Thursday, January 31, 2013

10 Mile Point 27/01/2013

For our Sunday dive, Jim, Greg and I decided to do 10 Mile Point near Victoria.

I had done 10 mile twice before, but this time we'd be using scooters. I was excited! We'd also be using a much easier entry from a small beach to the North West of the regular parking lot. The entry at 10 Mile was not a lot of fun when I'd done it before, doubly less fun in doubles, and pretty much impossible with scooters and stage bottles.

For the first dive, we used the sand bottom bay to practice skills and run some line. Greg brought tent spikes that we used to tie off the line to, since finding good tie off points was usually a challenge. The skills and drills went well, and we all learned a lot as usual. I swallowed more water than I can remember in a long time, so made sure to refine my regulator switching procedures!

Jim discovered that his new scooter had flooded its light in the nose. We also were trying to figure out why it hung so low in the water when he stowed it behind him. He was not that happy at the prospect of probably having to send it back for repairs.

On the second dive, we scootered over to the 10 Mile wall. We discovered that it was very important to scooter out away from the shore, then bear back in. When we didn't do that, we ran into very large and shallow rock outcroppings, making scootering very difficult! No one hit anything, but it wasn't very fun.

Once we were on the wall, we stowed our scooters and took our time looking at all the life. 10 Mile wall really was spectacular. Visibility was maybe 20 feet, so not the best, but once you got up close, it didn't matter. You wanted to get up close anyway with all the little things to see. There were tons of decorator crabs and nudibranchs. I found a very pretty Clown Dorid that I had only seen once or twice before.

http://www.oregontidepooling.com/tidepooling_on_the_southe/2008/11/sea-clown-nudibranch.html

There were a lot of other divers at the site that day too. The tide was definitely right, since there wasn't a lot of current at all. We zig-zagged back and forth along the wall three times, and still there wasn't a lot. Scootering back was better, since Greg took us farther out then back in. His navigation was spot on, and we ended up right back in the bay.

A very good day of diving indeed! 

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