August 16-17, 2008:

Here we are already at the 3rd week in August -- where does the time go?  Saturday morning we kicked off a 2-charter day with a trip to the USS NH.  I was working with a tech class and we were punching out a couple of skills dives, and this is a perfect spot - usually - for this kind of stuff.  Unfortunately, despite beautiful surface conditions and air temperatures, there was a slight surge and the visibility was only about 10 feet with some surge on the bottom too.  We made the best of it and spent 2 good dives working on all those fun skills like valve drills, air shares, stage deployments, bottle passing, lift bag deployments, timed ascents - fun, fun, fun.  When we finished up there, we returned and reloaded for an afternoon trip to the Baleen with a group from NH.  Since I had already done two dives, I sat this one out - but the group reported decent visibility around 15 feet.  The sea conditions were beautiful and there was hardly any wind........... until, we had to go home.  On the way in, we had to pass straight through a nasty thunderstorm.  With lightning hitting the water all around us, torrential rain and black skies, it was a fun ride back.  Fortunately it didn't follow us all the way to the dock, so unloading was relatively dry.  Sunday the weather looked to be excellent again for our offshore trip - when I woke up the forecast simply said: SW 5-10 knots.  Nice!  We got underway and cruised out of the marina in the early morning hour -- we were motoring out when suddenly my cell phone rang.  It was Roman.  Why would Roman be calling me when he's on the boat.  I answered the phone thinking for some reason Roman was being a goober and calling me from the back deck -- but when I looked, no Roman.  A voice on the phone simply said "This isn't funny."  No kidding.  Anytime I have to turn the boat around -- it ain't funny!  It turns out, Roman decided to go get himself an egg sandwich at Brothers just as we were finishing up loading and we left without him!  Now, I know what you're thinking, "don't they do roll call?"  Well, yes normally we do, but we also tell everyone, once loading begins we leave as soon as we're done - and that might be early!  On top of that, not only did we need to come back to the marina (we had just cleared the jetty at the mouth of the marina), but Roman didn't even get ALL of us an egg sandwich!  Good thing he had his cell phone or it could have been a long, long day for Roman waiting for his dive gear and car keys to come back from diving.  As you might imagine, Roman faced a brutal day of hazing, but it was all in good fun.  Anyway, as we headed out, it became apparent that we did not have 5-10 knots of wind. I don't know who or what generated that forecast calling for 5-10 knots, but when we got offshore to our destination, we had more like 4-5 foot seas and 15-20 knots of wind our of the SSW.  To make matters worse, the current was so strong that when we dropped our shot line, it sucked the entire line - including a tuna ball - 10 feet beneath the surface.  We were lucky to get our gear back, as we grabbed it quick when it popped up briefly in the surging current.  Unfortunately, we had to scrub the dive since the conditions were too poor.  We decided to instead head back inshore and hit the Miss Sonya to see how she's aging on the bottom since April.  Overall visibility was about 10-12 feet and there was a decent current running from about 30 feet and up.  All in all it wasn't a bad day, but we drove a long way out to turn around and come back inshore.  That's how it goes sometimes.  The good news is, we can go back. 

August 9-10, 2008:

Divers suit up for the Romance.

August 2-3, 2008:

This weekend brought another busy weekend of diving with 3 charters lined up.  Saturday morning broke overcast, but without rain and with pleasant air temperatures.  We were bound for the Baleen, but changed plans last minute to hit the Coyote instead in search of a missing stage tank from earlier this summer.  We got out to the site and picked up the mooring - there was virtually no wind and seas were calm.  There was some haze, but overall the conditions were good and there was no fog, which was originally in the forecast.  I splashed in first with Dave Cangiano.  We dropped down to the wreck and found somewhat dark, but decent visibility around 15 feet.  It wasn't bad and there was no current at all.  We took a swim aft nearly to the stern from our tie-in point at the water tank near the boiler.  Our mooring was all twisted up - not having much luck this year keeping moorings from getting fouled.  This had wrapped it self about 10 times around some wreckage and is of course chafing the rope.  There was not much scope in the line.  I knew there was a reason it was such a fast drop - it was pretty much "straight down"... Anyway, we took a leisurely swim as Peter buzzed around us on his scooter running sand sweeps off the wreck looking for the stage tank.  The vis near the bottom was kind of murky though and it was tough discerning anything, as he found.  After 20 minutes I was actually getting cold - my hands - which don't normally get cold this time of year. The water temperature was around 42F - chilly!  We made our ascent and for most of the way the temperatures were around 48 F until we reached the shallower stops where it crept up to the low 50s.  The decompression was nice and there was no current to speak of - of course, until the current decided to show up!  I was floating back off the line when suddenly I felt as if something took a hold of me - didn't feel right for sure.  I looked to my right and noticed I was nearer to the equipment line so I headed over to that just as a switch flipped and the current roared in.  And I am talking roared.  I was at my 20 foot stop and as the current surged, it pulled me and the line out almost as far as it would go.  I dumped gas out of my wings and paid the line out in my hand.  Our 40 foot weighted equipment line slid through my hands until I was nearly holding the weight.  I was wondering what I was going to do if I had to keep going paying out line!  I definitely couldn't make it back over to the other line.  Hanging on - literally - I finished my decompression and then hand-over-hand hauled myself up.  That was an impressive current and it came out of nowhere (we were on a flood tide that was just starting so it wasn't totally unexpected, just stronger than expected).  With only 1 trip that day, after Dave and Pat B did their dives, we got in a little early and enjoyed some downtime in the afternoon.  Sunday's trip to the YF415 actually brought even better conditions than Sunday as we had some sun.    The wind was light and we enjoyed another great ride out to the site.  We picked up the mooring amidst gill nets in very close proximity.  Roman, Dave C and I splashed in together.  There was some current running again here too, but we popped through it below 30 feet and descended down to the wreck. Visibility was pretty good at about 15-20 feet and reasonably clear water.  Dark, but clear.  We took a leisurely swim forward and around the starboard side debris areas before heading up for another pleasant decompression --- this time in almost 68F water temperatures near the surface!  Crazy.  It was cold on the bottom - low 40s -  but in the shallows it was hot!  Such odd weather and conditions.  Once again the current showed up and I had to haul over to the line before it disappeared when it roared in.  It wasn't quite as bad as on the Coyote as it came and went more this time.  Overall it was a great dive.  Finally for the afternoon we capped it off with a trip to the USS NH where we had some students doing skills dives.  Dave worked with the class while Roman and I did a dive -- Roman having done his first ocean CCR dive -- I wanted to crack a bottle of champagne over the rig, but that seriously might have broke it.  Kidding.  Anyway, aside from a thunderstorm and torrential rain followed by "more rain" soaking us down for the unloading and cleaning up -- it was a good day.  All in all another great set of dives and pretty good conditions to boot - actually they were great conditions, doesn't get too much better than this.

July 26-27, 2008:

July 19-20, 2008:

Despite oppressive heat and humidity, the weekend weather looked pretty good. Saturday morning kicked off with a trip to the YF-415. The winds were light and it was very hot. The conditions were otherwise great with only a slight lingering swell from the persisting Bertha remnants in the Atlantic. The tide was incoming so I was hopeful for good visibility, but the swells have definitely murk’d things up a bit. The water column visibility was amazing at probably 50 feet, but down on the wreck, it was more of a cloudy 12 feet or so. Not the worst we’ve seen, but it could have been better. In the afternoon we headed out for some class dives with students. Fortunately it was a lot nicer out on the water temperature-wise, but with the SW winds, we did end up picking up a lot of annoying biting flies, which almost made putting pants back on a serious consideration despite the heat. For Sunday we were headed out to dive the Pinthis and Paul Palmer. The weather was once again excellent – with very light winds and essentially no swells at all. We were hitting the Pinthis first today since the tides worked out better for that with regard to the Palmer. The ride down was smooth and in no time we were picking up the mooring and getting divers suited up. Dave and Pat B went in first and when they returned, Scott and I went in. Since we were doing well on time (we needed to be over at the Palmer by a certain time for slack), we could do a longer dive. So we planned a 45 minute bottom time, which was plenty of time to see all of the wreck inside and out. We also had our scooters today and I was looking forward to that because the Pinthis is an excellent wreck for scooter riding since the visibility is so good – I would estimate it was 30-40 feet on our dive. When we got down to the wreck we decided to scooter out to the end of the anchor chain stretching out into the sand off the bow. Someone asked me about it and while I know there’s not much out there from talking with others, I hadn’t been out there myself. So, we blasted out to the end of that – probably in the neighborhood of 200 feet of chain is laid out in a snaking pattern, maybe a little more – at the end of this chain we found a small anchor. There you have it. We parked the scooters back inside the wreck and took a tour up and back inside. Then we did a few laps, did a few wide passes out around the wreck looking for debris and then headed up for a short deco, back on the boat in about 60 minutes time. Right on schedule, we hit the road for the Palmer. We had a nice smooth ride into Stellwagen, but didn’t see any whales, which was a bit surprising considering we almost always do. Dave and Pat B splashed in again here, and the others quickly followed as the tides weren’t particularly good (we didn’t have an actual slack per the current tables) and the window of opportunity is always small here in terms of slack time. Most of the time we can get 1-1.5 hours of "dive time" – but we’re diving in ~1 knot of current on the ends. Anyway, when it was our turn to dive we splashed in with scooters and buzzed down to the wreck. The visibility was a disappointing murky 15 feet – cloudy. This was probably the lowest visibility I’ve ever seen here. It wasn’t terrible, but we’re used to 30-50 feet of visibility on the wreck. Anyway, it wasn’t the end of the world - I think I saw about 50 ocean pout, so that made up for it. We cruised down the 276’ long wreck to the stern and worked our way back. As the dive progressed, we could feel the current picking up. The rides to the stern were slower, and we flew back as we scootered to the bow. After about 30 minutes we headed up in a now very stiff current. As we surfaced, it was clear the conditions had changed with the tide and we now had a choppy 2-4’ sea running with increasing wind out of the South. We beat it for home and in the process got hammered by thunderstorm after thunderstorm all the way. We could see them on the radar, but there was no avoiding them – and watching bolts of lightning hit the water as cracking and clapping went off overhead with hail and torrential rain coming down made that 30 or so mile run very long. But, it was a great day of diving and I can’t wait to go back and do it again!

July 12-13, 2008:

Despite it being the middle of July when you normally can't go wrong with weather, the remnants of Hurricane Bertha offshore in the Atlantic reached far enough up our way to make the weather plenty weird.  Saturday was a perfect day - absolutely beautiful.  Flat calm seas, light wind -- really awesome weather.  Our double-header trip to the Bow of the Poling was excellent - though the vis was not so great at about 10 feet and kind of murky.  Sunday the weather was warm and sunny - but windy - with 15-20 knots out of the South through most of the day, a SE swell running from Bertha and then some chop building in on top of that adding up to a 3-5 foot sea that was not so nice as the day wore on.  The morning run out to the YF-415 was not too bad, but the seas progressively built in.  For the afternoon, it was pretty sporty out there so much so that we had to make our lobster/scallop dives ducked in behind Satan's and Children's Island -- pretty much the only place we could get some lee, and even there wasn't all that pleasant sea conditions wise.  We did OK on scallops and lobsters despite the challenges with the conditions.  Overall the visibility this weekend on all dives was kind of blah, but it was otherwise it was very nice summer weather.  And for sure, 12 hours bouncing around on the boat yesterday made me appreciate having a desk job come Monday morning!

July 4-6, 2008:

The holiday weekend was upon us and we had great diving lined up from Friday right through to Sunday.  Friday we headed out to the Coyote and despite a relatively promising forecast (light wind) we discovered the weather forecasters pretty much have zero clue what the weather is going to do lately.  Instead of NNW 5-10 knots as predicted, we got NNE 15-20 knots with a choppy 3 foot sea.  Oh yeah, and it was raining in the morning too.  We had a nasty little sea following us all the way out to the wreck --- coming from behind slightly on our port quarter.  We took a couple of good "kicks" getting caught in troughs as the waves pushed us around.  Suffice it to say it was not a nice smooth ride out.  Anyway, once we got out there the motivation levels were quite low - no one was moving fast to put on gear.  Dave and I both decided to skip it, as the conditions were kind of blah and I was feeling pretty blah myself - not seasick, just feeling like I was getting sick.  Anyway, everyone eventually splashed in and reported vis around 12-15 feet, dark and just OK overall.  We headed in and by 2 pm the weather was improving - the sun was even coming out.  We re-grouped and headed back out later that day to catch some fireworks in Marblehead harbor - by then the weather was good and the show went on (last year it got canceled last minute).  Saturday AM came early for sure and when I woke up, I was sick.  I had that sick "buzz" in my head and a sore throat.  Not good.  I have been so tired lately from nonstop everything that I think I am finally sinking in the quicksand.  We loaded up and headed off to Kettle Island for the morning trip.  Despite wanting to go lay in a bunk, I decided I would not let this ruin my weekend so I suited up and went diving.  Scott and I hit the water and clocked in about 66 minutes before Scott's "I forgot to hook up my pee-valve" situation reached critical status and we surfaced.  We did ok on lobsters and everyone enjoyed the dives.  My father Fred even came out to dust off the gear and do a little lobstering himself.  For the afternoon we were headed out to do some scalloping.  Even though I was equalizing fine and didn't appear to have any problem getting up or down, I still felt like crap.  But I pressed on and decided I would dive in the afternoon too.  I lumbered into my stuff while Dave and Scott kicked back in lawn chairs and splashed in to do some scalloping.  I hit the bottom at 70 feet - vis wasn't bad at about 15 feet - and immediately saw I was "in them" - so I filled a bag in about 20 min.  The bag was getting heavy and I was a bit tired so I cut it short and shot the bag of scallops.  Unfortunately my reel jammed when the line hopped off the spool when the bag was half-way up and I had no choice but to let go.  At that particular moment I was cursing myself for getting in the water!  I ascended and when I hit the surface the boat came to pick me up since we had gone live-boat to pick up the first round of divers after dropping them in while anchored.  That was just fine with me since after I heard the engine grumbling above and I figured we were live, I stopped navigating with my compass!  Anyway, I did OK on scallops and we got my bag and reel back no problem.  It was a very long day - a fun day - but long and it was 6:45 pm when we finally left the marina to head home.  I pretty much left my rebreather completely set-up except for popping off the bucket to remove the scrubber and change out tanks.  I guess I was going to find out if we really needed to rinse out the hoses and counter-lungs each day!  I figured I'd be either "the same" or completely go down the tubes overnight, so when I woke up Sunday and felt "more or less the same" I was optimistic about the rest of the day.  Of course, I didn't want to miss out on a chance to dive the Pinthis, as it's one of my favorite dives.  We loaded up with a good group of people and headed out, getting off the dock about 10 min early even.  We had a great, smooth ride down despite heavy fog south of Boston.  When we arrived, we picked up the mooring that had been installed by another boat and got right to diving.  Dave headed in first.  When he returned, Scott and I splashed in for our dive.  I didn't have my precious scooter - yes, I was forced to swim - since Scott is breaking in the rebreather.  Of course, it was much easier for us when we first got our rebreathers since we didn't yet own scooters - so it wasn't much of a sacrifice. It is important to just focus on learning the rig when you're new, and you must leave the toys behind when you do it.  We didn't shoot video for almost an entire season when we first got our CCRs. The task-loading of learning the rig took it all.  Anyway, we hit the water and dropped down - the visibility was spectacular at 30 feet or so.  There was a rather annoying current running and it made me think, "boy a scooter would be nice right now" -- but I managed!  We popped inside the wreck for a swim to the bow to avoid the current.  Then we drifted back to the stern outside the wreck, went back inside and crawled as far back as I have ever been heading aft and exited through a small opening near a beam.  It was a fantastic dive and not once during the 45 minute bottom time was I cold or bored.  We had an uneventful deco accompanied by 2 good sized dogfish.  When we surfaced the others were suiting up and things seemed much like they were when we splashed in.  I asked if we already had the BBQ -- they did, and we missed it.  Fortunately, there was some food left, though someone forgot the cheese that is an essential component of a cheeseburger.  Scott and I polished off the remaining chicken wings, ribs and burgers -- everyone had a great lunch with a good BBQ on the boat's grill.  Those that were doing a second dive headed in, and we relaxed during the time everyone was off diving.  We were still socked in with fog so the ride home was one with radar and looking-out involved.  Everyone - and I mean everyone - crashed out hard for the ride back, except me of course because I was the lone person awake driving the boat back for the 2-hour ride.  It wasn't too bad, but I sure wished we had autopilot!  Just kidding.  Anyway, we returned back to the marina at about 3:30, off-loaded and called it a weekend.  After a good night's sleep I am hanging in there, and hopefully will shake this cold or whatever it is before next weekend!  Check out some photos from the weekend in the photo gallery!

June 27, 2008:

Our offshore diving plans got scrubbed due to bad weather moving through the region, so we tried to put something together for some local diving on Saturday, and then spend Sunday doing some regular stuff -- errands, sleeping, cutting the lawn -- stuff we don't do much of when the dive season is in full swing.  Saturday we met with a few of the regular gang - all of us blown out of one offshore trip or another.  The weather wasn't all that nice even up in these parts -- overcast, a little rainy, humid but not hot -- in fact it was a little cool... and fog, plenty of fog.  We loaded up and headed out.  When I checked the weather buoy in the morning the wind was showing as pretty light and out of the NNW.  But when we got down to the marina, there was definitely more of a breeze and it was more out of the N-NE.  We cruised out to the Coyote - cutting through fog and increasing seas.  When we arrived on site, it really wasn't all that nice out there!  We had a good N 15-20 kt wind and seas were running 2-4' anyway.  Worse, the way the wind and tide were running, we were sitting exactly beam-to in this so we were rolling back and forth.  Joy.  Anyway, I suited up and splashed in with Pat B.  We all planned to bring scooters, but the conditions weren't too inviting and I had a strange feeling the visibility wasn't going to be all that great since the tide was going out.  We splashed in and headed down. Sure enough, the visibility was about 10 feet - kind of murky.  We took a swim down the starboard side heading aft.  It was quite a smooth cruise actually and I was really enjoying Pat's 50 watt light -- no, I didn't have it, I was just following his light around.  Yeah, even with a 35 watt HID light myself, I seem to have some light envy going on.  Damn - that 50 watt is a nice light.  I want one.  Anyway, we turned around and it became apparent why the swim out was so smooth -- we had a fairly stiff current running now and we had to trudge our way back through it.  It wasn't terrible, but it was annoying.  Anyway, with the conditions somewhat borderline, we decided to head up and call it a dive.  The deco was uneventful, except for the fact that an O2 bottle that someone hung on an equipment line was gone.  In the rough seas, somehow both clips managed to pop off and the bottle sank to the bottom.  If I needed a reminder (I don't) why I always carry all my own gas, or have support divers available, this was it - clipping bottles off on lines isn't the most reliable option out there.  We'll be out looking for this bottle next weekend, but if its found before we find it, please contact me as it does belong to someone.  Anyway, we wrapped up and headed in -- by then the fog had blown out and while it was still rather blah weather, it was good to get out for a dive.  Unfortunately the kid that was supposed to mow our lawn flaked out and didn't do it, so we got to go home and deal with that.  Ugh.  I'd rather be diving.

June 21-22, 2008:

Another weekend of excellent diving was lined up and we kicked it all off with a trip to the Baleen on Saturday morning with the group from NEUE. The weather was absolutely glorious with essentially no wind, millpond-flat seas and sunny skies. We made the run out to the wreck, arrived, picked up our mooring and settled in for a great morning of diving. I suited up first and splashed in. On the surface the visibility was a bit murky and I got worried – we were coming off low tide and even though the flood tide had begun, there was a possibility the visibility would be bad from still water. Anyway, once I cleared the 80 foot mark or so, the water got crisply clear and by the time I arrived on the wreck I could tell the visibility was spectacular. The mooring line was fouled – the rope having gotten caught underneath a piece of wreck along the rail on the portside in the stern, so I freed that and placed my strobe on the line. There was plenty of ambient light and I would put the visibility at a solid 25 feet. I struck out heading forward, swimming along the starboard side. Swimming along I could look down and see the bottom or look up and see the top of the wreck. This is such a pretty site – especially when the visibility is like this – so I took a real slow swim just enjoying the anemone garden covering the upper structures. I rounded the bow and did the same working aft before rising up and checking out the stack. Finally I worked my way back to the stern and then headed up for an uneventful deco. When I got back aboard, Dave & Pat B splashed in and did their dive – and they too were thrilled with the diving conditions. Everyone had great dives and it was a very enjoyable, relaxing morning. We headed in for the afternoon trip – originally scheduled for the Romance, but the group decided on the Poling to get a shot at good visibility. We cruised up to the Poling with the next group – also from NEUE – and arrived on the wreck site at the same time as Cape Ann Divers. The other mooring was occupied by a private boat so we worked out the details to share the remaining mooring; we tied off to their stern. I suited up and splashed in with my scooter. I scootered up to the CAD boat, and descended down their line. The visibility was definitely good, but it was pretty murky when I first got down there from all the traffic. As my dive progressed – and others left the bottom – it got much better. I’d say it was in the neighborhood of 20-25 feet. The highlight of the dive was definitely seeing a large wolf eel that was holed up under the break. Boy, those things sure do look mean. I enjoyed watching the wolf fish for awhile as cod fish swam over to check it out. Pretty cool. Anyway, I finished up the dive and headed up the stern mooring. When I surfaced, our boat had moved to the break mooring since the other boat had left. Dave knew I had a scooter so he didn’t think it would be a problem for me to make it back over to our boat. The other divers had dropped in on the break mooring after we moved, and I just scooted back to Gauntlet along the surface. I love DPVs! Dave took his turn making a dive and the rest of us relaxed enjoying the great summer weather. The wind had picked up a bit, but overall it was still very nice. We finished up and returned back to the marina around 5-5:30 pm. On a scale of 1-10, if I were going to rate the diving on Saturday, I’d give it a 9 – these were pretty awesome conditions. Sunday wasn’t quite as nice a day as Saturday. Even though the skies started out pretty clear, the weather grew overcast with some fog/haze and rain moving in as we headed out with a group for a trip to scuttled eagle class destroyer in 240 fsw, Eagle Boat 42 in the morning. It did clear out for awhile – and we even saw some sun. The visibility was pretty good there on the Eagle Boat too - about 20 feet, but darker. As the afternoon wore on and we ran our PM trip to Egg Rock, thunderstorms moved into the area. As we motored home it got pretty windy with choppy seas from the gusting wind – definitely some squalls were moving through. When we got back to the marina we had a short delay getting back into our slip as the large schooner "Friendship" was trying to get off the wharf for a cruise (the schooner goes out a few times per year). The wind was funneling down the "alley" into the marina and turning a 200 foot long schooner (yeah, they were using engines) did not seem to be going well. It wasn’t real pretty. The harbormaster was involved, and a few boats had to play tugboat and push them around to get them turned in the right direction. It was interesting for sure. It was actually interesting for us getting out as well as getting back on Sunday. Apparently the marina was quite full on Saturday night with transient boats so they decided to put one literally on the last 4 feet or so of dock in front of a sailboat on a finger pier opposite our boat. I guess there is no such thing as "we’re full"… The only glitch was that the boat was about 30 feet long. It was not too cool on the marina’s part, and not too easy for us to get out considering we have to back out of our slip and we had less than 1 foot of clearance on either side between this boat and a large wooden Grand Banks trawler docked along the opposite side. If there’s one thing that I think most will agree on in that marina, it’s that when it gets ugly docking or pulling out, it gets real ugly – not a lot of room for mistakes in there – especially when there’s wind or any tidal current involved. Luckily, there was no wind and I carefully backed us out; we cleared through without incident … thank goodness for bow thrusters.

Well, my dive report for this week has been slightly delayed, but not for lack of trying. A glitch with our FTP account prevented me from updating the website, but that’s all resolved now. Anyway, this past weekend was sort of a mixed bag weather-wise, but we got out both days and were able to run 3 great charters. Saturday kicked off with a trip to the USS NH wreck site. We were finishing up a class and this is an excellent training site because you can get some depth (30-40 feet), it’s a nice sand bottom and the visibility is usually good. I hopped in with the group to finish up our last 2 dives for the Intro to Technical Diving class. This is a fun class where we do endless air-sharing drills, valve drills and lift bag deployments – among other skills. We did 2 dives and clocked in a total of about 90 minutes bottom time, which was good. It was actually fairly hot out with very little wind – beautiful weather – but I was pretty warm in my suit – didn’t even cool off much in the water. It made me wish I was wearing a lighter undergarment… but since I knew that I have been bordering on getting sick from being a bit run-down towards the end of last week, I think my internal thermostat was off, especially since I froze on Sunday’s dive. Oh well. Anyway, we hammered away at drills and everyone did great. We wrapped up and headed in just in time to load up for our afternoon trip to Burnham Rock and Kettle Island with the New England Aquarium Dive Club. Since I had done 2 dives in the morning, I was skipping these and Dave was planning to dive at Kettle – one of his favorite spots (and mine). I was mainly looking forward to relaxing for the afternoon and letting Dave take care of putting new zincs on the boat since we forgot (again) on the morning trip… this was the plan anyway until his neck seal split like a melon while he was suiting up – he was done, for today at least. This tear was beyond duct tape. Fortunately Dave has another suit at home, and he knows this guy who does a hell of job on drysuit repairs – so there were no worries about the rest of the weekend. While we considered waiting to put the zincs on the next day, we weren’t keen on this because we were going to be further out and not in such a sheltered place, and where bouncing around under the boat is not too desirable. Despite urges to remain in my chair like a lump, I got up, put all my stuff back on and got in the water to do the zincs. I needed to cool off anyway, as I was still hot. I didn’t have enough gas or energy to bother doing an actual dive, so when I finished I climbed out and returned to my chair. Everyone enjoyed their dives – Burnham was great with excellent visibility despite a little bit of current running. Kettle got high marks from everyone also. This site never disappoints. All in all it was a good day and we returned to the dock around 6 pm. Sunday we headed out to dive the YF415 and Reliance as a single trip, and the weather was quite different – overcast, pouring at times and cool. There was a moderate breeze around 10 knots out of the East, which lumped up the sea a little bit. We did have the heat on most of the day, quite the difference a day can make in New England! Hot one day, freezing the next… such odd weather. Anyway, we got back to the dock a bit early around 3 pm, as we were able to get off the dock about 20 minutes ahead of schedule. This was good because it was in fact Father’s Day and we were already overdue for a cookout. Despite the gloomy weather to close out the weekend, it was an excellent series of dives.

Finally a brief break in the weather allowed us to get April started off right with a double-header day of dive charters on Saturday before weathering out of Sunday’s dive. For the morning trip we were headed to the New York Central 14 II – aka NYC 14-2 and formerly known as the "Pug Wreck." The morning broke with dreary skies and light to moderate rain. But the wind was very light and the seas were laying down into a ground swell, so we departed almost on time for the NYC 14-2 with an eager group. You might ask, why only "almost on time"? Well, someone overslept. It was the same someone who was the guilty oversleeping party on another trip not long ago (see the May 20, 2007 dive report). Yes, a repeat offender. Out of the kindness of our hearts we waited. Fortunately he did arrive by about 7:35 am, so we were not delayed very long and we were cruising out of the marina by 7:45 am. There was a moderate ground swell running, but it wasn’t bad and we made good time riding out. When we arrived on the wreck site, there was no mooring. This was no surprise given that we haven’t been on the NYC 14-2 in quite a few months now. We made ready to put in a line and took care to make sure the drop was good. I was a bit concerned at first about how precise we were – mainly because I knew the visibility was not going to be good and if we were even a little bit off the wreck, it would likely mean a wasted dive and another round of drops. I had received a visibility report earlier in the week and while I felt we had a better shot of some visibility in deeper water, the NYC isn’t known for the best visibility and given the combination of "everything" – there was a really good chance it would be just plain terrible. After a few passes by the line, I decided the drop was good, and Dave and Pat B splashed in to tie in the line. I had counted about 7 minutes when the lift bag popped up indicating we were secure, so I knew something had to have gone right. The group suited up and divers began entering the water. Soon, Dave was back, as was most everyone else. As can be expected, visibility reports varied widely from "can’t see anything" to "don’t bother" to "it’s not bad"… Honestly, it didn’t matter to me what the report was, I was going. Between dive shows, blow-outs and being sick it has been too long for me without a dive. Some of my dive gear had actually dried. When I woke up on Saturday morning, I honestly thought I was getting up for work – the regular kind. So, I was diving no matter what. Roman had finally woken up and we got ready. The final consensus was "black as night, terrible water column visibility, but about 10 feet on the wreck." That actually didn’t sound too bad to me, considering. Roman and I hit the water and began dropping down. The surface water was a murky, nasty brown color and by the time we hit 20 feet it was indeed dark as night. We saw the wreck just a few feet before running into it. I had some reservations about backscatter in low visibility with my new Salvo 35 watt HID light, but that was quickly put to rest on this dive – the light cuts through everything. We got situated and then swam the wreck. I should add we were tied in right on the edge of a beam adjacent to the frame around the deck opening for the engine and boilers. When Dave & Pat dropped down to the wreck, they found the shot line had landed squarely in the middle, right on top of the engine. So, that made things easy for them, plus it tied us in to a good spot on the wreck since for some of the divers on this trip, it was their first visit and this at least had put them in a spot where they could see something interesting without getting too far from the line. Roman and I took a lap around the wreck and then popped inside before puttering around the engine and boilers for the reminder of our bottom time. It was like a night dive. I couldn’t see any gauges without a light or some kind of illumination. It reminded me again of how much I would like to have a secondary display for the PRISM with a luminescent face. Anyway, it was dark down there, but overall not too bad. I mean, it wasn’t too good either, but it was good enough. The water temperature was about 39F, so it’s coming up a bit. We ascended through the very dark and murky water column, did a short decompression amidst a slightly annoying ground swell we could feel around 20 feet and up, and surfaced. It felt really good to be back in the water. By the time we surfaced, the rain was gone and skies were clearing. We cruised back to the dock and unloaded in preparation for the afternoon trip to the Poling. The sun was coming out and the wind was all but gone – and while this seemed promising, I knew the visibility was probably going to be worse given the Poling is shallower and we were hitting an outgoing tide on a new-moon spring tide. Eek. We loaded up with the next group and enjoyed a nice run up to the Poling where we had the wreck all to ourselves. There was no mooring here either so Dave and Pat splashed in to repair the old mooring. We dropped them in on a shot line and had them reattach a new piece of line with a buoy they carried down with them to the old mooring and then blow the whole shot line to the surface where we would collect it back aboard. They did just that and in no time the group was getting ready to dive. I was undecided about diving. The visibility report from a few days ago was a black 2-4’ and I could tell just looking at the lines in the water that it seemed worse than the visibility on the NYC 14-2. Dave came back and said it was real bad. Actually, he was so descriptive about how bad it was that we decided it was detrimental to morale and needed more appropriate "messaging" (some of the customers weren’t yet in the water and suddenly looked not very enthused). So, the group coined a new term to be descriptive, yet positive about the visibility – "macro conditions." It was going to be a "macro dive." We thought that sounded nice – after all, in these macro conditions, one might see a nudibranch that might otherwise be overlooked – and that sounded nice. Wouldn’t you like to see a nudibranch on your dive? Anyway, I decided to skip this one. The group hit the water and managed to make the best of their dives despite the challenging and not so pleasant conditions. Unfortunately, these are typical post winter-thaw spring conditions. I try to look at from the perspective that these are good skills dives – since whether it’s a deep wreck or a shallow one, low visibility and darkness add complexity and thus help sharpen skills for future dives. The good news is the weather is getting better and better diving conditions will be upon us soon enough. Either way, diving is fun.

Well, I suppose it would be an understatement to say that it’s been a tough March weather-wise. While this winter hasn’t been unusual in terms of blow-outs overall (I just finished analyzing 4 years of charters looking at every weekend – very interesting), March has in fact been one of the worst months we’ve seen in years. March should be a great month. After all, it is my birthday month, but the truth is, it’s still very much winter and a thus a surprisingly tough month with weather – and for getting sick. I don’t know how many of you out there got completely sick right after Sea Rovers, but I did and I must say, I haven’t been that sick in years. I actually took 1.5 sick days from work and spent 4 days in bed – that’s a lot for me. Many people I spoke to reported essentially the same thing (some even ended up in the hospital). So, who ever you are that got out of your cage and brought this into Sea Rovers, Dustin Hoffman and the "Outbreak" team called – they’re looking for you. Anyway, I am improved, but was still on the DL for diving this weekend and had planned to stay topside. The wind of course hammered us Friday and into most of Saturday, keeping us dockside. And while we normally reserve the major holidays for family stuff, we decided to run on Easter in order to get a trip in. We arrived at the marina bright and early now that we’re back to our early morning departure schedule. It was quiet. One of the live-aboard people ran into us as we were loading and asked us if we were out "getting our religion" – well, I guess you could say so. There were no Easter eggs in sight, instead just a full boat of mostly the regular gang who were eager to get a dive in after many disappointing cancellations. While the forecast initially looked good for Sunday and a trip to the Holmes, the wind was actually up and the 7 am buoy report was showing 20-25 knots of wind out of the NW and seas at 3 feet. We decided to keep it simple and head to the Poling, the most protected location with this wind. At this point, we’ll take whatever we can get. Interestingly, the marina basin water was very clear and I predicted good visibility. We got underway and enjoyed a nice ride up to the Poling. The seas were a bit choppy, and it actually got progressively worse during the time we were out. I am not sure if there was some sort of local wind effect with the wind coming off the land, but we were seeing increasing seas and had some gusts to 25 knots or more with wind that was mostly westerly, even though the buoy was reporting improving conditions. With the boat secured we got the divers suited up and in the water. The water looked murky on the surface, but everyone came back with two comments mainly: it was cold (37F) and the visibility was very good (15-20 feet). The air temperature was cool, especially with the wind chill so we did have a little bit of freezing up going on, but the sun was bright and kept things melting. All in all everyone seemed to have good dives and even reserved some time for a good prank. As many of you know "trail mix" is very popular among some on Gauntlet. Personally, I don’t like it, but certain people will go so far as to sniff it out (and eat it all) where ever it might be hidden aboard the boat. This time, the "communal" trail mix that was (oddly) freely offered up had a bit of a surprise with an additional ingredient – it was spiked with loads of hot pepper! Suffice it to say there were some sour faces on that deal after a handful went down not-so-smoothly, and later I found myself throwing away a nearly full package of this stuff when cleaning up the boat. I guess no one wanted it today. Anyway, we got back to the dock at about 10:30 am since Dave also skipped the dive so we could get things wrapped up quicker – we had the boat unloaded and buttoned up by 11:30 am and were heading home to join our family for Easter lunch. We even had time to see the Easter bunny so Dave could get his chocolate eggs. Next weekend is BTS – but April is around the corner and it’s time to get back to diving.