It’s that time of the year again!

Some look forward to Christmas, New Years, the aniversary of their divorce, but macho people like me always favor the beginning of Lobster Season.

And so it started…

Crazy Ivan, Instructor John, Jim and I set out in the mighty zodiac at 11 PM and headed to a spot that was located via Jim’s psychic lobster powers.

The moon was not visible.

We were in the water at midnight; it took me a while to get situated and submerge to 35 feet.

Logged SCUBA Dive #371

Secret Location: 4f 66 66 20 74 68 65 20 47 61 74 65 73 20 6f 66 20 4d 61 72 2c 20 74 6f 77 61 72 64 73 20 74 68 65 20 68 6f 75 73 65 20 6f 66 20 6c 69 67 68 74 20 6c 61 79 73 20 61 20 73 70 6f 74 20 66 72 65 65 20 66 72 6f 6d 20 68 6f 75 73 65 20 6c 69 67 68 74 73 2e
Palos Verdes, CA

Solo Diving/SoCal Buddy Diving

In With: 2600 psi
Out With: 500 psi
Max depth: 40 feet
Waves: Pretty flat on the surface, surgy below
Visibility: 10-15 feet
Temperature: 62 degrees or so
Total Bottom Time: About 35 minutes
Lobsters caught: 0

Lobsters usually start the season shallow, but I was told by a self proclaimed lobster expert that due to the weird weather this summer, the lobsters are probably still deep.

I swam towards shore; the bottom was really surgy – kelp moved back and forth.

It was really hard to try and spot lobsters because everything that could move, was moving.

I made it to 20 feet – the visibility sucked and the surge was too much, so I turned back around after not seeing any lobsters at all.

I made my way back, past the boat, to 40 feet and pinned a huge lobster… anyway, it was huge until I measured it.

The thing still needed to grow another half inch – yeah, the shorts look big if you haven’t seen any; I released it, unharmed.

On this dive, I saw three lobsters – two shorts and the third one, I missed the grab because I got caught on kelp.

I made it back to the rubber yacht where Jim was waiting.

“Did you get any?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah I got one,” Jim responded.

He pulled out three lobsters – one was a six pound bull!

I was thinking, “Great, I’m going to hear Jim gloat all night long.”

And yes, I was right.

Crazy Ivan made it back with one bug, then Instructor John with none.

We discussed where we went and what we saw.

All four bugs were caught in 25 to 30 feet of water; we decided to move the boat closer in, and to another spot.