Posted by George Austin on December 03, 2001 at 11:26:38:
In Reply to: Re: Beach Diving posted by DougD on December 03, 2001 at 09:49:15:
It sounds like these South Coast Divers take their beach diving seriously. Right the most important thing is to know when to say when as far as the surf goes. The vis is not going to be worth it if the waves are macking anyway.
What we do before anything is give the site a good 20 minute lookover. Timing the sets and counting set waves. If its a go, then we'll gear up.
Standing on the beach,BC totally airless, mask around neck and fins in hand, we'll wait for the last wave in a set and make for chest deep water as quick as we can. Once in chest deep water, we can go ahead and figure 4 those fins on. Mask up and we're good to go.
I see tons of classes trying to get through the surf zone with air in the BC and it just doesn't make any sense especially when they're not going out between sets. Which most of them don't do. Then when its time to dive under a wave they can't. The issue with needing air is probably due to the fact that they're usually extremely overweighted therefore they need air to stay afloat.
We also never have reg in mouth while making a beach entry, its mostly a safety concern in case we have to dive under a rogue--its conceivable that you could embolise in the surf.
Ending the dive is the same deal. Stay out of the impact zone while your'e waiting for the lull. You'd be in chest deep water getting the fins off and pulling the mask down. Once the last wave of the set passes, go ahead and walk fast out of the water. Piece of cake. the key is patience and timing.
**A note about Divers Cove.**
If you 'd like to check out the outer reef--a site we call "Lobster Traps" walk into the water directly in front of the guard tower and set your bezel to 160 deg. Kick out for about 15 minutes looking down. About 300 yards offshore is this cool little reef about 100ft X 100ft. Rarely visited due to the distance from shore. Big fish hang around here as well as a few bugs. Bunch of old lobster traps that we break the doors off of. They are unused and have no floats attached. Just junk.
A few years ago at Shaws Cove, some macho firemen went out during a storm in the summertime with 8 to 10 ft waves. Since Shaws faces due south, it picks up all of a south swell. Anyway, these guys got into the surf zone and naturally started getting pummelled. No one saw them again until the surf started backing down, couple days later. Finally the lifeguards found their bodies just bouncing around on the bottom in a big circle. The cove had become kind of a surgy whirlpool during the storm.