Last Friday and Saturday I went on the last Sea Sons Annual Halibut hunt trip aboard the Peace. I went for the first time last year and had a great time.
The Sea Sons have been doing this for years However their numbers are dwindling since they have not had a new member in years. That combined with the economy reducing the number of divers have forced them to make this the last of their trips.
This year we were scheduled to go to Nic, but the weather dictated that we go to Santa Cruz. The water at Cruz was 58°F. The water was very green and the visibility ranged from 5 to 15 feet. It changed even at the same depth as I swam.
There were six halibut taken on the trip by four divers. Don Thompson got two, Travis got two, Bill Skwarlo got one, and I got one. We did six dives on day one and four on day two. On day one I saw one short, and many bat rays & angel sharks. On day two I saw nothing than on the last dive as I was heading back to the boat, my air was down to 600 psi, and I was just about to unload the gun when I saw the fish. I took the shot and the vis quickly went from 5 feet to zero. I worked up the spear line, found the fish and tore out it's gills. I then pulled the spear out of the sand, grabbed the gun spear and fish and headed for the surface. I was about 20 yards behind the boat when I surfaced.
I sad to see the trip end, because I really enjoy the hunt and enjoyed going to sites that normally are not visited.
Here are my pictures from the trip.

©2009, Chris Grossman

click on the images to enlarge

John Higgins	Sunrise	Fidel Luna	Don Thompson
Don Thompson	Don Thompson	Don Thompson	Don Thompson
Don Thompson	Don Thompson	Mike Kass	P7108925clr.jpg
P7108926lr.jpg	P7108928lr.jpg	P7106400lr.jpg	P7106401clr.jpg
Pual Ross & Steve Sanford	Chef Joe	Chef Joe	Pual Ross
Steve Sanford	Chef Joe	P7106422lr.jpg	Fidel Luna
P7106430lr.jpg	David Vilhauer	Steve Sanford	Steve Sanford
Bill Skwarlo	Bill Skwarlo	David Vilhauer	Chris Grossman
Chris Grossman's Underwater Photography

©2009 Chris Grossman, diver.net

• Halibut Hunting seahunt 08:19:41 07/15/09 (3)
  • Re: enervated? Divebum Don 17:50:06 07/15/09 (2)
    • So I did seahunt 07:02:20 07/16/09 (0)
    • Re: Re: enervated? divebum Don 18:02:16 07/15/09 (0)
• Re: The Last Annual Halibut Hunt halibug 12:17:08 07/13/09 (0)