Archive for November, 2006
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Though most of it can be blamed on the general murkiness of the waters those days, I am not very happy about the reef photos I took with my small underwater rig (Canon S50, underwater housing, ISO 400). Sure there are some decent ones but I feel like my setup is now limiting me a bit and I have gear lust.
(This is a Southern Stingray on the deck of the Bentwood ship wreck. They have been in the news a lot lately)
Bibb, Duane & snappers 1
Very rough seas prevented us from diving yesterday but today, we buckled up and set out for an adventure. With 3 to 6 foot swell and the occasional 8, I was barfing by the first dive interval. It was a rough ride to the wrecks.
We dove two ships today, the Bibb and the Duane which have the US record of service time (except for the USS Constitution). The Bibb lays on its side while the Duane sits upright. On our first dive the Bibb was an amazing sight and a surprisingly relaxed (though deep) dive. We walked around, swam around, perched on its structures until it was time to come up.
The Duane was waiting. The ship sits upright in a hundred feet of water, its crows nest can be seen from the boat on a clear and quiet day. But it’s not a clear and quiet day.
After being ‘hot-dropped’ (the boat doesn’t stop, just tries to stay near the line, above the ship), we begin our descent towards the wreck.
After four minutes hovering above the bow, looking at very large Barracudas, we start swimming towards the center of the boat. Suddenly and without warning a cold sand storm envelops us , our visibility reduced to a couple of feet. Sam and I decide to swim together, close.
The water is colder, a thermocline, though it’s hard to tell what caused the silt could. We seek refuge in the wheelhouse for a quick and eerie photo shoot.
The water is still heavy with sediments and we don’t quite know where we’re going. We follow the main axis of the boat looking to get to the ascent line.
After a brief stop at the crows nest, I rely on Sam’s experience to lead us. As we swim between the mid-section of the boat and the stern, we’re enveloped by troubled water and can’t really see anything until our slow descent takes us to the lower bridge portion. We’re not really sure how long we have to swim but now we’ve got a point of reference a couple feet down from us. We eventually reach the stern and its ascent line which we follow up, dutifully and slowly.
We get to the surface as I deploy my safety sausage. We don’t really need it cause the boats is 30 yards away but I hadn’t used it since I bought it a couple years so what the hell !
After those two dives our captains take us closer to shore, for a nice, shallow, relaxing reef dive. We get to see (or rather Sam doesn’t seem to notice fish around us, most of the time, he likes big chunks of rusting metal, but a camera in hand he seems to enjoy being tossed around on the reef. We get to see lobsters, a small spotted moray eel, a couple of small stingrays, a mantis shrimp and many other things. More photos later. I’ll leave you with a very nice one, from Sam again (all wreck photos from Day 3 are his, he’s really getting the hang of it) as we wave goodbye to the Keys. For now.
She’s a beauty ! 2
But beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
P.S. in response to the question in comments, it’s a sea cucumber. it was sitting on the upper deck of the Spiegel Grove. I had to get really close (inches) because of the very wide angle lens (14mm) on the 5D. Luckily, the Bêche-de-mer don’t move fast…
Spiegel Grove 0
Yesterday, Sam and I dove the Spiegel Grove, a massive intentionally sunk dock landing ship. We visited the superstructure and the area around the well and crane. It was a beautiful dive at a maximum depth of 83 ft. After four years, many inhabitants have settled on the artificial reef including the largest and most beautiful filefish I had ever seen. All in all, a great dive.
After those two dives, Divers City took us to a shallower easier dive, the Bentwood, a smaller transport vessel thank sunk during WW2 after it head bunted a larger ship.
Metal was scattered everywhere and the wreck had lots of nooks and crannies. Large and small critters populated the reef including a few Midnight parrot fish (rare !), a large yellow eel, a nurse shark and her remora as well as a majestic Southwestern Stingray.
Sam took this photo of the Stingray (his best so far, I think, with the EOS 5D in the Ikelite enclosure), mine are still in my camera since Aperture won’t import Canon S50 RAW files (but will for all the other Canon S*):
[Full gallery here]
Going deep 2
Today I am leaving for a dive trip in Florida organized by PGDive. Weather permitting we will be diving on the wrecks of the Spiegel Grove (two dives), the USCG Bibb, the USCG Duane, the Eagle and the Benwood.
Except for a small wreck in the Maldives and the Dome in Turks and Caicos, these will be my first real wreck dives and no doubts my deepest dives. I flirted with 130 feet before but it seems we’ll be getting a lot more acquainted in the next few days.
My dive buddy Sam and I will be taking a lot of photos in the next few days and I’ll try to document my experience as best I can. Stay tuned.
