White Point, San Pedro, CA
Dove with Ron B. who I met through the Sandeaters.

In With: 3200 psi
Out With: 2500 psi
Max depth: 35 feet
Waves: 2-5 feet
Visibility: 1-2 feet
Water Temperature: Not Cold
Total Bottom Time: A little over 10 minutes

Ron B is in the Navy and about to transfer to Italy.

He’s down here from Washington and wanted to get in some local beach diving.

Originally we were going to do Cardiac Hill, but it looked too rough; the waves were coming in from the kelp bed.

We then tried Long Point, but the gates were locked; so we drove to White Point.

Over looking the cliff, it was obviously low tide, but the conditions seemed doable.

We geared up and went to the water around 8:35.

The place where we normally enter was dry, so we went one cul de sac over; it protected us from the waves that were picking up.

As soon as we got out of the protection of the cove, we got pounded by waves and surf.

I yelled to Ron, “Just keep going out!”

We rested out side of the surf zone and soon submerged into a murky soup of silt and sand.

We couldn’t see shit.

Ron had a light, so I knew where he was; I had my bright blue fins, so he was able to track me.

I kept my spear gun in front of me in case I ran in to something.

The surge was starting to pick up, so after 10 minutes or so, I motioned to surface.

It wasn’t getting any better, so we called the dive off.

We swam in; the waves hitting the rocks and reefs acted like a vacuum.

I used air getting back in; after all, I did have almost a full tank.

It was quite a workout getting back in.

I think a lot of divers would have panicked or gotten tired.

Ron B looks like a weight lifter who seems to know his limits; neither of us was worried about the other.

We made it back to the quiet protection of the cul de sac.

The lifeguard drove over and said, “The visibility sucked, didn’t it?”

We spent about an hour bullshitting with the lifeguard who was chasing fishermen off the rocks.

Two fishermen got swept away and drowned last weekend.

The lifeguard we were talking to was one of those that participated in the rescue.

He said that, “They all stank like alcohol.”

Oh well, I thanked Ron for providing bananas and nuts while we watched the fishermen dodge the waves.

Vis still sucks!

The following is Ron B’s account of the dive that he posted to the Sandeaters group:

Date: Sat, 11 Jun 2005 17:19:40 -0700 (PDT)

Subject: [sandeater] Dive Report for White Point Saturday AM June 11th

Went to dive “Cardiac Hill” this morning and met up with… another Sandeater, after much discussion due to low tide and the good size waves we decided to go to Long Point.

We got to the gate at Long Point at around 0800 and it was still locked so we went to White Point.

We checked out the surf and it looked manageable so we went for it.

Surf was 2-4 feet
Lots of Surge
Max depth was 35 feet
Vis on the surface was about 18-24 inches
Vis on the bottom was a solid 24 inches (sometimes only 12″)
I had my camera….but no pictures
Didn’t notice the temp. Was swimming so much was hot the whole dive.

There was no red tide here according to the lifeguards.

We had a great workout swimming threw that surf!

We called the dive after only 10 minutes because conditions were getting worse.

After we got out the lifeguard came over and talked to us for a while and said he wasn’t going to let anyone else dive.

Well at least we got wet!

Ron