Critters and stuff's Blog

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Aug 29, 2019

The Monterey Shootout

Another Backscatter Monterey Shootout Monterey Shootout in the books. Everyone else is so much quicker than I am to get their images and FB posts up. It was a fun shootout, like past years, full of friendly faces and of course, it’s always great to get out diving. Monterey is something else, I just wish it were a few hours closer :) 8 dives over 3 days, 6 for the shootout, and 2 of those were a first for me diving the beautiful (and long surface swim) Point Lobos! ...Read More

Nov 25, 2018

Attack of the dorks

I love/hate sheephead. They are such dorks, often perplexed by their reflection in the dome port (or anything shiny, for that matter) and give some pleasing colors to contrast the blue water. But, they can be little shits too. Usually my gloves are thick enough that I’m only startled when they bite, but this time it actually kind of hurt as he managed to get the whole tip of my pinky. ...Read More

May 8, 2018

Salps, rockfish schools and cabezon off the oil rigs

The oil rigs are still one of the most unique dives I have done, and I’m not sure why I don’t dive them more often! I just checked, and February of 2016… yikes. It was a good day on the Pac Star with Bluewater Photo although waves picked up around the 3rd dive. The top 60 or 70 fsw was a bit murky but deeper down past 100 fsw, it opened up and there were some nice schools of rockfish. ...Read More

Apr 7, 2018

Tuna crabs and sevengill sharks

Wooohooo! My first non-horned/swell/leopardwayoffinthedistance shark encounter while diving! Swimming along and out of the murky water, a shadowy blob turned into a large 6-7 ft sevengill! How’s that for a first encounters! And of course, freakin’ tuna crabs make me laugh. I may or may not have been torpedoing into them head first laughing like a crazy person. They are a much cuter photo bomber then garabaldi.

Feb 13, 2018

Getting cray-zy: Ice and high altitude diving in the Sierra Nevada

I couldn’t have asked for a better group of complete strangers to spend my weekend with ice diving the cold lakes near Mammoth. Well, technically ice diving Mammoth Lake and just normal cold water diving Silver and June Lake. And complete strangers is a bit of a stretch too. The diving community in Southern California feels surprisingly small, so I have several friends who know parts of the group but having never met any of them, I had no real expectations so I was pleasantly surprised. ...Read More

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