I was the first to arrive to the Rocky point marina. It had gone from warm the previous day to overcast, windy and downright chilly. I was glad to put on my dry suit undergarments which kept the wind at bay. It was a short drive from my folk’s place to Redondo Beach, but I gave myself plenty of time to arrive. I ended up waiting for about 15 minutes during which time the two cups of coffee and bottle of water I drank on the way down really had me cross-legged. Once everyone arrived, I got that out of the way. I met Dick, the boat captain and the rest of the divers. It is a cool thing to meet up with other divers – only two of whom I even knew and only from the internet and through mutual acquaintances.
The plan for the day was to leave at 7am and dive on three wrecks, 2 technical profiles and one recreational profile. Once we got all the gear sorted, Jamie and I and Nick would be doing Tech 1 profiles using 25/25 and 100% for deco. We would scooter on at least one dive. Nick took care of all my tanks and gas and I was very appreciative for all his hard work setting up the trip. Jamie was assembling the scooters, and right out of the gate, one wasn’t working. Darn. That would put the dive plan for the Palawan in jeopardy. We got all the rest of the gear sorted and Nick realized that he forgot to bring any weights for me. Rob Lee was there with his super fancy van/portable dive shop and was gracious enough to loan me a 9 lb. v weight and some clip on weights, which I think was going to be perfect for this trip. A little about my diving background, I have 183 dives over three and a half years. I earned my UTD Tech 1 certification earlier this year diving in Fresh water. Out of 183 dives, only 32 or so are in the ocean. I dive a lot locally because it is much easier on the wallet, but I love to dive and really relax underwater.
We donned our dry suits on land and boarded the boat already set to dive. We arrived at the site and Captain Dick and Dive master Chris dropped a shot marker line on the wreck. The pool was open and the conditions looked great. The first team geared up and rolled back into the water.
Nick, Jamie and I got geared up and ready to go. We rolled over the sides of the boat and proceeded to get our deco bottles, which had been stowed on lines over the side. Just as we started swimming over to the down line, we saw a bag surface and we now needed to wait for the first team to see what the problem was. We swam over to the SMB and saw them fairly close to the surface. As the other team surfaced, they informed us that the shot line was bouncing along the sandy bottom, with no wreck in sight. The boat captain tossed us a dive flag float and told us they would relocate it, and then tow us over there. That plan sounded good to me as the current was very prominent. I spotted a small squid swimming in Rob’s fins while we were waiting. It is always cool to see squid since we don’t see them very often diving in Colorado or New Mexico. They located the wreck again, almost a hundred yards from our current position and tossed a tow line off the boat and we all grabbed hold. Jamie held onto the dive flag buoy, and was closest to the boat. I was behind her, nick was behind me. As soon as the boat started pulling us, I realized I needed a regulator in my mouth as we became vacation tow floats gone bad. It was very hard to hang on and I was getting banged in the head by Jamie’s dive float, which was making her have a hard time hanging on. This seemed to go on forever, but it was very tiring and much more difficult and not really fun at all. Now we were really ready to descend.
We began the descent and I got a little ahead of my team and was more with the other team. Once we got to the bottom at 135 fsw I saw Jamie signaling me politely “hey we are your team over here” we got back together and proceeded to enjoy the beautiful fish on the wreck. As a guy who mostly dives freshwater lakes, I am always so amazed when I dive in the ocean at how full of life it is. It took me a few moments to acclimate to the conditions and my new team, but then we were on our way and enjoyed 25 minutes of bottom time looking at giant lingcod, and cool “pink stuff”. I wish I knew more of what I was looking at, but it was very enjoyable nonetheless. At 25 minutes the thumbs came out, and we ascended up the line. I immediately realized that I have never done a team ascent in current. I was the Deco captain, and wasn’t exactly sure what the best position was. Jamie is a rock star – great diver and she is a champ at dealing with the current. As we kept heading up on our deep stops, I ended up just hooking a finger on the line to keep my attention on the deco and the team. At 20 feet, after Jamie switched to her 100%, I came off the line to do my gas switch and was kicking, Jamie signaled… “No” – stay on the line. I think she was worried that I may lose them
I was very humbled by the current and my own acknowledgement that completing deco with my team rather than working on figuring out current and positioning strategies. Get the deco done, then discuss. We surfaced after a total runtime of 51 minutes, with a max depth of 137 fsw.
On the surface I told the team “man, I didn’t expect that current – and I realized I had no idea what the proper way to keep together was on the fixed line – talk about feeling like Lake Boy”. Jamie and Nick explained that it takes some work and that scooters make it easier, but in general it takes constant finning to keep together on the line. The other factor working against me on the ascent was that I may have been a little light starting at about 50 feet. I had no gas in my wing, and let too much air out of my dry suit, so I was getting a bit of a cramp in my right hamstring. Needless to say, I didn’t have a death grip, but I was definitely glad to have the line to help me deal with this new challenge… ocean current! Talk about feeling lame! In my book, this was a great dive and the ascent and deco and team were great otherwise. This dive made me realize that no how matter where you dive or how much you dive, getting some variety is very important. I had spent all year training in a variety of lakes! Cold – no problem. Dark, no problem. Poor visibility, no problem. Current – ok good thing to experience for me.
We enjoyed a ninety minute surface interval and prepared for the second wreck, The Palawan. We were already down one scooter, so Nick was planning to tow Jamie and I was borrowing Maciek’s scooter. We got in the water, I adjusted my tow cord and we scootered over to the down line. The descent was uneventful but the visibility got worse the lower we went. Same goes for the current. It took constant scootering to keep the line in view. We got to the bottom, and Jamie was fussing with something, which I later learned that she was out or argon and had been inflating using back gas (25/25) all the way down. Talk about cold! Yikes! They got situated in tow position, and we came up the bow of the Palawan. The plan was to scooter down the wreck, and back. Once we came close to the up line, we would explore that area some more. We were a bit gas-compromised so we ended up planning this one as 120 for 30 minutes. The scootering was fantastic. This was a really fantastic dive despite 10-15 foot visibility. The feeling of freedom I enjoyed while cruising the wreck was unbelievable. That was until my scooter started to stutter. I signaled the team, and told them that my scooter was having problems. We turned the dive at that point and realized we scootered with the current about two thirds of the way down the wreck. So I juiced my failing scooter for a compartment or so, then it totally died. I signaled that it was dead, and proceeded to stow my ride. I tried to find my butt d-ring – which I had recently adjusted, but still could not find it so I clipped it off to my right chest d-ring. This made a frog kick very much kick kick kick with no kick glide to speak of. So we proceeded to swim back the nearly hundred yards to the up line. This was a series of ‘down into a compartment, up over – get killed by the current, and repeat’. It was quite a lot of work. By the time we got close, Jamie signaled “out and up” – we confirmed and proceeded to the up line. When we got there, we confirmed thumbs and proceeded to ascend. We were a bit slow off the bottom, as Nick was on his rebreather. Jamie had a constant “where the F is nick” look. It is always great to hang out with couples and see a guy getting “dog housed” underwater LOL. The visibility coming up was awful through about 40 feet and the current was stronger than the first dive. I was lighter than the last dive since I had the HP100s rather than the big 119's. Jamie called the deco on this one, and we did a clean ascent – I still hooked the line with a finger to stay put while Jamie kicked like a champ. Much respect for her tenacity and ocean adaptability. I will dive with her anytime. She is one heck of a diver. The vis opened up at forty feet and was really good which made deco much easier.
We surfaced after a 47 minute runtime, min temp 54 degrees. She immediately said – did that dive suck or what? I enjoyed it immensely, despite the broken scooter and ripping current. Nick was breathing water in his breather, and Jamie was done. I was in the mood to dive, but despite drinking copious amounts of water, I think I was still dehydrated. Both my hamstrings were sore and cramping, which for me means water and dry suit squeeze was too much – which meant I had been underweighted the whole trip. Good to note for next time!
We headed to a third site, the Avalon to check out conditions. When we arrived we found the kelp sideways, but dropped a shot line anyway. After a minute or so, it was a long way away. Verdict was the current was too strong, and we all had a good day diving, so we called the trip.
I had a great time diving in California, and really want to come out here and dive a bunch more to really practice diving in current on some non-deco dives to work on that skill. I could see driving out and diving nitrox on shallow dives for a week – just for some practice. Next time I’ll use a bit more lead.
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