This month we’ll be back in Silver Lake for our monthly club meeting. The date is Wednesday, August 16th and we’ll be gathering at Casita del Campo. Join us to see what’s new and reconnect with the membership. Also this evening we plan to screen the first half of the Netflix documentary “Chasing Coral” about the decline in healthy marine ecosystems. Can you think of a better excuse to justify that hump day margarita?
CoCo View Vernacular
A strike in baseball is bad; but to a bowler, it’s good. Similarly, having an old, rusty clunker in your front yard is frowned upon, but at CoCo View having a wreck in your “front yard” is amazing Picture a landscape of aqua clear blue water, hammocks swaying in the breeze, parrots cawing in the distance, and a submerged world with a sunken wreck, DC-3 plane, and oodles of marine life, and you have the front yard we got to play in for a week.
Our adventure started off not with a bang, but with a frustrating whimper. After more than 2 hours in line waiting to check our luggage, and then racing over to Tom Bradly Int’l terminal to wait in TSA security, we were finally off to our gate. A quick stop at a bar for a bon voyage celebratory drink, and then it was the big blue skies to Roatan.
CoCo View Resort (CCV) is located on Roatan Island, just north of Honduras in the Caribbean Sea. It’s situated on the south shore of Roatan, perched on the edge of the world’s second largest coral reef. As CCV’s website boasts, it’s “The most returned-to dive resort in the world.” They offer diving and snorkeling to your heart’s content with shore diving available whenever you desire. To paraphrase one reviewer, “It’s not a resort to go and party or tan, but a great place to go if you’re a diver. It caters to the dive community.” Located just a few fin kicks away in their front yard is the 140’ wreck of the Prince Albert, Newman’s Wall, and Coco View Wall among other attractions. CCV is isolated and very much like a liveaboard on land.
For me, aside from the incredible diving, the trip represented a break from the norm. As Belle describes her poor provincial town, I didn’t see the baker with his tray like always; the same ol’ bread and rolls to sell. Rather, the days melted into one another. The day of the week was insignificant. We’d wake, eat breakfast, head out on the dive boat, return from diving to have lunch, head out on the dive boat for a couple more afternoon dives, return from the dive boat to rinse our gear and get ready for dinner, happy hour with Willie at the bar pouring drinks, eat dinner, and then repeat the following day. I didn’t think I’d ever say it, but it was almost too much diving. Almost. With the potential of four dives daily from the dive boat, unlimited shore dives and night dives, as mentioned earlier, it is the place to go if you’re a diver.
In addition to eat, dive, eat, dive, drink, eat, sleep, repeat, we also enjoyed an informative and fascinating lecture on sand. Really! Sand! We got to dance with a local troupe who performed some native dances. Everyone benefited from Patty’s lecture on buoyancy. As we told Patty, if she were heading a cult, we’d drink the cool aid. She is entertaining, engaging, and truly knowledgeable and experienced. And, I’d be remiss if I didn’t also comment on experiencing beautiful and vibrant tropical sunsets surrounded by friends and fellow divers. Oh, and a drink from Willie. It was tough returning to reality and the norm after a week at CCV.
If you get a chance to make it to CCV, be sure you check out Mary’s Place. Take your time to see and enjoy all the “Tchotchkes” tucked away on the shelves. You’ll be glad you did.
Did you know that the latest group of dive students are heading out to Casino Point this weekend to demonstrate their skills in the open water? That means it’s the perfect opportunity for all you already-certified divers to join them on this day trip and to get in a couple of dives at the marine park there. There have been many giant sea bass sightings recently and we can’t think of a better way to beat the resurgent heat wave than jumping into the cooling California ocean water and exploring the deep. Afterwards you can grab lunch with the group at one of Avalon many beachside restaurants and raised a toast to the newly certified divers!
Since this dive is a “come as you are” event, you will need to bring/rent your own gear; tanks and weights can be rented on site. Also, you will need to book your own travel aboard the Catalina Express via this link. The plan is to leave the Long Beach landing at 8:15am and to return from Avalon Harbor on the 5pm return. Please be sure that you email Buck (rainbowdive@sbcglobal.net) if you’re planning to join us. If there is a last minute cancellation due to conditions, he will email you to let you know the trip is off. Hope to see you there!
A few years ago, divers discovered an apparent underwater “lost city” off the coast of Zakynthos in Greece. New research reveals that the site, which was thought to be the ruins of a long-forgotten civilization that perished when tsunamis hit the shore, is in actuality a geological formation—and a bizarre one at that.
Looking at the photos of these underwater formations, it’s hard to blame the divers for coming up with their initial assessment. These things look wholly unnatural, resembling paved floors, moorings, courtyards, and colonnades.
“The site was discovered by snorkelers and first thought to be an ancient city port, lost to the sea,” said study lead author Julian Andrews from the University of East Anglia. “There were what superficially looked like circular column bases, and paved floors. But mysteriously no other signs of life—such as pottery.”
Well, it was too good to be true. It now appears that this “lost city” never really existed. Researchers from UEA, along with experts from the Department of Geology and Geoenvironment at the University of Athens, recently conducted a mineralogical and chemical analysis of various formations found at the site. In particular, they investigated the mineral content and texture of the underwater formations using microscopy, X-ray, and stable isotope techniques.
“We investigated the site, which is between two and five meters under water, and found that it is actually a natural geologically occurring phenomenon,” said Andrews.
The researchers found that the linear spread of the cement-like structures is likely the result of a subsurface fault which never ruptured the surface of the sea bed. This fault allowed gases, including methane, to seep up from deep below the Earth’s surface.
“Microbes in the sediment use the carbon in methane as fuel. Microbe-driven oxidation of the methane then changes the chemistry of the sediment forming a kind of natural cement, known to geologists as concretion,” explained Andrews. “In this case the cement was an unusual mineral called dolomite which rarely forms in seawater, but can be quite common in microbe-rich sediments. These concretions were then exhumed by erosion to be exposed on the seabed today.”
The strange formations were created up to five million years ago, and are quite rare in such shallow waters. Similar structures, say the researchers, tend to be hundreds and often thousands of meters deep underwater.
Originally posted by George Dvorsky on Gizmodo.com
The recent Barnacle Buster club trip to Cozumel was an amazing adventure to say the least. The flight home was a rough return to reality and in stark contrast to the rest of the trip, but it didn’t matter. We were still flying high from diving in Cozumel.
Seven days earlier . . .
For Thomas and me, Cozumel was a series of firsts: first time to Cozumel, first night dive, first time swimming with an octopus, first time seeing a Splendid Toad Fish, first dive spotting a Seahorse, first fresh water dive, first time diving through caves . . . well, you get the point.
This year’s Splash Day was one of the largest ever. The free annual event gives aspiring divers an opportunity to try out scuba gear in a swimming pool with an instructor before committing to a class.
For certified divers, it’s a chance to refresh skills and catch up with friends.
Scientists are seeing a marked increase in the ocean’s cephalopod population. Scientists are not sure as to the cause or whether their “boom” will last, but either way this makes for great siting opportunities for all watchful divers!
An analysis published today in Current Biology indicates that numerous species across the world’s oceans have increased in numbers since the 1950s.
“The consistency was the biggest surprise,” said lead study author Zoë Doubleday of the University of Adelaide. “Cephalopods are notoriously variable, and population abundance can fluctuate wildly, both within and among species.”