Charlie's Diving Blog: Two Dives with the Silver Prince December 9, 2017

Guy Foster and I made a diving trip to Carmel Bay on the Silver Prince last Saturday. Sadly, the Silver Prince has been sold and is being moved up to the Seattle area for diving there so this coming weekend will be the last time to dive with this boat. Two years ago the Monterey Express was also sold and it moved to Mexico so there has been a very large reduction in available space for boat diving in Monterey.

Saturday had very calm conditions and was also unseasonably warm, which is becoming a more and more common tale, of course. Our first dive was on the Pinnacles, we had very clear water, 40 ft plus visibility, and 54 degree water temp. Guy was recently given a used Drysuit and decided to use it for our trip. He quickly discovered that the wrist seals were too large for him so he had to quickly abort on our first dive and then sit out the second dive as well. But it was a beautiful day out on the ocean and Guy took some great surface shots of Pacific Whitesided Dolphins and Right Whale dolphins that came and played with the boat's bow wave and wake as we headed home after our second dive. A well trained rescue diver, Logan, vouched for by our boat's dive master Leroy was looking for a buddy so he joined us for the first dive and me for the second dive.

Below are some photos from this dive, for more, please go to:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/4sizuHwx7z2qQwBc2

A dive instructor told Guy, when you are learning to dive with a drysuit, the anchor line is your friend! Guy wisely took this to heart for his first drysuit dive.

Guy, his buoyancy well under control, pauses before ascending, with Silver Prince in the background.

Still way too many sea urchins on the Pinnacles, so still way too little kelp.

Look at the size of this sea urchin!

Olive Rockfish

Painted Greenling with a White Spotted Rose Anemone and more sea urchins...

Gopher Rockfish

Logan cruising on the Pinnacles

This is the largest male California Sheephead I've seen in Monterey and Carmel, it's the size of the ones commonly found in the Channel Islands. Sheephead eat urchins so he should be very well fed.

Our second dive was at Mono-lobo, we had 20-25 ft of visibility, significant surge in shallow water. I buddied up with Logan instead of my usual diving solo when one of my regular dive buddies is unavailable. We saw several lingcod and a school of blue rockfish.

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Image may contain: sky, tree, mountain, outdoor and nature

Monastery, behind the beach named after it, photographed by Guy Foster at Mono-lobo.

Below are some photos from this dive, for more, please go to:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/upZXuNaxn1lbMKdx1

Mono-lobo again has its usual beautiful mixed kelp forest of Giant and Bull Kelp.

One of several lingcod we saw on this dive.

Logan with another lingcod

Logan with what could be called a plethora of Blue Rockfish

Black Rockfish

Painted Greenling and a Sea Lemon Nudibranch

Beautiful Giant Kelp during safety stop

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Guy shot this photo of me just on board at the end of our dive

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When we started back to Monterey after our dive we quickly encountered a large mixed school of Pacific Whitesided and Right Whale Dolphins that delighted us and themselves by playing in our bow wave and wake. Guy took these surface shots.