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After Action Reports
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Humpbacks and Grey Whales
December 11, 2005
Story by Sharon E.
December 11, 2005 Dive

After several recent rain storms, our day of diving was clear and sunny! The seas settled down and it was like a lake. We headed to Carmel. Enroute the engines on the Escapade slowed way down. That only means one thing, Whales! We caught a glimpse of a spout, then the footprint about 75’ from the boat. As we watched, a fin and the back of a humpback whale surfaced. A long 3 minutes and he surfaced again. This time all of this back and up came the tail, a full fluke waving to us. What a wonderful sight. This was Susie’s first trip on the boat in Monterey and her first whale sighting. It doesn’t get any better than this.

Our first dive was on Outer Pinnacle. A prestine site in Carmel. Today we had a Deco Procedure class; we were geared with stage bottles and reels. We jumped in 90’ of water for drills. Descending during s-drills, we were met with 50’ viz! Bill and Chris ran the reel through the rocks and along the reef. Bill did a valve manipulation drill, Chris, a mask switch and all doffed and donned stage bottles. These skills were a bit challenging in the 6’ surge. But we had the viz on our side. As we surfaced we did a gas switch and surfaced after 45 minutes.

While below the crew on the surface spied a large grey whale showing off a bit. Two whales in 2 hours, Pretty cool!

For dive two, we headed about 2/3 of a mile to Dahli’s Wall. An old favorite of most. Today the kelp was carpeting the surface. As we descended, the water got darker and darker. The bold HID lights appeared “washed out”. This dive definitely offered the low viz environment which easily simulated a much deeper and night dive. We dropped to about 70”, where Andy, Sharon and Gene tied in the reel. We stayed near the tie in due to the low viz and the strong surge to perform the skills. As the team performed the dive, Les managed to lift diver deco bottles and other attached equipment without being detected by the diver. This demonstrated just how easily one can lose necessary equipment and never miss it till it’s needed. The lesson learned here was to check your gear throughout the dive and problem solving thru losses. A couple of good deco procedures dives.

Also Les demo’ed the new Halcyon Evolve wing on these dives. The Evolve is designed in a circle versus the horseshoe shape of the Explorer. This allows for inflation along the bottom. The dump value is easily located as well. Les tried the 40# lift model which performed very well on a set of twin steel 80s and 2 stage bottles

For more pictures from the trip, check out our Photo Gallery. Do you have some pictures you would like to add to the gallery? Contact us!

Did you miss out? Our next dive trip is Sunday, Nov 07. Call us today to book your next dive!
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