Posted by DougD on January 14, 2002 at 23:36:04:
Despite a cold and sore throat that had me down last week I went out on the Truth this weekend to log some certification dives toward my AOW. I had been really congested all week but felt good enough to give the dry-suit class a try on Saturday morning, and then got back into the pool Saturday afternoon for part of my on-going Stress and Rescue class. That went pretty well so I decided I would go ahead with the dives planned for Sunday (plus, I didn't want to lose my non-refundable C-note), then rushed home to pack and kiss the wife and baby goodbye.
I boarded the Truth Saturday night at about 9:15 p.m., attended the dive briefing at 10:30ish, yacked with some other divers until about midnight and then curled up in my sleeping bag on bunk 10 (port side) for a long winters knap. I slept pretty soundly until about 4am when the engines fired up and the Truth put out to sea. It was a very surreal night. I don't know how rough the seas were but occassionally I was awakened by some vigorous rocking motion, all the while dreaming that I was on a cruise ship ride with various "work friends" that really shouldn't have been there. Very odd dreams.
I was awakened at about 6:30 or 7:00 a.m., when the boat hit calm water, fully expecting to find myself on the backside of San Miguel Island. No such luck. I guess all that rocking around was worse than I knew because it caused the Captain to look for calmer waters, which he found between Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz Islands. All our dives on Sunday ended up being right there off the East Point of Santa Rosa Island.
None of the sites are what I would call spectacular, but for our purposes they were just fine. I dove with my new dry-suit (which was awesome) and my new HP-100. I wore the same amount of weight I always do; the weight of the steel tank off-setting the added bouyancy of the suit.
The first dive was to 95 feet (we really wanted to break 100' but without a shovel we weren't going to make it here). We dropped down the anchor line and found ourselves on a small rock reef with a little shelf to look under. We stayed there about 8 minutes and ascended to some lesser rock formations at about 65'. No current on bottom but when we surfaced behind the boat a nice little surface current took us right to the step with no effort.
Dive 2...yahoo...was supposed to be a nav course...hee, hee...but went slightly awry when we hit a monster current on the bottom. At about 45' was a 100' line we were supposed to use to gauge our kick cycle against...I got somewhere around 50 kicks before I reached the end of the line and that took about 3 min. We were supposed to go out to the right for about 50' then turn back do another 100', turn right again and complete a rectangle. My buddy and I did our turn and found a wall running parrallel to the line. We followed the wall back at about 60 fsw, but the current blasted us quickly past were we needed to make that last turn. At the end of the wall we turned and tried to make it back to the starting point but the current was just too strong to fight. I looked up and the boat was right there above us. We decided to go ahead and ascend, and were swept away by the current as we did so. It carried us straight back from the boat and we came up right on the drift line. No problem. Later we found out that everyone experienced the same trouble.
This second site was pretty nice and I would have loved to have spent the whole dive on that wall. I saw my first big lingcod there as the current rocketed me by like an "orange torpedo," as one diver described me later.
The third dive was closer in to the East Point of the Island and was for enjoyment. Saw some small rock reefs, sparse kelp, some interesting crabs, and a short visit by some curious sea lions. It was surgie here but the current was not so bad. We surfaced an easy 30 yard swim from the boat. At that point my ears sinuses had had enough and I called it a day.
There was a fourth dive but I ate lunch instead and then crashed on bunk 10.
The ride in was pretty bumpy but not like the night before. All in all, it was a pretty good trip. Maybe the dive sites weren't the best, but the company was great and I enjoyed diving and sharing stories with my classmates and the other divers and crew as well.
The truth is a nice boat if you haven't been on it. Kudos to the crew, cook, and dive leaders.