefly explored the
wall just off the side of the rocks, where I was hoping to show everyone
the memorial plaque that was put there a few years ago, but I couldn't
find it. (We later found out that it's no longer there. Does anyone know
what happened to it?) So we reversed direction and headed out toward the
island. There were plenty of big longhorn sculpin, lots of flounder, and
of course lobsters. Catherine reported seeing the juvenile flounder that
camouflage themselves so well with the sandy bottom. I also saw some
pretty good sized striped bass. That's why this site is also popular with
fisherman, and so there's lots of monofilament line floating around, some
of which I cut up into short pieces with my dive knife. As we rounded the
island to the ocean side, I found the pipe that I had told everyone about.
When we got to the broken end of the pipe, which is at a depth of about 45
feet, we turned around and headed back. I kept my eyes open for a large
Atlantic torpedo ray, which I had seen here two years ago, but I didn't
come across any this time. The water temperature at depth was 51 F, but
near the surface it was 55-60 F, and so my first dive was an hour long.
During the surface interval, my wife, Lisa, and younger son, Matt, arrived.
King (the dog) quickly trained them to throw his tennis ball around.
While we relaxed and enjoyed some snacks on the rocks, Keith and I planned
our 2nd dive. We wanted to practice using a wreck reel and light, in
anticipation of our "Tri-state wreck rodeo" dives coming up the following
weekend. We entered the water and headed due north until we came across a
lobster trap, which we then tied the end of the reel line to. I then went
out about 100 feet, unreeling the line as I swam. After turning around, I
swam back, reeling the line back up while keeping it somewhat taut. So
far, so good. Then it was Keith's turn. No problem on the way out, but
on the way back, the reel got all knotted up. But Keith was able to
unknot it and complete the exercise. We practiced a little more, and then
headed in to the wall. There were plenty of big lobsters here...too bad
my lobster license is not good in Maine. I also saw a little rock gunnel.
After the dives, a group of us enjoyed a scrumptious lunch outside at the
adjacent seafood joint, and then topped it off by going to the homemade
ice cream place up the road. My wife and son and I then enjoyed the rest
of the afternoon soaking up the sun at York Beach. The perfect end to a
really enjoyable day.
- Robert G
Wreck of the Romance, redux
Divers:
Peter Kerrebrock and I headed back to the wreck of the Romance this past
Saturday. The word of the day was "visibility", both above and below the
surface. Above the surface, we had a day with what pilots like to refer to
as "severe clear", and below, the vis was somehow even better than last
week.
We got to the wreck shortly before mid-day (We prefer to go diving at a
reasonable hour - I don't understand why most dive charters need to leave
before any civilized person is out of bed...), and found another boat
already hooked in. We fished around with the hook for a few minutes, and
managed to hook what we later found out was some sort of giant cable. We
geared up, both of us diving dry, and dropped down the line into 43 degree
water at the bottom.
Remember what I said about visibility? We were both somewhat overweighted
and we did our best to ruin 25 foot visibility by bouncing up and down off
of hull plates while we hooked in the reel. I've tried to be
extra-conservative in weighting while I get used to my new suit (it's an
Otter crushed-neoprene, by the way, and it's great), but I think it's safe
to take off a few pounds. The vis was so good we didn't even need a glider
and we were off to explore. We followed the same propeller shaft out
again, and even found the other one. There weren't too many lobsters
around today, but we did bag a few scallops, and I gave mine to Peter since
I was heading out for dinner that night. During the dive, I found what
looked like some sort of porthole, but it was still attached to the wreck.
Next time we'll see if Mr. Crowbar can work his magic. Peter came up with
a fork, which added to his spoon last time, gets him closer to a complete
set.
We followed the line back, and unhooked and sent the anchor to the surface
on the lift bag. Coming up the line, I noticed that Peter was doing
extra-conservative stops, and when I looked at his console, I realized that
his computer was off. I have the same model, and while it's a good little
computer, it doesn't auto activate and, most frustratingly, you can't turn
it on underwater. After completing a short oxygen hang, we came back up,
got our stuff together, and headed back into Hingham. Dive time was 44
minutes at 83 feet.
Another great day of diving, and a good tune-up for the wreck rodeo.
Yours truly,
- the South Shore contingent (Peter and Chris)
Wreck of the Romance
Divers:
Peter Kerrebrock and I headed out under foggy (more on that later) skies on
Saturday morning to dive the wreck of the Romance, a steamer that sank in
1936 in Boston Harbor. I hadn't been to the site before, but Peter had ,
and we expected it to be a nice, relatively easy dive. There's more on the
history behind it at:
http://www.mwdc.org/Shipwrecks/Romance.html
Peter's Loran numbers were right on, and after sweeping around with the
sonar for a few minutes, we set a hook in the wreck and geared up. We got
in the water at about 10:45, with Peter diving doubles and me diving a
single tank and a pony. The surface conditions were great - nice and calm.
After descending the line, we came down next to one of the large boilers.
Water temperature at depth was about 42 degrees and visibility was
fantastic - about 20 feet. Peter set up his wreck reel, to which I hooked
a glider and we were off. We followed one of the large propeller shafts
out to its end, and then we were able to find the rudder on the floor of
the sea. While we were digging around, Peter grabbed a couple of scallops,
and I came up with what I think was most of a small lighting fixture with
the glass bulb missing. Most of the wreckage is pretty well broken up (it
was dynamited at one point since it's pretty close to a major channel) and
it's not too recognizable as a ship, but you could make out some of the
hull plates and ribs. We followed the reel back to the anchor line, and I
started my ascent. Peter decided to stick around for a few minutes longer
since he had doubles, and I took my time getting up to 15 feet where we had
hung oxygen regulators. I set up my jon line and had a nice relaxing deco
hang while waiting for Peter. He joined me in a few minutes, several
scallops richer, and we got back on the boat and unhooked. Total dive time
was 38 minutes for me (add a few minutes for Peter), at a depth of 74 feet.
While we were in the water, the fog had gotten much worse and visibility
was down to, at some points, about 100 feet. A small sailboat passed us
and told us that their GPS was broken, so would we give them some Loran
numbers. Hmmm...not sure what good that was going to do them, but we
shouted them over nevertheless. We navigated our way back to Hingham
harbor via Loran waypoints, since we couldn't see a damn thing through the
fog. After about 45 minutes, we were able to make out the windmill at the
tip of Hull, and we were back in the harbor. Had the fog been that bad
when we left, we probably wouldn't have gone out. All in all, a great
dive.
- Chris
Summer Solstice Twilight and Night Dives
Divers:
At about 6:15 pm, we met up at Stage fort park, next to the baseball field,
for an evening dive with a night dive to follow. After surveying the site,
we decided to make our dives out to a cluster of rocks just inside the
buoys, to keep navigation simple for the night dive. Tim was in a drysuit,
and underweighted, so after struggling with it for a while, he decided to
sit out. Water temperature was a balmy 60 farenheit for the first dive -
much warmer than I had expected. Visibility was bout 10-15 ft, and we had
a max depth of 22 ft on my gauge. We saw quite a few skates, plenty of
crabs, and a few flounder and 2 or 3 lobster hiding in the plants around
the rocks. On the way back in, Kirill lost both weight pockets, but Mike
came across one and brought it in.
The sun was setting as we came out, so we switched tanks and waited a bit
for it to get dark. There were many delightful little insects that decided
to come out and keep us company during the interval. (Read "nasty
mosquitoes")
We got in for the night dive and followed the same course, but the tide was
coming in, so we were able to get under sooner. Temp had dropped to 58, but
I wasn't complaining! The Dixon pair got separated for a minute, so we
stopped to see if they would find the flag and join us, which they
did. Later, when they got separated again, they decided to just head
in. This dive had more life to see, one skate, a few big flounder, and some
baby sea ravens in the plants. There were more lobster out, and I came
across one with a body the length of my forearm (only thing I really had to
measure against). This dive was a bit deeper, due to the tide, with a max
of 26 ft. There was a bit of a current on the way back in, which I only
noticed because I had to constantly correct my heading but still ended up
about 30 ft. from where we got in. (I stood up, reluctantly, when I hit 5
ft.)
All in all, for my first dive as organizer, I think things went well, and I
enjoyed it. I doubt if there was much to be seen if you were more than 4
ft. off the bottom, though. Ahhh, New England ;-)
- Jordan
Folly Cove night dive
Divers:
Yesterday (6/16) Mike Hobbs, Nikolai Schwertner and I headed up to Cape
Ann for an evening and night dive. After reviewing the wind direction
(from the East and South for the last day) we settled on a protected
North-facing site, for which there are fewer options, and so settled on
Folly Cove. It was a perfect early evening when we arrived, with a clear
sky and light wind. The cove itself was nearly calm. Unfortunately it
had been quite windy for the last few days, from just about every
direction, so we were not expecting perfect vis, too. Nikolai and I were
diving dry, while Mike was going for the full experience (diving wet).
The first dive took us out along the West side of the cove to a depth of
about 44 feet. Water temperature was in the mid 40's. Vis was about as
expected, maybe 12-15 feet, maximum. The sun was already low in the sky
so the high shoreline cast a shadow over that side of the cove. There
were a few skate, flounder and striped bass, as well as the usual
invertebrates to be seen, but in general not a huge amount of sea life.
We made it out to the point along the base of the rocky wall, and then
returned shallower where there was more light.
After a leisurely surface interval during which we were treated to a
gorgeous sunset, we suited up again as darkness fell and headed out along
the East side of the cove. In the mean time the sea life had come out of
hiding. There were skate everywhere, as well as numerous young cod,
hake, flounder and cunner (that fish ID course came in handy). A large
number of bugs, mostly shorts but a few of legal size, crawled around the
rocks. Nikolai had his camera with him, so we'll have to see what came
out. This was Mike's first night dive (well done!) Unfortunately after
the sun set the mosquitos also came out, so we hastily packed up and
headed off.
- Peter Kerrebrock
Boat dives to Paddock Rock and Kettle Island
Divers:
Hi Folks,
Robert has gently reminded me that I need to write up a dive report, so
here it is, if a bit belated.
After some other committments cleared up for last Saturday, I decided to
hop on the CAD charter out to Paddock Rock and Kettle Island. It was the
first time for me at both sites, and the first boat dive of the year
reminded me just how much I prefer boats to getting pounded on slippery
rocks by surf, but I digress...
The divers along for the day were me, Sam Peretz, Robert Granetz, John
Armstrong, Sylvie Legall, and Antonio Layon. I buddied up with Sam for our
first dive, and we headed off. The first thing I noticed that there was a
definite therocline at about 30 feet where the temperature dropped from a
balmy 55 degrees down to about 42. Sam and I swam around for a while, and
although neither of us were hunting for lobster, we saw a few
nonetheless. We also saw a pretty large lumpfish, which made several dives
for me this year where I've seen one. Paddock Rock is a nice dive site,
especially on the top of the rock, where the sunlight tends to warm things
up and provide quite a bit of ambient light. There's also a nice sheer
drop-off on one side, where I was able to really notice the exceptional
visibility that day - we were swimming at about 50 ft., and I could easily
see to the bottom of the trench at 80 ft. Sam was getting low on air, so I
headed back with him to the anchor line, and continue solo for a few more
minutes. I decided to see what was in the trench, and after descending to
a max of 79 ft., found that there was nothing but colder water down there.
All in all, a pretty good dive. We continued on to Kettle Island, but
John's on the hook to write that one up.
- Chris
Postscript - I had been talked into going diving with a dive buddy on
Sunday at Cathedral Rocks, and we had a great dive there on Sunday
morning. We hit high tide on the nose and the conditions were as good as
I've seen them there - I was even able to do a giant stride off the rock at
the entry point. After four dives that weekend, plus the clamber up and
down Cathedral Rocks, I slept like a log on Sunday night.
Dive 2 - Kettle Island
As our buddies had all abandoned us for greener pastures, the leper colony*
- myself, Robert, and Chris - took to the water at Kettle Island for a
second dive. The boat moored close inshore to the small rocky islet in
about 25 feet of water. Immediately after descending into the slightly
more turbid water, it was clear that we were in prime lobster territory.
Within moments, I had laid my hands on an eggless beast that proved to be
only *this much* too short (note to lobster - I'll be looking for you next
year).
As we headed along the bottom, keeping the shore to our right, we
discovered the oft-spoken-of, seldom-seen Kettle Island swimthrough - a
small hole under an enormous boulder that I wouldn't go into myself, had I
not seen someone else do it first. Robert seemed much more interested in a
narrow gully that he had found, so rather than take the swimthrough, we
went that way instead.
Gradually we worked our way down to about 50 feet, looking for, and
sometimes finding, lobsters, all of which were either unreachable, too
small, or loaded (from an egg perspective). As I glanced into a hole on a
low rocky ledge, I noticed what must have been the Father of All Lobsters.
I summoned Robert over to show him, hoping that he would have a strategy
for getting the firmly entrenched monster out of its stony redoubt. The
conversation that ensued was no less clear for having been conducted in
sign language:
Robert: (to John) You! Get in there and get it!
Leaving FOAL in peace, we headed further along the bottom, starting to head
to shallower water as we began to consume our precious stores of compressed
gas. We were not 3 minutes from having left FOAL when we ran into a diver
from another team who hurled a lobster at us. Fascinating, we thought,
free lobster (what a deal) until we realized that we were facing the Mother
of All Lobsters. Mother, we knew, because this behemoth was loaded with
eggs. Even had she not been an egger, and given that she had no v-notch, I
would lay even odds that this one would have been too big to take.
The dive ended with a leisurely 100yd surface swim in the bright sun.
Another day, another dose of nitrogen. Life is good.
- John A
Monterey, CA
Divers:
Hi all,
many thanks to those of you who wrote me to recommend places to go diving
while i was in the san francisco bay area a few weeks ago. thanks tim,
chris, shawn, winslow, tevye, and especially reyco who wrote back with tons
of advice and links to divers and web sites.
the most common advice i received for diving in the bay area was monterey
bay, where there are a huge number of dive sites. the water temp is similar
to the east coast, and the main features making diving in monterey
interesting are, as far as i can tell,
here is a link to some california dive sites, with links to monterey
(thanks reyco!): http://www.scubasanfrancisco.com/info.html
The place most strongly recommended was Point Lobos State Reserve, and
especially the North Monestery beach; from reyco: "It's got everything--depth,
kelp, seals, easy and free parking , good viz, few people. It's
right on the edge of the underwater Carmel canyon that drops down to 3000'!
If you stick to the edge of the kelp beds on the North side of the beach,
you should get some good diving, as well as see the edge of the canyon. The
only caveat is that surf conditions here can change rapidly, and I have
seen divers crawl out on the beach without masks, fins, snorkels,
etc. after getting pounded by the waves."
since i was diving solo and it was my first dive since last october, i
chose to dive Breakwater Beach, an area similar to Folly Cove in cape ann
with an easy beach entry/exit. there were at least 30 other divers who
were learning to dive that day, so i waited until most of them were out of
the water and out of the way.
Dive Site: Breakwater Beach
i drove down from SF the 75 miles for a late afternoon of solo diving. the
entry into the water was a gentle beach during low tide. apparently, the
two best spots to go are along the east wall heading due W, which makes for
a beautiful artificial reef and anchor for tons of kelp, and an old
anchovie pipeline running from shore straight out into the bay. i chose
the wall. i swam out 50 yards before dropping to the sandy bottom and
followed the wall, which made for a beautiful artificial reef. along it
were tons of anemones, starfish, and massive kelp columns. for the
uninitiated, kelp forest diving is a real treat--the long underwater
columns creates a natural habitat for fish and the otters/seals that hunt
them, and the play of sunlight and shadows is dazzling. i didn't dive with
a knife, but i would typically recommend it (my other kelp-diving
experience was on Catalina Island, just off of the los angeles coast--i
would highly recommend that place if in the LA area). getting caught up in
a few kelp vines isn't hard to get free from--a good hard tug is enough.
any more than a few vines requires a dive knife. the density of kelp was
low at Breakwater beach, so it wasn't a problem. amongst a ton of sealife,
including sculpin-like fish (i dunno if they were actual sculpin), skate,
and others, i spotted a 4-ft brown-speckled fish (maybe 90 lbs) with a
massive head similar to a wolf fish sans the protruding teeth--i tried
looking it up in my Marine Life book, but to no avail. sadly, no otters or
other large mammals (besides other divers) were around. the colors were
similar, but more vibrant, compared to those in cape ann. after an easy
jaunt out, i headed back in and tried to avoid the schools of first-time
divers who were stirring up the sand like an arabian sandstorm.
as a side note, i rented from Aquarius Divers, located only 1 mile from the
beach. very friendly, lots of patient advice about where to go. next
time, Point Lobos and North Monestery beach.
- matt
Magnolia Rocks
Divers:
Hi Folks,
We (Me, Robert Granetz, Mike Hobbs, Peter Kerrebrock, and Kirill Zhurovich)
headed out for a morning of diving at Magnolia Rocks this morning. The
forecast called for a sunny morning with a cloudy afternoon, but I guess it
was wrong. (All I know is that when I left my house it was sunny, but it
turned cloudy somewhere around Quincy...) When we got in the water a
little after nine, it was starting to drizzle, and reports from other
divers we ran into were that it started pouring while we were
underwater. Peter and I headed out together, while Kirill and Robert
paired up. Mike was making his first dives in Massachusetts and was pretty
shocked by the water temperature and slippery rocks. Welcome to New
England diving, I guess!
Both groups headed out roughly south, and returned to the north. I had an
exciting moment shortly after descending to about 30 ft., when I went to
breathe from my regulator and got a mouthful of water - what had happened
was that the mouthpiece had slipped off the regulator body and I ended up
swallowing a gulp of seawater. No trickle of saltwater as a warning, just
a total surprise. I wasn't sure what had happened (had my first stage
leaked? had a hose connection broken?), so I started up towards the
surface while I grabbed my octopus. After surfacing with my octo and
collecting myself again, I rejoined Peter and we headed off. After
thinking about it, I realized that I could have just used the regulator
without the mouthpiece, but I think my initial surprise hindered clear
thinking. Lesson well learned.
During our dive, which had unusually good visibility, about 20 ft., Peter
found the largest lobster that I've seen on shore dive - it must have been
at least five pounds, but alas, it had eggs and must have known it was
safe. I named it Mr. Pinchy, but nobody seemed to get the joke. (Doesn't
anyone watch the Simpsons?) We found a few others, but all of them were
too short. It's good to see them out though - many more than the last
dive. We spent 35 minutes at 36 feet, where I saw water temperatures of
40-41 degrees, and I think Robert and Kirill did about the same. We ended
up surfacing right about where we entered, which was surprising since I was
pretty lax about navigation.
After taking a look at the surf, which had increased quite a bit since the
first dive, we decided to call it a day and retire to the ice cream place
off of 128. Good dive, and it's nice to be getting back to regular diving.
We're discussing plans for future dives - there seems to be a demand for
some easy shore diving for people who are getting back into the sport, so I
was thinking about setting up a shore dive here on the south shore - most
of the dive sites don't get deeper than about 30 feet and generally have
easy, pebbly beach entries. Anyone up for a dive at Brant Rock in
Marshfield? It's also a great site for a night dive.
'til the next dive,
- Chris
Pebble Beach night dive
Divers:
Last Thursday night (5/13) Nikolai Schwertner (dive organizer), Mike Hobbs,
Kate Jenkins, Jim Flavin and myself headed up to Cape Ann for an evening
and night dive. Heavy traffic in the dive shop and on the roads delayed
our departure from the Rt 128 Burger King parking lot, so we figured on
making just the night dive, but that left us enough time for a leisurely
review of the possible dive sites. The evening was clear and cool, with a
moderate wind from the North. We met briefly at Folly Cove where there was
a small surge on the rocky beach. It was getting toward dusk, so assessing
the vis by peering down into the water from atop a rock was deemed
unreliable. We elected to try a location with an easier entry (and shorter
walk from the car!), so around to Pebbly Beach we drove. There were small
waves breaking here, too, but no matter, we were ready to go!
After suiting up we waddled down to the beach (a wide swath of fist-size
stones that now covers a shore-side road) and into the water. Mike was
beached soon after by a broken mask. We had one flag for the remaining
four of us, so although we were buddied in two groups of two (Nikolai and
Jim; Kate and myself), we pretty much stayed together for the entire
dive. The vis was as good as you can expect for New England, and in my
experience well better than average at 20 to 25 feet. I had a new light
project with me (the latest contraption to emerge from my basement, the
"photon torpedo" which puts out 50W or 100W depending on how many bulbs are
burning), so I was either going to dive in a bright pool of light or in the
puny yellow puddles of my back-up lights, depending on whether on not the
thing flooded. I'm pleased to say it didn't flood (not a drop!) and I had
a very pleasant dive, as it seems everyone did.
The pebbly beach gives way to soft sand in about 6 feet of water, and this
extends out several hundred feet to a depth of about 25 feet and a rocky
bottom crawling with creatures. The sandy bottom makes navigation easy,
just swim perpendicular to the little ridges on the bottom, and you're
either going more or less in or out (use a compass to decide which). Kate
and I saw numerous fish including a sculpin, a sleepy flounder who didn't
mind being caught (and released), a crab with eggs, a moon snail, lots of
shorts, and a male keeper that was probably 1 1/2 pounds, but alas, this is
Massachusetts (not Rhode Island) and night time is when our native lobsters
can wave their claws at us in taunts. Throughout the dive I could hear the
rattle of the cobbles tumbling in the surf at the beach, and there was a
gentle back-and-forth swaying surge along the bottom. We maxed out at
about 30-35 feet and a bottom time of about 40 minutes. The water temp
seemed warm at about 47 F.
After a brief struggle with the small surf and loose rocks we all made it
back to shore and gravity. I had to remind Jim that the lights I loaned
him would melt if used out of water, so we stumbled up the beach in the
dark. Expecting a late night as it was, Mike Jim and myself packed up to
leave, but Kate and Nikolai were last seen heading down to the water for
another dive. We'll have to wait for their second-dive report.
- Peter K.
Halibut Point State Park
Divers:
Well, I for one think the person coordinating this hike should be banned
from all future organizing activities...
First of all, she was later than her usual 15 minutes that we have come to
expect...Second, she had locked herself out of the locker and could not get
a dive flag until the day of the dive- oh, I mean hike...Third, she really
cannot drive... and fourth, did anyone tell her this was a dive she was
planning and not a hiking trip?
The Halibut Point TREK could not have been done on a better day. It was
sunny, just hot enough to sun yourself on the rocks but not so hot that you
were boiling up. A lovely light breeze to keep you cool as you went down
the hill, then up the hill, then down the hill, then up the hill, then down
the hill...you get the picture...
But seriously, the dive report
Halibut Point 5/1/04
Attending: Robert Granetz, Kate Jenkins, Jason La Penta, Sam Peretz, Peter
Kerrebrock, Shawn Mattison, Chris Russo, AnaClaire Meyer and our favorite
not yet a diver- Sarah
Nothing short of sheer insanity and stubborness made us do this, but we did
it!
On that map of Cape Ann where they say the walk to Halibut Point is long, I
think they should have written LONG!!!
The day was perfect, the water was 37F at 50 ft and 39F at 30 ft and a
balmy 42F or so in the shallows. The visibility was a delightful 3-10 feet
with the plankton and all the spawning fish/crustaceans/etc. There was
little chop and although Robert G vehemently denies it, there was a slight
current heading SSW or so.
High tide was just about 8:45am or so. The best diving was in about 20 ft
of water where there was better light, better visibility and lots to look
at. The terrain is big granite slabs both above water and below, and be
careful the black algae on the rocks is SLIPPERY!
Also, boats tend to come in really close to the shore so this is one place
you definitely need a dive flag.
Dive #1...
Robert, Chris and Peter headed out at 60 degrees and went out to about 50 ft
of depth. This dive was notable for Robert catching a sculpin in his
teeth!
ok, he caught it in his hands...
Kate, AnaClaire, Jason, and Sam went out as a group and managed to get
separated because of poor visibility. Everyone made it back ok despite
AnaClaire trying to get everyone killed by keeping the dive flag
underwater. This dive was mostly cold though there were abundant sea
urchins, some interesting rose like egg casings and bright purple stars.
We made it out to about 30 ft of depth with a heading of 90 degrees and
swam like mad against a current to get back.
Dive #2
Shawn (the only person who gets up later than AnaClaire) joined us for the
second dive and Peter and Sam headed home.
Robert, Chris and Kate headed in for the second dive and did not have much
to talk about when they came back.
Shawn, Jason and AnaClaire had a great time. We headed out at about 130
degrees, aiming to mostly hug the shore at about 20 feet.
As we peered through the haze, we saw:
Sarah, apparently the only sane one in the bunch, had a lovely nap.
Post dive
Some of us went for ice cream at the Industrial Park exit which I believe
is exit 21...the "baby" size is two large scoops for $2.35 and the "small"
is three scoops for $2.90. Can someone tell me why don't we go there after
every dive?
And of course, the big question...Would I go back despite the brutal hike
to get there?
not sure.
Thanks for a fun dive everyone! My apologies for the coordination (or lack
thereof)!
- AnaClaire
Folly Cove
Divers:
Yesterday, John Armstrong, Chris Ranney, Eric Downes, and I
did some Patriots Day diving at Folly Cove. Although the warm weather was
not good for marathon runners, it was great for divers. Chris is one of
the instructors that taught our O2 and CPR class in December, and Eric is a
former scuba club member who was doing his first dives in a while. Eric
was diving wet; the rest of us were in drysuits.
Folly Cove was an excellent choice for a dive site yesterday, since it was
very well protected from the strong SW winds. We arrived a little before
10:00, and were starting our surface swims to the left side of the cove by
10:40. I got a water temperature reading of 42 F at the surface,
decreasing to 40 F at depth. This is warm enough so that my hands didn't
get cold this time, even with all the holes in the fingertips of my gloves.
Chris brought a digital camera along, and made good use of it despite the
rather poor visibility. He snapped pictures at a furious rate, eventually
filling up all of the camera's memory. At this point the other divers
turned around and headed back, while I continued on in a fruitless search
for lobster. There weren't even any in the few traps that I came across.
I did find an intact, toothed jawbone (mandible), which we later speculated
may have come from a bluefish. During my return along the sandy bottom of
the cove, I stumbled across a big winter flounder, which may have been
sleeping, since my clumsy movement hadn't scared it away. I puzzled for a
moment, trying to figure out how to catch it without having a spear or
fork. I finally unclipped my catch bag and shoved it down right in front
of the fish's face. It worked! The fish shot right into the bag.
Back on shore, we soaked up the warm sunshine while Chris gave me pointers
on how to filet a flounder. After an hour+ surface interval, Eric and I
headed out along the right side for a 2nd dive. After about 10 minutes I
felt my flag line suddenly go slack. The rubber link had snapped. We
surfaced and tried to swim after the flag, but the strong winds were
carrying it out to open water much faster than we could swim. Oh well,
that flag is nearly a decade old, and it had more patches on it than
original material. We submerged back down and continued the dive without
further incident.
After everyone's gear was all packed up, the four of us went to the lobster
shanty just up the road and ate some tasty fried seafood while seated at
the outside tables next to the cove, basking in the warm sunshine. This
was the perfect way to spend the holiday. When I got home, I cleaned and
fileted the flounder, breaded and baked it, and voila... my family loved
it!
- Robert G
Winter wreck dives
Divers:
Although I didn't get anyone from the club to go diving on Sunday, I did
get a call from Cape Ann Divers saying that they had a boat going out to
the wrecks of the Poling and the Nina-T, and there was a seat with my name
on it if I wanted it. Yes, I'm there! This was actually the first dive
charter of the year for Cape Ann Divers, since the harbor had just thawed
out a week earlier. I thought this was particularly fitting, since I was
also on their last dive charter of 2003 (along with John Armstrong); kind
of like being at both the season opener and the season finale.
The weather was overcast with a light snow falling when I arrived at the
dock. We were on the big boat, which was really roomy, given that there
were only 4 other divers besides me. They were all tech divers, with
double tanks, argon drysuit bottles, high-intensity lamps, etc. All I had
were single 80 ft3 aluminum tanks (with plain air) and a pony bottle.
Fortunately, I don't have any inferiority complex about my equipment. (Pun
intended.) I did actually have a brand new regulator (Zeagle Envoy 1st and
2nd stages... raved about in Rodale's Scuba magazine, and only $300) that I
bought just a few weeks ago. However, I didn't know yet how it would
perform in winter conditions, so I didn't want it to be my primary reg on
these deep dives. (Last February there was a fatality on a Cape Ann Divers
trip to the Poling which was caused by a malfunctioning reg in the ice cold
water.) So I hooked up the new reg to my pony bottle and continued to use
my old one as my primary.
Our first dive was on the Poling (my 16th dive on the Poling). It wasn't
until we were nearing the dive site that the captain discovered that the
cabin heater WASN'T WORKING!!. This meant there was going to be a lot of
shivering during the surface interval. Not only that, but he didn't have
the hangbar setup either. Anyway, it was high tide, so my max depth was
30.8 m (101 ft), and the water temp was 2 deg C. Visibility was pretty
good...about 20 ft. I did a little penetration of the wreck this time,
going down the central stairway hatch, turning to port along the short
hallway, and into one of the crew's quarters. I could see some of the
other divers in the adjoining room. After exiting, I strolled around to
the broken end, and peeked into the fractured pipe where I had seen a
lobster before. Sure enough there was a lobster in there, maybe even the
same one. I considered trying to get him, but my hands basically felt like
two balls of ice...no dexterity, no feeling. I told the lobster that I'd
be back for him when the water warmed up. I circled back to the stern,
reaching the mooring line just as my dive computer was about to hit the
no-deco limit.
After getting back on the boat, the only thing anyone could think about was
going into the cabin to warm up, but as I said, the CABIN HEATER WAS NOT
WORKING! Just one of the rewards for being on the first charter of the
year. (I usually can't go into the cabin because I'll get seasick, but
these wrecks are so close to the Dog Bar Breakwater that the captain takes
the boat back behind it into the calm harbor for the surface interval, and
even I don't get seasick in the cabin. But just to remind you, the CABIN
HEATER WAS NOT WORKING! So my whole body was shivering, and my hands
pretty much stayed frozen. The captain had prepared some tasty snacks for
us, which I could just barely pick up with my hands and get into my mouth.
Then, one of the tech divers announced that he was just too cold, and he
wouldn't be doing the second dive. For a moment I worried that all the
other divers would bail out also, leaving just me, but fortunately that
didn't happen. I went out on deck and changed over my tanks, which is
pretty difficult with numb fingers. (Since all the other divers had
doubles, they didn't have to do this.)
The second dive was on the Nina-T. Max depth was 32.4 m (106 ft), and the
water temp was +1 deg C. Vis was about 15 feet. This was my 8th time on
the Nina-T. On my most recent dive here last summer, I had finally figured
out the layout of this fishing trawler...the mooring line on the winch, the
pilot house aft of the winch, the large mast up towards the bow, and the
whole boat pitched steeply onto its starboard side. But we were in for a
big surprise...the Nina-T has broken apart over the winter! It's now just
a debris field. Bummer! I tried to mentally re-assemble the pieces, but I
just couldn't get my orientation. It doesn't look like a boat anymore. I
also couldn't find the mooring line for a while either, because the piece
of debris that the mooring line is tied to looks just like any other piece
of debris there. For some reason, I warmed up a lot on this dive, although
my hands were still only partially functional. When I got back to the
mooring line, I discovered that the other 3 divers were already up the
mooring line somewhere, so I began my ascent too, even though I still had a
couple of minutes of no-deco time left.
By the time I got back on deck after a 3-minute safety stop, I was quite
warm, and even my hands were okay. And I had confirmed that my new Zeagle
reg doesn't spontaneously free-flow in freezing water. But I didn't get a
chance to actually breathe from it at depth, so I'll have to test that out
during a shore dive in the next couple of weeks.
- Robert G
Magnolia Rocks
Divers:
There's no question about it, winter is my favorite season. And with so
many outdoor activities to do during the winter months, it's a challenge to
squeeze in some dive time. So even though this past weekend was frigid, it
was my only chance to dive this month. I was really tempted to go out on
Saturday with the temperatures in the single digits, but I showed some
degree of sanity by waiting until Sunday, when the temperatures were in the
teens. Since I was diving solo, my wife actually agreed to accompany me to
Magnolia Rocks, and watch from the confines of the heated car. It was
close to high tide when we arrived at the site, and we immediately noticed
a rather brisk wind. The surf was not bad, but as each small wave
withdrew, a little more ice would be added to the coating on the rocks. I
suited up quickly and sl
Monday, 20 December 2004
Author: Effie Kitsou
Date: Dec. 20th 2004
Duration: 35 min
Max depth: 6.7 m/22 ft
Temperature: 21 C/69.8 F
Saturday, 18 December 2004
Authors: Robert Granetz, Chris Russo
I thought I'd chime in as well - hope everyone is enjoying the holidays -
I'm too stuffed from Christmas dinner to move at the moment. Too add to
what Robert reported, I'm a little disappointed that our plan to nab the
pipe lobster didn't work. It's a little depressing to admit how many
purportedly intelligent divers this crustacean with about four neurons has
outsmarted over the years. Oh well.
Sunday, 21 November 2004
Author: Robert Granetz
Sunday, 10 October 2004
Author: John Hebert
Max Depth: 30 ft
Temp: 53 degrees
Saturday, 02 October 2004
Authors: Peter Kerrebrock and Chris Russo
Well, my dive karma made up for not having been able to get out during all
of August by giving me two great weekends of wreck-diving in a row. On
Saturday, Carl, Peter and I left Boston at an absurd hour (bars in
Providence were closing as we drove through it) to dive the wreck of the
U-853 with well-run Ninigret Divers. We left so early because Peter and I
planned to penetrate the control room and engine rooms, and there was
another boat leaving New London for the 853 that we feared would silt up
the interior. Peter and I carpooled down together, but we were soon caught
on I-95 by Carl "Leadfoot" Stjernfeldt, who cajoled us to pick up the pace
with frequent phone calls.
Sunday, 26 September 2004
Authors: Chris Russo, Robert Granetz, Peter Kerrebrock
Max depth: 32.4 m (106 ft)
Water temp: 8 C (46 F)
To add to Robert and Chris's reports, a few more observations, mostly to
flag a few differences between this operation and a well run outfit like
CAD. The captain certainly seemed to have plenty of experience, but it was
a budget operation (the only way he could do it for the low price he
charged, I suppose), and he was rather cavalier and cut corners in many
ways. 1. This was a gasoline engine powered boat and there was an odor of
gas in the cabin, but I never heard the sound of a bilge blower before he
started the engines. 2. I don't know about anyone else, but I thought the
boarding ladder was way too short and flimsy (there were only two rungs),
and to make matters worse it was offset to the side from the hand-holds on
the transom, so getting out of the water was pretty awkward. 3. He
anchored with a Danforth anchor which is suitable for hooking the bottom,
but generally isn't used to hook wrecks because they tend to sail as they
descend and can miss the wreck (the wreck in this case was so big it hardly
mattered). It is more common to use a grapple anchor, since it sinks
straight down and will generally only hold in debris but not the
bottom. When hooking a wreck, it is common practice to let out a little
more line than the water depth and let the boat drift a bit dragging the
anchor until you think it is hooked, then pull the line nearly vertical
(making an allowance for sea state). If you are actually hooked in debris,
the anchor shouldn't come out even under a lot of tension. If you're
hooked in the bottom, the anchor should pull out, then you can try
again. But he had enough line out for the Danforth to hold both in the
wreck or the bottom, so as Chris pointed out, we really didn't know if we
were hooked in the wreck at all. 3. Another consequence of the anchor
line being long and at a low angle is that it was more difficult to
maintain depth while hanging. I noticed that as people congregated at hang
points then moved apart, the hang depth kept changing due to the varying
load on the line. 4. Lastly, there was leaving the anchor in the wreck
when the last person had come up, which cost him his anchor. Robert did
have the presence of mind to loosen the anchor, but that didn't ensure it
wouldn't rehook. Before the last dive we were discussing what should be
done with the anchor (usually the last one up at least wraps some of the
anchor line in the flukes to ensure the anchor pulls out backwards so it
doesn't rehook, and there are many other more creative ways of dealing with
the anchor that people have invented). But the captain told us not to
bother, just leave it. He used the engines to pull the line through a
large float that slides on the line, which is a technique used by fishermen
who anchor in really deep water and don't have an anchor winch. As the
boat drives off, the float slides down the anchor line and causes it to
pull on the anchor at a high angle, disengaging the anchor from the
bottom. Then the float slides back to the anchor and prevents it from
sinking again, and the line can be pulled in with little effort. But the
anchor was still caught in the wreck, so it wasn't going to pull out even
if hauled vertical. When the line came taught, the float submerged and the
boat suddenly stopped and slewed to the side. He pulled with the engines
from a different angle, and this time the line snapped at the anchor, and
the float slid off the broken end of the line. We did go back for the
float, though.
Saturday, 11 September 2004
Author: Mike Hobbs
Wednesday evening, 01 September 2004
Author: Chris Russo
Sunday, 29 August 2004
Author: Louis Cheng
Wednesday night, 18 August 2004
Authors: Peter Kerrebrock, Robert Granetz, John Armstrong
Peter's dive report covered just about everything, so I have only a couple
of things to add. It's just incredible how poorly wreck reels perform in
actual practice. I think John was using a new "tangle-proof" reel that he
had purchased recently. He had tied this off to one of the steps on the
stairway (scuttle) that descended into the wreck. Seemingly within seconds
the line was jammed around the reel, completely defeating the whole purpose
of using the thing. From this physicist's perspective, it's as if the
nylon cord's lowest energy state is when it's tangled around the reel, and
as soon as you let go of the line, it rapidly seeks its ground state.
Peter claims that thicker cord, or other cord material (such as
polypropylene), is less prone to this problem. Now maybe being in a wreck
at 90 feet at night might make things a little more challenging that usual,
but I personally think that this piece of gear is in serious need of a
complete redesign. Some clever person should be able to come up with
something much more user friendly.
I will echo the notes of my co-conspirators in all regards save one: The
tangle-proof reel did, in fact, not tangle. Extra line did spool off the
reel and wrap around the body, but pulling on the free end cleared the
excess immediately. I am embarrassed to admit, however, that much of the
time wasted in stowing the line was due to inadequate setup - in other
words it was operator error. Because I had not yet fitted the line with
the tech-diver-preferred, girl's-hair-wangy, plastic ball, I spent a
couple of annoying minutes at 90 ft trying to tease apart thin kevlar
line with fingers swaddled in neoprene and fleece. I am headed to CVS
this very afternoon to rectify this problem forever.
Sunday, 01 August 2004
Author: Jordan Stanway
Saturday, 24 July 2004
Author: Kirill Zhurovich
Fri-Sun July 2004
Authors: R. Granetz and C. Russo
-----------
On Saturday morning, we left Hoboken, headed across Manhattan, and ended up
on LI, where we headed out with the Sea Hunter III
(www.seahunter.org)
to dive the wreck of the San Diego. For those of you who haven't dived the
sites, there's a good sketch of what the wreck looks like on the bottom at:
Sunday, 18 July 2004
Author: Bill Lyons
Saturday, 10 July 2004
Author: Robert Granetz
Saturday, 03 July 2004
Author: Chris Russo
Saturday, 26 June 2004
Author: Chris Russo
Stage Fort Park, Gloucester
Saturday evening, 19 June 2004
Author: Jordan Stanway
Wednesday, 16 June 2004
Author: Peter Kerrebrock
Saturday, 12 June 2004
Authors: Chris Russo (Paddock Rock) and John Armstrong (Kettle Island)
John: (to Robert) No way, you go in there and get it!
Robert: Come on, go get it.
John: Not a chance, buddy.
June 2004
Author: Matt Grein
1) shore access to deep water
2) kelp--attracts tons of beautiful sealife
3) otters and seals
4) visability 20-40 ft.
Ocean Temp: 50's F
Air Temp: 75 F
Ocean Current: NA
Max Depth: 45 ft
Scuba Shop: Aquarius Divers
http://www.aquariusdivers.com/
Sunday, 16 May 2004
Author: Chris Russo
Thursday night, 13 May 2004
Author: Peter Kerrebrock
Saturday, 01 May 2004
Author: AnaClaire Meyer
- one flounder (not sure what species or whether it was a right or left
hander);
- two crazy crabs with stuff hanging all over their shells;
- some tiny brittle stars wedged in every imaginable crevice;
- tons of sea urchins (do they purposely stick stuff to their spines for
camoflauge or is that accidental)
- a crazy soft coral looking thing hiding underneath a crevice
- lots of little baby shrimp and I swear I saw a baby lobster complete with
two little claws
Monday, 19 April 2004 (Patriots Day)
Author: Robert Granetz
Sunday, 22 Feb 2004
Author: Robert Granetz
Sunday, 11 January 2004
Author: Robert Granetz