Yesterday myself, Debbie K., Scott G., Kevin Lee, and David K. took the Sundiver II to San Clemente. Departing at (gulp) 5:20am, we arrived at the island in about 2 1/2 hours. We did three sites on the southeast end of the island - Fish Eye, Fish Hook, and Little Flower. Conditions were spectacular - the water was 68 degrees down to 60ft, and visability ranged from 40-80ft. depending on the location and currents.

We had a couple of unusual encounters. On the third dive I was shooting a nudie with my 105mm when I looked up just in time to see a 6' soupfin shark coming right at me. It broke off about 10' away and swam off into the blue (no, I didn't get a photo). Wow! I had never seen one in the wild before. Then it came back around about 5 minutes later to make a second pass. When I got back on the boat I found out Debbie and David had seen 4 of them swimming in a small group - all of them in the 6' range.

Later on that same dive I spotted a large scorpion fish in a crevice. As I started to focus on the fish, something annoying and yellow kept getting in the way. I looked up to shoo the annoying garabaldi only to discover it wasn't a garabaldi at all but a scythe butterfly fish. Goodbye scorpion fish, hello butterfly fish. That one I did get photos of.

I'm sure Scott or Kevin will have a more complete report and pix to post. I'm looking forward to both.

This will be my last dive in SoCal until May. Next week, I'll be temporarily locating to Melbourne, Australia for 8 months to work on an HBO show. I've been told the diving there is a lot like the diving here, so I'll be packing up all my dive and photo gear to find out. Hopefully I'll be able to post some trip reports and photos and let you know if this is really true.

Until then, g'day mate!