Red Diving Hood

I knew it was too ambitious to go to Bass Rocks for the last dive of October. October is always a wash out. The winds come with October and they sort of calm down in November. November comes with more possibilities of good diving, last opportunity to say “bye” to most fishes until next spring.

We did suit up for Bass Rocks but once we ended at the ocean landing we saw that the entrance and exit was quite rough. So, quick discussion and change of plans we decided to go to Stage Fort Park. I wasn’t necessarily excited about that dive but it has been too long since I got wet, so I would take anything so we headed there. It was probably fun for the people on the streets to see a fully geared up diver driving the car 🙂

We didn’t dive the regular spot but Half moon Cove, down the pavilion. It is a small sandy cove/beach. The entrance is quite easy, walk down the paved ramp and enter the water. Under the water it is mostly sand and grass. Mike and Geoff in our group followed ~120 degree out and reached approximately 30ft waters “with big rocks where things can hide under”.  It turns out that they had the most exciting dive with a big searaven sighting. Rest of us mostly saw hermit crabs, grubbies, a single pipefish. It is a quite boring dive when you get excited for a small cunner swimming around. 🙂

Buddies: Bert, Dan, Mike, Geoff.

52F, 20ft, 60 min, ~10ft viz

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After a whole week of Nor’Easter hitting the coast, it was iffy to do any dive this weekend. Many dive shops canceled their dives. We heard that last Friday the viz at Stage Fort Park was 2 inches!! Saturday the weather looked awesome in Worcester, it was sunny, much warmer and the wind was quite low. We were considering doing a high tide dive at Cathedral but could not be sure. After phone calls to Undersea Divers and Cape Ann Divers for dive reports we decided it may not be enjoyable nor safe to dive.

I used the day for a drive up to Undersea Divers to give a second chance to the DUI drysuit. I was getting fidgety about end of the dive season as the leaves were falling down and the temperature was dropping. I desperately needed a drysuit to expand my dive limits. This time I tried the suit with thick undergarments and it did not feel as bad as I thought it was (my brain quickly worked on changing my perceptions). I finally decided to buy the suit, a DUI suit in really good condition for 400$ !!! Sean, who was helping me with my purchase threw in a dry suit bag for me. AND he said he could throw in an undergarment. Unfortunately the one he found was small for me so I couldn’t get that one. But at the end of the day I was probably happiest diver in the Cape Ann area that day 🙂

I wanted to try my new drysuit and luckily Jim, our divemaster for Mass Diving Shore dives, decided not to cancel the the sunday dive. In the morning we decided to go to Stage Fort Park, based on the yesterdays report for 10ft viz.

We reached the dive site and we saw a baby seal resting on the rocks formed by the middle reef at low tide!!! Man, it was going to be best dive ever! Not only having a decent dive at Stage Fort Park but seeing a seal? This year I have dove at Salvages and have not seen a single seal under water! This was my chance!

We got our gear on, got in the water, took our bearing for the reef (190). The viz was in 10 ft range, once in a while would drop to 2 ft but  would dart out and get to better viz again. I tried to swim fairly fast towards the reef so that I could catch the seal. Once I got close to the reef I surfaced and saw that the seal was gone :(. I immediately went under, looked around but could not find it. Oh well! It was still good excitement. Rest of the dive I was circling among the big boulders/rocks at the reef, once in a while greeting the school of juvenile pollocks. I would chase these guys whenever I see them, hoping I would coincide with the seal (it must have gotten hungry sitting under the sun so long. I know sun always makes me hungry). But, still no luck. However, at the end it was a really nice dive with bunch of frilled anemones, pollocks, crabs, moon snails and golf balls. It was interesting that I could not see any of the northern cerianthids or the baby sculpins I saw during last weeks dive, nor the lobsters other guys saw.

When I came out of the water, decently warm, I was dry! The neck seal worked perfectly and there were only slight moisture on my wrists. However, the boots attached to the suit were too big, getting loose during the dive, making my feet very uncomfortable. This needs to be sorted out soon…

After the dive we stopped by White Beach, heard there was a tuna hit the shore. Yeah, it was still at the beach, in much worse condition then i thought it would be. Poor thing, I wonder what happened to it, and why nobody ate it after it was dead…

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Wow, it was cold! The storm causing really bad viz yesterday was all around Cape Ann, as well, so we had to change our initial plan to Stage Fort Park. I was hoping to do Cathedral Rocks due to high tide and good depth but it was said that our best bet would be Stage Fort Park or Niles Beach. So we ended up in SFP.

The weather was really cold and windy. Actually it wouldn’t be too bad if it wasn’t windy but wind really hit the bones hard (:P). I had decided not to do the dive but then, again, I gave in to the peer pressure and decided to dive. (obviously my dive buddies were day dreaming when the PADI instructor discussed negative effects of peer pressure 😛 ).

So, we went in and the viz was ~5-8 ft, as my best guess. The plan was to go to the reef, which is straight out (180) and hang out there, 30 mins out 30 mins back. The mostly sandy bottom is interrupted by occasional small rocks and stuff. Today was the days of juvenile sculpins (Jason would correct me “grubbies”). We saw many of them with different colorings. I love those little creatures. We also came across a few toad crabs, I have a bad history with them and they are so ugly looking. Not my favorite creature, I must say. As we progressed, I am guessing the bottom became softer and muddy and we saw bunch of northern cerianthid. The cool one was the “twins” I saw :).

Jason and I were not very lucky to find the reef. Apparently the other groups found it. As the tide goes lower we see that the reef was slightly to the right not straight out. Next time I will record the bearing, if I get to it eventually. Some divers did a second dive, as I was trying to warm up in my car. As always the second dive was much better, they have gone to the reef and the viz had improved to 10-15ft, also with the help of the sun showing its face. Once again remembered the note to myself: IF you are going to do a single dive do the second dive. 🙂

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