Logged Dive #313
Secret Location: 31 30 30 20 79 61 72 64 73 20 74 6f 77 61 72 64 73 20 74 68 65 20 73 68 6f 72 65 20 6e 65 61 72 20 74 68 65 20 77 72 65 63 6b 20 74 68 61 74 20 69 73 20 6e 61 6d 65 64 20 41 76 61 6c 6f 6e 2e, Palos Verdes

Solo Diving/SoCal Buddy Diving

In With: 2800 psi
Out With: 300 psi
Max depth: 65 feet
Waves: Pretty damn flat!
Visibility: 15 to 25 feet and very clear!
Water Temperature: About 56 degrees
Total Bottom Time: About 25 minutes

The boat was moved 10 minutes away and anchored in 45 feet of water; another dive boat was anchored 100 yards away in 60 feet of water.

I was the second overboard and the first to submerge down the anchor line; and again, I caught my first lobster of the dive at the anchor.

This place had a nice and interesting reef structure but I saw less lobsters; the ones that I did see fled at the first swoop of my light.

I continued on…

I caught another bug and bagged it 15 minutes into this dive.

I ascended to spot the boat, and a boat I did spot; I took my compass bearings and submerged to continue hunting on the way back.

I spotted another lobster, pinned it, but it shot between my legs… I felt something.

Was it my gauge like last time?

I felt lobster legs poking in my arm and grabbed it with my other hand, dropping the light.

I opened my bag a little too quickly and one of my detainees escaped!

I bagged the one I had and I just hoped I was “trading up” in the size of lobsters.

Getting low on air, I ran across the anchor line and thought, “Wow, I didn’t know the Island Diver anchored with a nylon rope.”

I also thought I was a little too deep, at 60 feet.

I surfaced and soon realized I had aimed for and ascended on the wrong boat; it was smaller and unoccupied.

I looked for the Island Diver and spotted it; with only 300 psi left, I surface-swam and bitch-crawled over 100 yards of kelp

I pose with the two lobsters I liberated from this dive.

Ax brought up a huge bug that Mike C. weighed – a six pound bug!

Ax with her bug.

We broke out the deco bottles.

We enjoyed a nice and flat ride back to port.

Ax and Mike C. display their trophy bugs of the night.

Do I look macho posing with all my bugs, or what?

Debriefing continued in the parking lot until a little after midnight.

Finally this season, the tide is turning for me!

I heard tonight that the pre-seasonal swells of a couple weeks ago are pushing the lobsters deeper than usual this time of year; apparently lobsters are still plentiful off the Santa Monica break waters, but I am not familiar with that area.