Once again the weekend arrived with more west-southwest wind in what was shaping up to be an almost exact repeat of last weekend. It is just a lousy weather pattern, but as I have said before, at least it’s not an east wind. Anyway, the story is the same – west winds around 20 knots with seas at 3 feet is where we started on Saturday morning. Oh joy. We left the marina with a hearty group headed for the Brenton Reef Lightship. With the hope our mooring would still be there, we had planned to pull out our old broken one to clean things up a bit and get some of our tackle back. It gets expensive constantly putting in moorings, but more than that, I believe that our moorings on the Lightship are getting cut by fisherman because they disappear all too frequently. This irks me. Anyway we cruised out to the wreck in a fairly smooth ride … and it was not surprising it would be a smooth ride because the sea was on our tail. But when we turned circling around the wreck we were able to fully appreciate the conditions – which were basically pretty crummy. We spent some time searching for the mooring hoping we were just missing it in the glare or it was obscured by the surface chop, but it was in fact gone. We decided 2 moorings in about as many months were enough for this time of year and we headed for the Talisman, which does a pretty good job of hanging onto a mooring. Running towards the south we were taking the sea basically straight on our starboard bow, so it was a wet ride, but we arrived on the Talisman to find the mooring intact. The group suited up and splashed while Dan, Roman and I waited topside for Dave to return. It was bouncy out there but it wasn’t too bad because we were at least sitting right with our head to the wind. When Dave returned he said the visibility was about 10-12 feet on the bottom. Not too surprising… I’ll take it. We suited up and splashed. Sure enough we had excellent visibility in the water column, but by the time we reached the bottom it was a murky 10-12 feet. We still managed a decent tour of the wreck and even saw some small fish here and there. Our decompression was uneventful and pretty comfortable as long as the last stop was held at 20 feet. We headed up just shy of an hour run time and steamed home. Sunday our plan was to dive the Reliance and hopefully get in some good rebreather scooter diving. But the sea conditions were not looking too good. This time we had mostly southwest winds around 20-25 knots and again seas around 3 feet. We headed out aiming for the Reliance, but we started taking the sea pretty hard a few miles out so we turned in for the Romance. In a mainly SW wind will have the Romance has the most lee out of all the sites except perhaps the City of Salisbury and Kiowa, which while sheltered from wind, might be a problem with current if we hit it at the wrong time. We also knew there was no mooring on the Reliance and in these conditions we did not want to try and put one in. This was a pretty tight, hard chop 3 foot sea. Surface work, especially when it comes to picking up and handling lines is not easy so if you can hit a wreck with a mooring on a rough day, it makes life a lot easier. But we were going to have to do some line work on the Romance, because the mooring on the wreck was just downright dangerous where it was tied in. We got lucky last week with decent visibility, but if we didn’t get that visibility again and divers were dropping down on a violently swinging piece of wreckage, someone could get hurt. When we got on site we picked up the existing mooring so we could get the boat in place and secure ourselves. Dave splashed in and we fed him down a new line. Up in the bow Scott and I paid out the line and cleated it off when the line slacked. Dave tied in this new line and then cut out the old mooring – when he cut the old mooring line, we just fell back on the new mooring. We watched the tension on the lines and when one went taught the other went slack, and we pulled up the old line. Since Dave ran the new line through the Gloucester ring on the granny line, everything was neat and tidy all rigged up – a perfect swap out and now a safer situation. Sometimes in low visibility on this wreck you tie into whatever you crash into. Later when you can actually see your hands you might realize it wasn’t the best place to tie in. In this case whatever kind of engine machinery this was (looked like a connecting rod); it became dislodged from the stain of boats yanking on the line. Once the lines were set, the pool was officially open and everyone suited up and splashed in. When Dave returned we asked about the visibility since Scott, Roman and I were still contemplating taking the scooters. Dave said the visibility was "like last week", which I thought was pretty good and definitely worth taking the scooters in for. But as others starting returning aboard, visibility reports were putting things more along the lines of 3-5 feet – definitely not what we had last week. After much squabbling Dave starting coming down on his estimates and we collectively settled on "lousy" as the visibility report and therefore decided to leave the scooters aboard. We splashed in sans-scooters dropped down to the wreck. I think leaving them behind was a good call – visibility was about 5-7 feet at most and it was a milky/murky kind of visibility. We swam the entire length of the shaft, which when you’re looking at a few feet of it at a time seems a lot longer than it probably is. Then Scott tied off his reel and we headed out in any which direction until we ran out of wreck, then we went another way. We did this for about 45 minutes before calling it a dive and heading up. All in all not a bad dive, but I sure didn’t get my scooter fix for the weekend. When we returned aboard, we made a few minor adjustments to the length of the mooring and then headed home. It was a decent weekend of diving in difficult conditions, but this seems to be the weather pattern we are stuck in. Granted it could be worse, but suffice it to say it could also be better.

The week of mostly decent, unseasonably warm weather ended on Friday with an evening of heavy rain, storm force wind gusts and then cold air temperatures. Strong west winds arrived and winds were steady at 25-35 kts – not good. The forecast was for diminishing winds over the course of the day, so we figured that we’d take a shot at heading up to the Poling to see how it looked. A west wind is not entirely favorable for the Poling, or anything else on the leeward side of Cape Ann, but we decided to try. We departed just after 9 am, pushing it out a little bit to try and take advantage of the forecasted conditions improvement. We had a pretty smooth ride, which was not unexpected since we had a following sea. Arriving up on the Poling it initially looked like things were not that bad, rough for sure, but doable still. We got tied in and scoped out plenty of line – conditions weren’t looking real good and in fact it seemed the wind was picking up. We settled in and waited to make sure we weren’t going to break out of the mooring, got the lines in and then started suiting up divers. Dave and I decided to bag our dives to remain onboard in case we did break out. On a day like this, having 2 people aboard in case we needed to live boat seemed prudent. Anyway, we held on the mooring and everyone made their dives. Visibility was reported to be about 10 feet. Cape Ann Divers popped out from behind the breakwater a little before 11 am – they wisely decided to head north to find flat water instead of making a run at the Poling. We finished up and headed in, wanting to get out of there ASAP since the wind was definitely not diminishing after all. We got back and called it a day. The weather was looking better for Sunday, though nothing could be certain… not only did we need the wind to calm down, but we really needed a wind shift to a NW direction. Indeed this came to be and Sunday morning looked very nice. We headed out for a low-key charter to simply enjoy the day out on the ex-USS New Hampshire off Manchester. With some of the regular gang, plus a new few new faces, we loaded up and headed out ready for some fun. Conditions were nice out off Grave’s Island, so we anchored up and the first divers started splashing in. Visibility looked really good, which was just what we were hoping for. Dave headed in first with Scott while Kristen, Aaron and I stayed topside. We broke out the soup and got the pot cooking so everyone could grab a hot cup of soup upon surfacing. Once Dave returned, Aaron and I suited up and splashed in. This was the first time we’ve gotten in with the scooters and the rebreathers, so I was glad for a low key "shakedown" dive. One thing about scooters is that with them it’s possible to have very rapid depth changes, which is usually something rebreathers don’t like – especially on descent where you can either spike or drive down your PO2, along with making it harder to maintain loop volume. I wanted to see how this would go so I practiced a few descents bombing down to 20-30 ft. It wasn’t too bad on the loop volume if you stayed ahead of it, of course the suit squeeze hurt pretty bad and my ears weren’t thanking me much – there are only so many places your one remaining hand can be at once…. Diluent add, suit inflation, equalize – this technique will need some refining! Anyway, riding on the rebreather wasn’t too much different than on open circuit, though a few items need to move to avoid getting in the way of the tow rope. What it all amounts to is more task loading and more refinement in buoyancy, which on the rebreather can go from "beautiful" to "horror show" with enough of a change in depth, loop volume, whatever – and on a scooter this can all happen real fast. The only other thing was that I found the DSV was starting to hurt my mouth from the strain of the flow on the breathing hoses. After about an hour my lower gum was hurting from the pressure of the mouthpiece. I find the DSV on the PRISM a bit heavy out of the water anyway, and with the increased flow from the scootering it was a little more noticeable in the water. All in all it was a great day… visibility was a solid 25 ft – perfect scootering conditions. These things are so cool. It was good to see some new faces out on the boat. Thanks to Kristen for helping with the food and taking pictures. We’ll do these types of dives again over the course the winter and next season, so if you’re looking for a low key day of fun, join us…

What was shaping up to be a fun-filled, jam-packed weekend of diving quickly eroded away into a big disappointment beginning on Thursday when a major coastal storm struck the region. Rain, wind, 13 foot seas… the whole nine yards … spelled the end of diving on Friday for sure. We were hopeful for Saturday as the wind was predicted to fall off leaving heavy ground swell, but when I checked the conditions that morning, there was still a 9 foot swell running, with winds forecast for NE 15-20 knots in the early part of the day. Last time we ran in an 8 foot swell a few years ago there was a lot of puking, no visibility and hard surge at depth. So we reluctantly cancelled the dive. We considered making a run to the quarry in CT to play with scooters and rebreathers, but instead we decided to catch up on fixing some gear. It seems like you have it good when, for example, you have a healthy collection of regulators … one goes down, just grab another… but eventually there are no working ones left, and they all need service. What do you do then? Buy another new one? Sometimes this is the solution. Anyway, we worked on the boat, worked on gear and hoped Sunday would give us a break and allow us to get out.  The conditions improved over the day on Saturday and things looked promising for Sunday.  Sure enough when I checked the conditions on Sunday morning, seas were down to 3-4 feet, mainly in swell. The wind was forecast to be light so we were going. Worst case, we would have no visibility and a heavy easterly swell, but whatever, at this point we would take it.  At this point something was better than nothing.  We loaded up and headed out. The weather was otherwise beautiful with unseasonably mild air temperatures. The wind however was much stronger than forecast. Great. We cleared the islands and it got pretty rough. There was an easterly swell with a hard southerly chop running on top of it. Seas were probably 2-4’ on top of the swell. It was definitely nasty out there with a wet, bumpy ride, but we made it out to the Talisman where we found the mooring was still intact. Of course given the wind and tide we were sitting oddly so we were basically beam-to in the sea – come on, can’t we catch a break here? – but we made ready to dive. Jeff, Pat and I suited up and splashed in. Surface conditions were lousy down to about 20-30 feet and then it improved. Mid water visibility was not bad. On the bottom the visibility was a murky ~ 10 feet. Old broken moorings had worked their way loose, probably from the heavy swells churning up the bottom, so there were old lines floating up everywhere in the vicinity of the mooring. I got out my knife and had a cutting party.  Anyway, we puttered around the wreck after cleaning up the lines a bit and then headed up. I expected worse visibility, and while it wasn't great, it wasn't terrible either.  We decompressed uneventfully, surfaced and then called it a day. We had considered going back out for a shallow water scooter run, but conditions didn’t suggest that would be worthwhile. I suppose we should be grateful for the one dive we did get, but it was still disappointing considering that it was beautiful all week up to Thursday, and of course got nice again on Monday just in time to go back to work.  We definitely did not get our fill of diving for this weekend.  But I guess there's always next weekend to look forward to.

After a great time playing down in Buzzards Bay last weekend, it was time to head back up to our usual stomping ground in Massachusetts Bay. This weekend we officially kicked off the "winter season" with a later departure time, and only one charter per day. Sleeping in a bit later is a nice treat, and allows us to load with a little daylight and perhaps warmer air temperatures. We met Saturday morning with plans to dive the Brenton Reef Lightship. The weather had been all over the place over the last few days, but when the music stopped, we had light winds, fair seas and extremely mild temperatures – unseasonably warm for November. But we’ll take it. We headed out for the Lightship and arrived in good time. While we were sincerely hoping our mooring was still there, we suspected it would not be there, especially given the recent weather over the Halloween weekend a few weeks prior. When we arrived indeed our mooring was gone – most likely from a storm, but its always possible the line was cut by a fisherman because there were plenty of traps in the area. Anyway, Dave and Peter headed in and tied in a new mooring. Conditions were pretty nice, though the wind was slowly spinning around towards the Southeast… bad weather certainly was coming. When Dave returned, Dan and I suited up and splashed in next. Visibility reports put it around a murky 10 feet or so, which wasn’t surprising given the weather. The Lightship also seems to be one of those places where the visibility is lousy more often than its not. I think I have a handful of dives there in really nice visibility. The rest have been in the 5-12’ range. Anyway, we started down and reached about 90 feet – there it appeared Dan was having a free flow as bubbles were coming up around his head, but when I came in to assist, it was in fact his drysuit inlet valve. I popped the hose off as quickly as possible – and then the valve fell apart in my hands. Nice valve. I handed Dan back his parts and he aborted the dive. I can’t say that I have seen that happen too many times, but it was a bummer, especially since it flooded his suit. Anyway, I continued down to the wreck and made a dive of it. We were tied into the high side just above the forward hold. I puttered around the wreck for awhile and then ascended, decompressing uneventfully amidst schools of dogfish that followed me up all the way to 20 feet. They were very cool to watch, and mid-water visibility was pretty decent, although at one point I got a little uncomfortable when one swam out a ways and then turned swimming directly at me. It turned away a few feet from me, which was good. Anyway, I surfaced; we pulled in the lines and headed home with almost everyone having enjoyed their dives. Ironically, Dan had a spare drysuit on board, which Dan had loaned to Tim when he discovered a mouse had eaten a hole in his suit just before his dive. There’s just no winning sometimes, even if you have 2 suits! Although it was definitely Tim’s lucky day. Anyway, since there were still a few hours of daylight remaining and the weather was holding, a few of us decided to head back out to play with our new scooters. Dave, Scott and I loaded our new toys aboard and sped off for the mouth of Marblehead Harbor where we could pick up a mooring, hopefully get some decent visibility and cruise around for awhile. We got out there and the water had that putrid green look to it that usually spells "no vis"… but Dave couldn’t resist so he jumped in first to weight-test his scooter while Scott and I waited for feedback. We had handfuls of scrap lead sheeting onboard to fine tune the 2 pounds needed for salt water trim. Dave came back; we made a few adjustments to all 3 scooters and then got ready to go in ourselves. However, Dave said there was literally no visibility. The words "no visibility" are sometimes subject to interpretation, so we felt that this must just mean that the visibility was bad, but workable. So we went in. It was bad – no visibility kind of bad. When my legs hit the bottom I realized we were "there" – I’d say the visibility was about 1 foot if that. We groped around for about 5 minutes until we finally realized we could not scooter together in this kind of visibility. We surfaced and got back on board. This was thoroughly disappointing. But we would not call it quits. We were hell-bent on riding these scooters. Remaining fully suited up we convinced Dave to drive us around to the backside of Children’s Island where we could try again. The sun was sinking fast, but we weren’t going back without a ride. We splashed in and dropped down. Visibility here was about 5 feet. It was… good enough. We zoomed off. Scootering on pitch 7 in 5 feet of visibility is a little tricky, especially when trying to avoid boulders that seem to come up out of nowhere! So you can imagine how hard it was to avoid boulders when we cranked them up to pitch 9 (max speed and power). It’s like doing 80 mph on the highway at night with the lights off. But you’d be surprised how quick your reflexes can really be when a huge rock pops up in front of you. We did pretty good staying together and avoiding collisions with stuff. After about 30 min we figured we should probably come up and see what was going on. The sun was setting so we signaled that we wanted a pick up and reluctantly called it a day. It was so much fun! I’ll never swim again… Sunday the weather broke with rain, heavy at times, patchy fog, but otherwise light wind and mild temperatures so we headed out as planned for a scallop charter. I must say, we tried about 4 different sites known to be good scalloping grounds and got totally skunked. A real disappointment… The visibility was pretty tough in a couple of places (that "no visibility" thing again). Scalloping is always a crap shoot and in marginal weather it’s even tougher since wandering far off in patchy fog is a good way to get lost for a while. I headed in with my scooter for my dive – and yes I was totally afraid of getting lost in fog because the urge to "open up" and fly, fly, fly is hard to control. But it was on the boat and I couldn’t resist, so in it went. I took my compass in with me and tried to run the four points for even amounts of time so I didn’t get too lost. Eventually though I got myself somewhere I knew was too far south because my depth was all wrong and that’s when I decided to surface. I was indeed farther south than I wanted to be, but I wasn’t too far from the boat. The group out with us this day was a tough crowd, hanging in there with good spirits through the rain and fog… trying through 2 dives to find the mother lode (yup, diving is fun, uh huh). It didn’t happen, but they were good sports. Hopefully we’ll try again sometime. At the end of a very rainy day we packed up all our toys and headed home for the remaining afternoon catching up on some couch time.

Another weekend was upon us and it was chock full of diving plans. Of course the weather was a moving target, but such is life in New England in October. Nevertheless we waded our way through Salem in the early morning hours while it was still quiet. In the afternoons it gets quite crazy with traffic since on a nearly daily basis it is growing more and more "spooky" with the escalating Haunted Happenings festivities that take place in the weeks leading up to Halloween. After all, Salem is the spook capitol of the country and Pickering Wharf is right in the middle of it all, so while it makes driving through the traffic more of a hassle, we also have the benefit of seeing all the fun and weirdness that occurs during Salem’s version of Mardi Gras. Anyway, Saturday’s weather window was open for just long enough for us to sneak offshore for our "special trip" – and despite a good ground swell we were able to get out while it was still nice. As the afternoon wore on, however, conditions deteriorated and so we modified plans for the second dive to occur at a more inshore location closer to home. As it was, we rode a good snotty following sea home. The following day we were planning to stay closer to home anyway for a more inshore deep wreck, but the stiff winds and choppy seas suggested a better location would be the Poling given the wind direction. Everyone was fine with this, so we headed up to Gloucester where it was calmer. Since we had been planning on a deep dive with the possibility of being blown out to a shallower site, we have gotten in the habit of keeping a few AL80s rigged as stage bottles with bottom mix like EAN 30 in them in case we get surprised and need to dive shallow when we only have open circuit trimix around. I wish we had thought of doing this years ago because it would have saved us the hassle of dragging around extra sets of doubles and swapping over at the last minute. With a bottom stage of nitrox we just wore our trimix back gas doubles using that gas for wings inflation and breathed off the AL80 bottom stage. So Scott, Aaron and I splashed in on the Poling each diving this configuration and knocked off a 30 minute bottom time with gas to spare on one AL80. And I still had 3500 psi in my doubles to boot. Conditions were good – a mild current running across the wreck, visibility a decent 20 feet with warm water in the low 50s… not bad considering we’re creeping into the fall. We lapped the wreck taking a slow leisurely swim and then checked out the break. When we dropped off the break and poked up inside I was surprised to see the bulkhead on the far port side completely eroded away. Last time I dived the wreck it was crumbling, but now it’s clear and wide open, wide enough to swim into the oil hold this way. It’s just a matter of time now before the break end top deck collapses, at least on the port side. This is the most dramatic degradation I have seen between two dives not far apart in a long time. Anyway, we had a nice dive, surfaced and headed in a bit early since everyone opted for just one dive. For the afternoon we had some rescheduled class dives to get in so we ducked in near Winter Island in Salem where we could get confined shallow water and ran through a few more dives with students. It grew windier, or at least gustier, and definitely colder. We finished up a bit earlier than expected, which was nice because it really sucks getting back and washing gear in the dark – a sure sign of winter. So far, despite the turbulent weather, its been better than last October, so I guess we should be thankful for that. Next weekend, here we come.

Well every now and then Heather lets me behind the key board to post a dive report so here it goes. This weekend we had a group from New York come up led by Randi, a fellow Prism diver. You know how the Prism divers need to stick together. Friday the weather was looking a little on the grim side for diving Saturday. Wind was blowing a steady Northeast, which with any wind velocity tends to blow out most of the diving, the wind was expected to pick up for Saturday making it a real mess on the water. Trying to accommodate the people from New York so they could arrange for their hotel rooms and a long drive, we decided to throw the dice to cancel for Saturday. When we woke up Saturday morning we tossed snake eyes because the wind was howling. The forecast for Sunday was shaping up to be the better day.

The group met first thing as planned on Sunday morning, we loaded up leaving right on time. The group chartered the boat for a full day wanting to do a deep dive followed by a shallow dive. Figuring that things were pretty messed up for a few days before we opted to hit the Brenton Reef Lightship, we have not been there for a while and figured it would be a good choice. Knowing we did not have a mooring in place, we put one in. The New York divers usually having a two hour run to most of the deep sites off New York couldn’t believe we would be on location with in a half hour from leaving the dock. After getting close, Heather slowed the boat down starting to make passes over the wreck so Scott who was crewing for the day could make a good drop with the weighted mooring line. Heather made the mark and Scott dropped the weighted line, afterwards she passed the wreck a few times to see if we were on.

From that point Heather gave the thumbs up that it looked good, Scott started helping me into my gear to make the tie-in. After about 5 minutes, I was making the splash and heading down the line. Surprisingly I was able to see the line heading down about 15’ – 20’ in front of me, the visibility was looking good to start out. When I got down to about 120’, it started getting dark but the visibility was still about the same. I was excited at this point because I was really expecting it to be a no vis. dive. Well before I knew it, I was at the mud at 170’, a little concerning at first because at first sight I could not see the wreck. I just wanted to get myself orientated by looking at everything immediately around me before making a move. I shined my light to the left of me and right off, I saw remnants of a gill net, this meant I was close. I then shined the light to the right while following the gill net right to the wreck. The weight from the mooring line was against the side of the wreck; overall it was great drop from Heather and Scott.

At this point, I had an orientation to where I was on the wreck; the weight was in the port side down in the mud. Rather then, have the divers drop to the deep side of the wreck and taking a chance having the mooring line get hung on wreckage I wanted to tie-in on the high side up on the starboard rail. This means bouncing the weight up the deck to the high point. Once I got up to the starboard rail I had to search for a good secure point to chain into. This wreck being wood can make it difficult to locate a good solid point to secure a chain too. After fiddling around for a few minutes, I found two good solid crossbeams that would work. Making a couple wraps of the chain and shackling it up the mooring was secure in. Now connecting the lift bag and weight together, I sent the bag up so the boat would know I was tied in and pull up on the mooring.

With a few minutes left I wanted to make a quick swim, the mooring was closer to the bow then the stern. I dropped back over the deck again and noticed what was left of the forward mast, I could not believe what I saw perched up on top. It was a cream pinkish white lumpfish; it was a beautiful sight to see him just resting on top of the mast like that. I swam over closer to get a good look before moving on. I then noticed a few pieces of china resting on the deck so I snatched those up to bring back over to the mooring line for the other divers to see. Afterwards one diver’s was impressed that when he said just leave a line of breadcrumbs to the artifacts did not really expect me to leave them at the base of the mooring line. Continuing along on my dive I swam towards the bow and back down on the outside of the starboard rail back to the mooring again. It was a brief, but great dive, it was definitely a treat considering I was expecting the worse.

For the next line of entertainment, we decided to cruise over to the Poling for some lunch and a second dive. Catching some ZZZ’s on the way over we arrived in short time, picked up a mooring, and we quickly dropped all the lines in the water getting everything ready to dive. While Heather was dropping the granny line and weight over the side, she commented that she could see the weight at 40’ of water. We spread out lunch for everyone to dig in and relax for their surface interval, while all this was happening I opted to drop in for my second dive. The water temperatures were warm and with the warm temperature, the water column was filled with all kinds of jellies. When I dropped in the water, I noticed there was a strong ground swell felt all the way down to the wreck.

After reaching the wreck and feeling the strong surge, I decided to swim towards the stern to see what the inside looked like. Again, to my amazement, the visibility was incredible; the inside of the wreck was gin clear. At the point I could not resist not dropping down inside, I started in the engine room. I have not been down in back there for quite a while because every other time I have been here for the past few months there was no vis. Therefore, I proceeded to practice my perfect DIR trim and begin smashing into anything I could, occasionally I give a pull on something maybe even fan out some silt. This was to ensure maintaining zero visibility silt out; once this section was blasted, I decided to make a swim towards the machine shop located behind the stairs. Continuing my perfect DIR trim once again, I would give a bang maybe even a slight pull and glide, the whole time dropping the visibility to zero. After making a pass around and realizing that I could not see anything it was time to make my perfect DIR trim exit and feel my way out.

After successfully checking out the engine room, I decide to make a swim around the crew’s quarters. Just taking a pass to check out all the junk I saw a two-brass drawer handles, which I have been collecting-- well I have two more to add to the collection. Before I knew it, time was up and needed to head up. The whole day was great, weather, people, crew and best of all the diving. Look forward to seeing group from New York to join us again next year.

After a fantastic Empress of Ireland trip we were looking forward to continuing the pattern of good weather and good diving back at home. However, the effect of the hurricane looming offshore was threatening to set us up for high winds and seas for at least part of the weekend. The forecast was being revised often, so we knew that it was uncertain and that only waiting and seeing would tell us for sure what we would be dealing with. Sunday did not look like the better day, but we were hopeful we’d be in the clear . Anyway, Saturday began with gorgeous late summer-like weather and a lobster charter. We headed out to our usual spots and once again had a very good showing for it. As I splashed in for my dive I was expecting very poor visibility – the water certainly looked murky from the boat. But once I punched through and hit 30 feet it cleared up and the visibility turned out to be quite nice at about 20-25 feet. After I surfaced from my dive we moved over to another spot where Dave jumped in for his dive. All in all, the take was good and everyone enjoyed their dives. For the afternoon we were finishing an open water class with the final two checkout dives being done from the boat. We decided to head up to the USS New Hampshire. The depth there is just right and with any luck we could get on some wreckage. The afternoon breeze was coming up and there was a lot of boat traffic making for a slightly choppy ride. Where it had been flat calm in the morning (but with a definite ever so slight surge), the seas were picking up now. Over by Graves it was calm however, so we anchored up and set in comfortably. There were a couple of other dive boats also there, but were able to find a place to set up without issue. We did two dives there, finishing up some skills and then having some fun learning a little about wreck diving and underwater archaeology – showing them techniques to fan away sand to expose the good stuff. We found plenty of copper sheeting, and large brass pins, but no brass spikes. It was a great day of diving, with the added bonus of making new divers as well. Sunday, unfortunately, did turn out to be a different story and not the one we were hoping for. When I woke up Sunday morning and checked the weather it was already blowing N-NW around 20 knots with 3 foot seas. That’s usually workable for an inshore dive, but for sure, our offshore deep wreck plans were a no-go. We suspected this was coming, and the weather was worsening, so we went ahead with the back up plan and aimed to hit something inshore. As we headed out clearing Marblehead, the conditions were even a little worse than what was reflected on the buoy report – we could see that a SE sea was running with a northerly wind-driven chop on top so we decided to duck into the Romance and were pleased to find a mooring there. It wasn’t that great there either, but it was better than anything else nearby. Shortly after settling in and sending in the first divers, the conditions completely blew up with a wind shift to the NE. With 20 knots of NE wind howling, the seas kicked up to 4-6 feet real quick. The rest of us splashed in fast with Capt Lori manning the topsides. Down on the wreck there was about 3-5 feet of visibility and some current depending on whether or not you were in the lee of the wreck. Scott ran the reel and we groped around the wreck for about 25 minutes before heading up. We were tied in near the prop shaft and spent most of the dive around hull plates. I don’t think I saw the boilers, but there were times I could see much so I could have missed them. Anyway, it was still a good dive, considering. When we surfaced it had picked up some more, but we were able to get back on the boat without issue. We had a slow ride in as the sea conditions were just too rough to go fast. We did get to see a B-2 stealth bomber fly overhead, which was pretty cool. I am guessing this was probably part of some Sept 11 anniversary security patrols along the coast. Everyone enjoyed sandwiches and the mountain of lobster salad from our previous day’s haul on the way in. I must say, I was impressed at how virtually no food ended up on the floor when making sandwiches considering how bumpy it was. We returned to the marina, offloaded and called it a day. Disappointing weather considering how nice it was Saturday, but so it goes.

An uncertain forecast made the weekend weather look questionable at best. In fact the forecast seemed like it was being revised at each update, though the forecast never seemed to reflect what we were all hoping for: sunny, clear, temperature 85 degrees, variable winds 5-10 knots, seas 1 foot or less. Yeah right. The weather this summer has been ok at best, and it’s pretty clear the writing is on the wall so to speak – summer is soon ending. It’s hard to believe Labor Day weekend is practically upon us. Already we’re finding ourselves wearing jackets on these cool mornings. I think there are a few good days to be had still, but the unstable weather we’ve had over the past few weeks is certainly hinting that fall is coming. Saturday we had some class dives to conduct that required we dive from shore. Actually as it turned out, Saturday was a pretty nice day, for sure much better than we were all expecting. It did get sunny and fairly warm, and so we were able to get in 3 nice dives from shore meeting the objectives for the day. Sunday we were back on the boat with a lobster charter in the morning followed by a trip to the Chester Poling in the afternoon. The conditions that morning were better than expected, but the afternoon forecast looked like things were going to get a little ugly out there. Sure enough, the morning was beautiful with little to no wind and we were treated to fairly clear skies. The cloud pattern suggested weather on the move however, so I decided to grab my foul weather gear before we headed out the door. That turned out to be a good move. We loaded up and headed out destined for Paddock Rock and Kettle to see what we could find in the way of lobsters. A slow start ended with a very strong finish – and everyone went home with a good haul of lobster. I made my dive at Paddock Rock while Dave jumped in over at Kettle. It’s been a long time since I have been to Paddock, but it’s a nice dive site. I dropped down to the sand around 70 ft and then worked my way around the rocks swimming along between the rock slabs and crevices. Visibility was pretty good at about 25 feet or so. As the morning wore on, the sky began to cloud over and the wind picked up out of the Southeast. Before long it was blowing about 10-15 knots and the seas were beginning to build in. We cruised back just as things were picking up, arriving at the dock at about noon. The second group arrived and we began reloading the boat for the next trip. We gave them a heads up that the wind was picking up and the seas were going to be bumpy – and everyone was ok with that so we proceeded to run up towards the Poling. It wasn’t too bad of a ride until we cleared Baker’s Island. From there on, we were pretty exposed to the SE sea, which was running at about 2-4’ but with a short period on the waves it felt unpleasant. When we arrived on the Poling both Cape Ann Divers boats were already on site and tied in. We felt that the conditions were too rough to tie off to the stern of either boat, so we arranged with Capt Steve on the big boat to drop teams in off their bow and send divers down their mooring line. They were only staying for one dive. Given that, we decided to live boat until we could pick up the mooring and so we elected not to put our own line in (sending a diver down their line with our line to swim it away as we sometimes do). With 2 boats already on site, divers in the water and choppy surface conditions this seemed like the best approach – especially since we could grab a mooring in about a half hour. We set up to make 3 drops of 2 divers per team and everything went smoothly. Then we stood off until our divers were up. We were able to get on the mooring just before the first team surfaced, so it all worked out well. Once we were secure I suited up and headed in for a dive myself. Conditions were ok – nothing spectacular. The overcast sky made for a dim, gloomy feel in the water column and though the visibility was easily 15 feet on the wreck, the lack of light made it feel like less. Actually in these kinds of conditions it’s almost better to swim around without a light on since your eyes will adjust and see much more than an 18 watt HID will see. Anyway, since we had gotten delayed by the mooring availability situation and since the conditions weren’t getting any better I kept my dive a little shorter in case Dave wanted to get in for a quick one as well. Even at that, by the time I headed up and returned to the surface it had grown much rougher and it was pouring. A few divers had opted for a second dive and they were heading down as I surfaced. When they surfaced, we pulled the lines and got underway. It was definitely nasty out there. I was glad I had decided to grab my foul weather gear that morning because I needed it. We dried off and relaxed on the way in, making good time getting in around 5:00 pm or so. We offloaded, cleaned things up a bit aboard the boat, and then took the toys home to wash them and put them away until next weekend’s dives on the Empress of Ireland. All in all it was a good weekend of diving.

Finally! Finally a weekend with good weather was upon us—warm, sunny, light winds, calm seas and a decent chance of good visibility underwater. Saturday morning we were headed out for a lobster and scallop charter and the weather was indeed glorious for it. We loaded up and headed out destined for Kettle Island. This is a nice dive site, particularly the portion along the ledge—rocky with a shear wall, a sand bottom at about 65-70 feet in depth and usually good visibility. Lobsters are plenty here, but they’re in the rocks and require some effort to get out. Since this was a shallower dive we were diving our rebreathers. After the Buzzards Bay weekend where we were diving in low visibility and strong current most of the time, coming back to dive here in good conditions was a welcome treat. I was feeling pretty together actually so I took the opportunity to work on some of the skills I am used to doing with far greater ease, like running a reel. A skill that on open circuit scuba I am pretty comfortable with became a monumental task loading effort when trying to dive the rebreather and run the reel. Things were going pretty good, so I decided to work on some of this a little bit. I tied off my reel and ran several sweeps out into the sand and then back around following the bottom contours until I found the boulders leading me to the wall. Once I found the wall I tied off the reel and swam around looking for lobsters navigating up and down the wall. The visibility was about 20-25 feet and the water was a balmy 52 degrees – nice. After an hour or so I headed up and returned to the boat. Everyone had enjoyed their dives. We moved over to Satan’s for the second dive – always a favorite. Dave splashed in along with the rest of the divers. It was a beautiful day out there for sure. I relaxed on the boat a bit and waited for everyone to return. All in the entire group did "ok" on lobsters. It seems they are still coming in, but they are there (on Sunday my father and his buddy bagged 20 lobsters, so they’re definitely out there). Dave hauled in a decent bag of scallops too. The weather was so nice that after dropping off the charter, Dave and I headed back out to enjoy the boat and do some cruising around the area. It was just too nice to be indoors on a day like that. Sunday was an equally impressive day with weather and I was truly hopeful for a good dive on the Snetind (Schooner Barge). This is awesome wreck, but last weekend it treated us rather harshly with about 2 feet of visibility. We steamed out to the Snetind in great conditions and with the light Southwest wind and relative location of the wreck, by the time we arrived on site the water was as flat as a millpond. It doesn’t get much nicer than this. Of course, along the way out and in close proximity to the wreck were dreaded gillnets. These billowing large nets are held at the ends by two buoys with "high flyer" flags on them. They nets are usually suspended just off the bottom, sometimes hung right on the wreck, sometimes just very close to it, and are a real danger to be getting near while diving. I’ve only seen one underwater once—a net strung across the end of a wreck. It was quite an unpleasant sight. Anyway, there was one quite close to the Snetind, so we took several passes determining what was where. The wreck was running North-South and the net was running East-West just south of our mooring, which we think is near the stern of the wreck. So by this, the net was just south of the end of the wreck, which meant it was off the wreck and moving north from the net, we were in the clear. We were confident in this so we tied off the mooring and got the lines in. Looking down the line, I could easily see 30-35 down. This was a good sign. But we were cautiously optimistic because on more than one occasion great surface visibility has just been the set up for disappointment when we arrive on the wreck to find low bottom visibility. Given the conditions the week prior, anything was possible. Dave and Jeff splashed first; as Dave was shoot some video. The last time we filmed this wreck was back when we were shooting with an old Light and Motion Hi-8 set up with dual UK 800 halogen lights. In other words, the images sucked. The other divers suited up and splashed in as well. When Dave returned, he reported excellent visibility (20-25 feet) on the bottom, with ambient light to boot. He thought he got some good video as well. He said however, the current on the wreck was ripping and in some places pull and glide was necessary. I suited up with Martin and Dan. It was hot, hot, hot suiting up with a 400G undergarment on. We all dipped before getting into our tanks, but it was still toasty in the sun. As I was suiting up I stood up to make an adjustment and when I sat back down I heard a crunch – my mask had somehow gotten under my tanks and I crushed the strap clip. Great. I wore Dave’s mask since it’s the same type (but the mask being fairly well formed to his face, it leaked like a sieve through most of my dive). Anyway, we hit the water and headed down. The current on the wreck had tapered off to a mild flow, but midwater it was moving pretty good such that it required a good amount of kicking and pulling to get down the granny. The visibility was definitely good and we arrived on the wreck to find fairly pleasant conditions. An old ghost mooring had become tangled in ours so before getting on with the dive I took a moment to cut some of it away. I stopped short of cutting out the whole mooring, as I didn’t want to see the line tangled in our lines as it headed up (the line was poly with floats on it), but I cut away enough to take the entanglement out. The visibility from all the traffic down there was not quite the same as when Dave was down there—perhaps the visibility was about 15 feet horizontally. Even down inside the wreck, which is cavernous, the visibility was way down, but this is to be expected when you’re the last one down. Anyway, we swam around the wreck getting familiar with the layout in the area. Neither Dan nor Martin had dived the wreck before, but were impressed with the amazing anemone growth on it. I think it’s fair to say this wreck is rarely dived, so it is quite literally pristine. We headed up when our time had elapsed and decompressed uneventfully. There was still some decent current running midwater, but near the surface it had abated. We surfaced, stowed our gear and enjoyed a smooth ride back to Salem, getting in early enough so that everyone could still make it to various Father’s Day family gatherings. It was a great weekend for sure. Let’s hope this sticks around.

Photos courtesy of Jeff Downing:
   

Dave and Jeff get suited up for the dive.

Martin and Dan are back from a great dive

More rain arriving late in the week threatened to ruin yet another weekend of diving. I heard a blurb on the news or radio that we’re something like 9 inches above normal for this time of year with regard to rainfall amounts. That’s nice. Anyway, rain continued to fall well into the evening on Friday and into the morning on Saturday. The winds were light however, and what looked like a potential cancellation or at the very minimum a downgrade in plans due to forecasts predicting heavy wind overnight, did not come to be. Despite some patchy fog, and of course the rain, we were able to proceed as planned to the Schooner Barge – more accurately known as the Snetind. We had a smooth run out and quickly set a line upon our arrival. Dave and Peter splashed to tie in, while the rest of us waited for the liftbag to come up topside. Soon enough the bag came up and we secured the boat. Divers suited up and hit the water as the rain came down. Upon Dave’s return we got a visibility report – and it wasn’t good. Visibility was quite poor, with all the usual highlights that go with it – dark, lots of particulate, etc, etc. Not the kind of report that makes you want to jump into 190 feet of water. Anyway, I suited up along Jeff and Steve and headed in. We knew we’d cut the dive short, but we just wanted to get down there and see what we could see. The surface visibility was very poor – maybe 5-7 feet, but in the water column the visibility cleared up a bit to perhaps as much as 15 feet – not bad. But as we drew closer to the top of the wreck at 170 fsw, the visibility went to nearly nothing and it was very dark. Around 150 feet we passed an old ghost mooring lying along our line. It’s covered in anemones now, but it’s still an unpleasant sight. We carefully avoided it and arrived on the wreck. I could see only a few feet in any direction. We didn’t venture too far and ultimately cut the dive short as we knew we would, and as most everyone did. Back on the boat after an uneventful decompression in balmy water I assured Jeff and Steve – who had never dove this wreck before – that this was truly a spectacular dive … in better visibility.

As we finished up the wind began to pick up, though the rain didn’t stop. We headed in, off loaded and then re-loaded for the afternoon charter to the Poling. The ride was relatively smooth as we had a following sea thanks to the westerly wind direction. We arrived on site and picked up a mooring. Dave headed in first with students, while Steve and I hung out topside trying to stay dry. The wind was picking up and the seas were becoming fairly rough. There was also a rather strong wind-driven current running along the surface – so these were really ideal conditions for just about anything… ya right. Soon enough it was our turn to dive and we headed back in as a group of four. The conditions on the wreck were actually not that bad – visibility was about 10-12 feet, dim, but compared to the last dive we had done, this was music to our ears. We had a good tour of the wreck and headed up. The wind was whipping, but the rain was tapering off, so we finished up and headed home to Salem.

Our plans for Sunday were far less certain. While the wind direction was "good", the velocity was not. Overnight winds around 20 knots, with gusts to 30 knots. The following day we were looking at anything from 10-15 (good) to 15-20 with gusts to 25 knots (not good). We didn’t know where the dial would land, so we decided to wait and see what the morning brought. Indeed it brought wind, but the forecast still suggested it would diminish over the course of the day. Our plans involved a rather lengthy transit, so the conditions had to be right. We decided to make a go of it, banking on the forecast improving. But once we were out about 4 miles off Marblehead, we were taking a fairly good sea of at least 3-4 feet and we had a long, long way to go still. We considered a few other locations, but the course lines to some of them put the sea right on our beam, which is never desirable. With the forecast obviously not improving, we decided to turn off and redirect to the Poling. Disappointing, but appropriate given the sea conditions. Indeed, we actually had very nice dives there, as the visibility improved to about 25 feet. The seas were a bit rough even there, but considerably improved compared to what we were dealing with a bit to the south.

We’re having some tough breaks with the weather, but what else can you do other than deal with it?

At last we came upon a weekend where the weather would cooperate slightly. But cooperating doesn’t always mean we get to do what we planned. Despite literally waiting until the last minute to make a go/no-go decision on a special offshore trip… the "final answer" was no-go. The wind was strong out of the SW, which is definitely an undesirable wind direction for making long transits offshore. Unfortunately it is also undesirable for pretty much everything else in this area worth doing as well. So, the choices were slim and the hour was early, but we decided to make a go of it and go diving. We decided that things would be better if we attempted to find lee by heading to the south, perhaps finding some protection just south of Boston. We aimed for a wreck in about the same depth range as what we were originally planning on diving and so we chose the City of Salsbury (aka Zoo wreck), a freighter wrecked on Graves Ledge in 50-90 feet of water, with the fall back plan of continuing on the Kiowa should it look really ugly at the Zoo wreck. We figured we’d get some protection from Graves light and if not, we could definitely get it on the Kiowa. The Kiowa, a large freighter rammed at anchor off Hull in a 1903 winter storm, is fairly close to shore, and would be in the lee with this wind direction, but no one was keen on diving the wreck because of the likelihood of low visibility in such shallow water. We took a pass by the Sweet Sue since it’s very close to the Zoo wreck. The Sweet Sue was a 47 foot fishing dragger that sank into 70-80 fsw on January 24, 1980 in a winter storm. It’s a small wooden wreck and small wooden wrecks in shallow water typically do not "hold up" well. We ran over the wreck a few times, but decided against diving it so we motored over the short distance to the Zoo wreck. Since this wreck is kind of all over the place we drove around the site a bit until we picked up what appeared to be some solid hull plates, and then dropped anchor. The first group of divers headed in while the rest of us suited up to follow along. Once Dave and the others were back they reported about 10 feet of visibility, lots of hull plates and increasing current. Sure enough, the current continued to pick up and was ripping by the time the rest of us were all ready to go in. Most people can never give an accurate estimate of current, but realistically I’d feel pretty confident in saying the current was running at ~1.2 knots, and that’s a stiff current. In addition to the current, the wind was increasing steadily, with building seas. Dan and I splashed and dropped down the granny – things were ok at 25 feet. But as we started pulling ourselves forward, the entire granny system, including the 30 pound weight on the drop line, was dragged to the surface. We got nearly to the bow, but didn’t make it. We broke off and drifted back. A second team of 3 entered and experienced the same problem. Even getting dragged up to the bow hanging on a rope couldn’t get us to the line. It became apparent that we had to get out of the water, so we did. Back on the boat we decided to wait for slack tide, which was in about an hour and a half. But while we waited the wind picked up to good 25 knots and we ultimately decided it was just time to go. Even if the current abated, the surface conditions were not getting any better. We cruised in with a 3-4’ sea running on our tail and ducked behind Children’s Island where we could get out of the wind for the rest of us to dive. This time I headed in with Scott since we left our suits on from the last go-around. There wasn’t much to see except sand, the visibility was decent at about 12-15 feet, and there was some surge on the bottom (40 ft depth). It wasn’t the most exciting dive, but we got in. Our plans had obviously been significantly and harshly downgraded. Nonetheless we made the best of it, and enjoyed the otherwise nice weather and some lunch before calling it a day. On Sunday the weather was much better, light winds out of the WNW, and sunny. It would have been nice to have had this weather the day prior. Anyway, we headed off with a group from PG Dive on a charter to the Chester Poling. This was another good dive for us to log some time on our rebreathers, and we were hopeful for decent visibility on the wreck. When we arrived on site we picked up the mooring and got settled in. Today I headed in first. I was very pleased to find the visibility to be excellent in fact – a solid 25-30 feet. What I have found interesting diving the rebreather is truly just how close I can get to marine life. There were several schools of fish on the wreck and I just swam right up into them, without them scattering away. I had a good tour of the wreck, enjoying the great conditions and definitely noting the seemingly advanced state of decay the Poling is in – hull plates on the deck are really beginning to disintegrate in some areas, and the holes in the bulkhead walls at the break end are getting bigger all the time. The conditions on the surface were excellent and after my dive I enjoyed them fully – bright sun and mild temperatures. All and all it was a good weekend, even if our plans were impacted by weather. It’s been a tough spring, not much you can do.

Despite last weekend’s brief reprieve from the generally poor spring weather, it returned with vengeance beginning with rain, wind, more wind, and more rain – and all with no end in sight. Friday afternoon we cancelled all our charters for the weekend, as strong east winds and building seas made it quite clear that the ocean would not be a welcoming place. Instead of calling it quits and spending a weekend doing mundane chores or vegetating on a couch, we decided to find another place to dive. Earlier in the week, anticipating that the extended forecast might well mean a blow-out, we discussed visiting the Brownstone Quarry in Portland, CT. The weather looked to be a little better in Connecticut and since we hadn’t been there before, we decided to check it out. We’re always trying to find good dives to log some hours on our rebreathers, so this type of place would certainly meet that criteria. A small group of us met at a stop along the Mass Pike and then caravanned down the rest of the way. The drive wasn’t too bad for us – about 2.5 hrs. We arrived at the quarry and were greeted by the Hayes brothers, who are developing this quarry into a recreational park for diving, hiking, camping, and canoeing, among other things. Ed gave us a run down on their ideas for the quarry – it’s easy to see that they have a vision for this place, something we could definitely appreciate once having looked at a barrel of fiberglass resin only to see a boat. The Portland Brownstone quarry is quite a historic place in fact. The brownstone itself was formed by prehistoric sediments deposited during the Triassic era (in other words, a really long time ago). From there jump to the late 1600s when the quarrying industry began to develop. Stone was cut from the quarry, hauled out or loaded on ships and ferried down along the Connecticut River to various destinations where it would ultimately be used to construct buildings, monuments and other structures. This industry boomed into and through the late 1800s – supplying brownstone that was ultimately used in numerous landmark Portland, CT structures, as well as those of Wesleyan University. In the mid 1930s on one final occasion the Connecticut River flooded and spilled over into the Portland Quarries, flooding them fully in about 15 minutes. Fortunately no one was injured during this event, but it marked the end of the Quarry’s stone producing days. Eventually cement production signaled the end for the quarrying industry as a whole. Like most flooded quarries, the Portland Quarry became a receptacle for cars, trash, probably a few people who needed to go away, and host to late night drinking and swimming parties for the young and dumb. New England quarries generally aren’t known for their appealing swimming and diving features - cold, dark, low visibility and at times, dangerous due to the debris either deep or barely hidden from the surface. Sounds a lot like what most of our diving can be categorized as, so this wasn’t a deterrent for us. Anyway, we got a briefing on where to go, what to see and suited up. Getting in is pretty easy since there’s a small floating dock presently in about waist deep water where stage bottles and the like can be placed. From there, the typical route seems to be to follow one of two ropes across the quarry to a shear wall. You can follow the wall along the edge or drop down into the abyss-like middle portion, where it is at its deepest around 80 feet. There are thermoclines and organic layers that significantly affect temperature and visibility, so much below 60 feet it’s basically a cold, black water dive. Otherwise the visibility is variable, running the gamut from "not much" to a decent 25 feet with ambient light (in the 30-60 ft range mostly). The quarry is quite large (not including the adjacent South Quarry also in development with depths to ~130 fsw) and would require a lot of diving to fully explore. I am told they are working on ways to improve the visibility. The water itself is clean of pollutants. So, we followed the first rope across, a bit of a transit, which runs mid-water around 20 feet give or take, and then worked our way along the wall to the second rope, which would lead us back to the entry point. Along this wall there’s lots of "stuff" – trash, of course, that they are slowly removing, but also a lot of old interesting and unique bottles. There are also fossils and other features representing an archaeological record in the quarry, though we did not observe these ourselves. Anyway, we followed along working this wall. As one descends deeper the visibility certainly diminishes, and no doubt you could easily enough find yourself turned around in a no-mans-land if you venture too far from the wall. We followed along until we reached a car perched on the edge of a ledge where the second rope began. Most of the cars are stolen, and divers who happen upon them pull the plates off so they can be turned into the proper authorities. The quarry features were interesting to look at, and it certainly drives home the point about why it’s not a good idea to go quarry jumping. The water was about 39 degrees below the thermocline, though it was pretty balmy in the shallows. We spent about 70 minutes in the water before calling it a day. Since it actually was a pretty decent day in Portland, we were able to enjoy being outside for a while, even catching some sun. After everyone was out, we stowed gear, hung out for a while and then headed home – back to the monsoon waiting for us in Massachusetts. All in all we enjoyed our trip to the quarry and would definitely go back. They have some good ideas for this place and it’s great to see an investment in developing infrastructure to support local diving. It’s not an easy thing to do in New England, but will ultimately benefit us all – and so it should be supported.