Posted by Chris on September 12, 2002 at 22:48:04:
My girlfriend Kathryn and I went on the three day, 8/31/02-9/2/02, labor day weekend trip to San Clemente Island on the Great Escape, aka Esther's "Le Grande Tour."
I was not feeling well because of a sinus infection, so I slept most of the first day.
However the second to last dive of the day was at Castle Rock.
Since that is such a beautiful spot Kathryn & I suited up dove there.
Tim had anchored in a relatively shallow spot, 35 ft., and there was a bit of surge, but the water was a comfy 67°F.
The visibility there was about 30 ft, but I saw many bugs, many San Clemente shorts and 3 looked to be around 3 lbs.
The next morning, after a beautiful sunrise in northwest harbor our first dive was at nine fathoms.
It was a rare time here with no current.
The coral here is incredible and there were hundreds of the San Clemente shorts in every hole.
The next dive was at Swiss cheese reef, however I elected to explore the outer edge of the kelp bed and saw several pink abalone.
The next dive was at Seal Cove.
I elected to sit this one out because I was tired, but Dale Lopez went on the dive and shot two nice halibut.
Our next dive was at ordnance reef in Pyramid Cove.
Here I also shot a nice halibut.
The next morning our first dive was at the Pyramid Cove arch.
Captain Tim dropped the anchor at the entrance.
After that we dove the east end reef where I encountered two morays and booth pink and green abalone.
One of the divers on the trip was Elaine Jobin who took some very nice pictures at the arch and at ordinance reef the day before.
The last dive was at little flower.
I elected to swim to the island instead of diving the reef.
Just along shore the island drops down in a wall to the sand at 110 ft.
There are many small cave in the wall, a few big enough to enter.
It is a very cool spot.
