Easy Diver is in the water at J Dock. That’s the good news.

The bad news is that there’s too much water falling from the sky. And it’s cold. And it’s foggy.

“It’s just miserable,” Peter said.

We didn’t go out either Saturday, May 3rd, or Sunday, May 4th.

We stopped by the DUI Dog Days site at Stage Fort Park both days.

The Captain was wearing his new black Crocs and there were huge lakes of water everywhere on Sunday. We didn’t stay long.

It may technically be Spring, but it certainly isn’t showing any of that kind of warmth yet.

Keeping our fingers crossed for better conditions next weekend.

Jacki K., Bethany Brousseau, Robert Sharpe, Richard Brandolini, Peter Donahue, Pat Walsh, The Captain and I all spent a week at Captain Don’s Habitat in Bonaire from March 12 - 19th.

We cavorted in front of a webcam at 30 feet off the dive site named Something Special.  I forewarned anyone I thought would be interested about our plans to be at www.breathebonaire.com at noon on St. Patrick’s Day, Monday, March 19th.  Kathy Cardinale took the time to capture some of the images and I went to www.animoto.com to create another little video.

Turn on your speakers.

The crew of Easy Diver keeps fit by chasing ice chunks.

Videography by Pat Walsh.

Summer can’t come too quickly for me.

Another new slide show format. 

Turn on your sound.

http://widgets.clearspring.com/o/46928cc51133af17/474865c877344c82

Thanks to Richard Brandolini for sharing this picture of a very happy diver:

He’s pointing to where the symbols “U S” are stamped on the shaft of the spike.  It identifies it as one that was made in Paul Revere’s foundry for the government. 

There’s lots of debris in the water from fanning for treasure like this.  His gloves are silt-covered and dirty from the digging.

He was having a grand time.

Good fun.

We drove around the cape on this, the morning of our last charter of the season.  It looked spectacular at Back Beach in Rockport, so we planned to go somewhere in Sandy Bay depending on what it looked like when we got there.

Well, we never got there.  It had been a fairly uneventful passage up from the mouth of Gloucester Harbor.  I just hugged the coast and let the northwest wind blow over the top of us.  I didn’t even need foul weather gear to be driving from the flying bridge.

What started off as a breeze at 8 AM was a roaring 25-30 by the time we rounded Lands End and were headed for the break between Straitsmouth Island and Gap Head in Rockport.  The wind had piled the water up at Gap Head so that it was 3-4 foot breakers at the Sandy Bay side of the shallows between the two masses of land.  The wind was driving the breakers’ spray up and over the flying bridge where Laurent was sitting in his full wetsuit.  He later said he had been having fun up there in the elements.  I called on Peter to drive it through from the lower station because I knew I’d be soaked by the time I did it from up top.

The Captain called it quits and had Peter make a careful U-turn so that we didn’t broach.  Then I climbed up and high-tailed it back the way we’d come.  No other dive site along the back shore looked worth the effort what with the surge from the southwest.  We were sorry the season had to end like this, but we had fun with Janet M., Paul Savageau, Bill Low, and Laurent.  Plus, we got Pete’s Chicken Noodle Surprise soup in the bargain.  The Captain was heard to exclaim, “Hey, there’s a big potato in my cup!”  Heh, heh.

There was a fishing boat with a stay sail making for home along the same path we were taking and it was being chased by hundreds of gulls.  I think he was cleaning his catch and they were savy to the fact that lunch might come whipping over the rail at any moment.  Janet M. took some amazing shots and we might get to post them if she emails them to me.

Pete took over again for the delicate manoever of docking in a heavy reverse wind.  All hands helped fend off and tie up.  Whew!

We had lots of help unloading Easy Diver and putting the winter-ready touches in place.  Now it’s just waiting for the hauling and shrink-wrapping.

It was a wonderful season, but now we’re off to DEMA and then Small Hope Bay Lodge in Andros, Bahamas, for some warm weather diving.

See you in the spring.

It rained hard last night, but there was very little wind.  The morning brought thick fog on the south side of the cape.  We decided to go north with some new folk who were renting everything from Freedom Diving on Rogers Street in Gloucester in order to go out with us.  It looked like it would be good at Folly Cove.

Laurent joined new-comers Kent and Steve as customers.  Kathy Cardinale, Peter Donahue, The Captain and I were crew.   We put-putted north with fog tendrils all around.  No one was out.  It was raining steadily.  We saw a large gaggle of cormorants on the river near the rocks painted as frogs.  They took flight as we neared and flew faster than we were traveling up the river to the beach at Wingaersheek.

We picked our way by the buoys up to the mouth of the river where the fog cleared somewhat because the breeze had picked up from the southeast.  It was drizzling.  Folly Cove looked like it would be a good choice since it would be Steve’s first boat dive and Kent’s first scuba dive since December.  

I anchored far into the cove at the graffiti on the western rock wall that we call A.R.E.R.  It was just outside Calf Cove and 25 feet deep.  The tide was coming in, so we hoped for reasonably clear water.  After his dive, Laurent reported it was about 15 feet of visibility with 48 degrees at 60 feet.

Pete and The Captain went in for a quick tour, while Kathy and I drank Pete’s chicken noodle soup to get warm.  The rain let up a little, but I had wet feet and my nose was dripping.  It’s hard to wipe that stuff on a foul weather slicker, so I kept tearing off sheets of paper towel to stem the flow.

As we hauled anchor to head back down the coast for the second dive, we noticed that the fog was thickening around Folly Point.  Sure enough, as we motored towards the mouth of the Annisquam, the fog became worse.  We didn’t think there would be any good site for the second dive where everyone would be safe, so we called it and gave everyone 1/2 of the fee back.  That way, we could be sure that there would be no fog bank losses at all.

The trip home was at dead slow, with all eyes peeled.  Red nun on the right when returning to port.  Green can on the left.  Watch for the day mark at the rock pile as we enter the river.  Watch for the white mooring balls on either side of the channel as we slowly move down the channel towards the marina.  It was a Hunter’s Moon high tide - 12 feet.  The whole marsh was awash.  Cormorants were huddled on the highest part of rocks across from Mary Scalli’s house as though they didn’t want to get their feet wet.

We had to lower our antennas to get under the railroad bridge.  Everyone seemed to OK with the shortened trip.   We certainly were.

Later there was kale soup + egg salad sandwich or a cheeseburger at Morning Glory restaurant.  It sure hit the empty spot in my stomach.

Tomorrow should be sunny for the last charter of the season.

and it’s October 21st.

The sun was turned on brightly, but there was a still westerly breeze as we toured the Cape looking for calm water.  The temperature was predicted to top 70 degrees.  We decided to go north and see what we could find around Cathedral Rocks.

Jacki K. and her buddy, Andy, joined Laurent, Pete, Veronica, The Captain and me for one of our last charter days.  It really couldn’t have been much better.

Our first site was The Mole Hole - our name for the Sandy Bay side of Point de Chene in Rockport.  It is named for a feature on the rocky shore where a home-owner on Phillips Avenue has covered a pipe draining from his property in concrete.  The result is something that looks like a rock-eating mole has passed by.  The bottom was 28 feet, but I heard something about some people barreling out to 80 feet and the muddy bottom.  They said there was a Northern Red Anemone at 78 feet and a large sea raven on a rock, checking out the tourists that passed him by.  There were also lobsters to be had.  It was 52 degrees in the water with about 15 feet of visibility.

We moved over to the base of rocks near Pigeon Cove for the second site.  The Captain calls it Mitchell/Dodge Rocks, but I don’t think those features are really near where we typically anchor when he calls for that place.   I saw a school of pollack and some tiny sea ravens hiding in the weeds.  I also saw a lobster trap sail up as a lobsterman pulled his pots right between me and the boat with our dive flag.  I didn’t even hear him come in.  He didn’t hang around and I returned to the boat and stayed close by it videoing tiny critters when I could stabilize myself in the surge.  Again, it was about 15-20 feet of visibility and 52 degrees over the sandy patches on the bottom with visibility dropping over the rocks where there was more churned up stuff due to wave action.

On our trip back to the marina, we snacked on Veronica’s contribution to our healthy lifestyle.  Then we each ate one of Andy’s Polish donuts to balance out all that sensible stuff.

Great day with super people.

Too bad we’re almost done for the season.

Bah.