I think I've been starting to go into diving withdrawals.


I spent November and December diving my butt off in warm clear water while working on the SDI Divemaster certification. And then once Christmas hit it was a hard stop as I flew back to the states to visit my family. I did get in a quick freshwater drift dive in San Marcos (the best drift dive in Texas!) but come on!

So once I was back from Santa Cruz I pinged Jack seeing if he was up for another two tank morning dive like we'd been doing before I left. He grumbled that he hadn't had to set an alarm since I'd left town and then cheerfully agreed to meet me at Crescent Wednesday morning.


And so just like that we were back!

January 8th, 2020

Welcome to another extended weekday diving morning thanks to the whole not being employed thing!

Jack and I have been taking advantage of the recent ideal Laguna diving conditions and I was eager to try out some locations other than our usual Crescent / Shaws / Divers hangouts. I remembered seeing a post about the Cleo Street Barge which is one of the rare wrecks to can easily reach from the shore around here.

October 11th, 2019

[Pics]

[Matt's Scuba Map]

After putting it off for years I completed my scuba open water certification in December of 2018 and have spent the intervening months joyously diving pretty much every chance I get. I hit 25 dives in January, 50 in April, 75 in June, and after the recent Indonesia diving trip I was sitting at 95. Which after the big summer multi-sport road trip became 98. Then it was only logical to do a shore dive the morning I came back into town leaving me at the ever important 100th dive milestone.

In addition to being a nice satisfying number some people will tell you that the 100th dive is supposed to be done naked to celebrate the milestone. This seems to mostly be done in tropical areas and if Instagram is to be believed there seems to be a bit more female divers than males taking part (though that could possibly be due to the fact cold water is a bit more friendly to the female physique vs say your average pudgy white male.)

Several friends who have been diving for years hadn't heard of the whole 100th dive = naked dive thing but there's plenty of validation on the internet and I'm not one to buck a tradition. That is as long as I find it amusing.

And since I wasn't about to stop diving for any length of time until I could make it someplace tropical that left a southern California shore dive. So on a Tuesday morning Jen Blackie and myself headed out to my favorite local spot Shaw's Cove to get things done.

July 30th, 2019

[Pics]

Last week had been hectic and I only managed a single morning dive on Friday.  That was mostly because I returned from the Buckskin Gulch trip Wednesday night and left for the Alabama Hills Climbing weekend on Friday but still!

This week was a full 5 days of soul wounding gainful employment and I was determined to make the most of it since the Spring Advanced Mountaineering Program kicked off next week and things were likely going to get a bit busier again.

Jack being the amazing friend he is he agreed to my slightly aggressive plan of 4 dives including three morning dives and a night dive with these two being back to back.

April 8th & 9th, 2019

[Diver's Cove Night Pics]

[Fisherman's Cove Morning Pics]

[Matt's Scuba Map]

The downside of these pre-work dives is that I have to roll out of bed at 4:45 am and drive out to Laguna before the sun is even up.  But hey, we all know sleep is overrated when compared against outdoor activities and I find a quick hour under water makes for a rather pleasant start to to the average workday.

This week I was only in town for two days after arriving back from a 5 day trip to Buckskin Gulch / Paria Canyon in Utah so this was my only chance to get out.  Fortunately the predicted 30% chance of rain Thursday night hadn't appeared so off we went!

April 5th, 2019

[Pics] [Map]

This week we saw enough of a break in the seemingly endless Southern California rain to allow Jack and I to get back out diving again before work.

So far all the morning dives have been at either Shaw's Cove or Crescent Bay so we decided to mix things up a bit and head for Diver's Cove located a short distance to the south.

March 26th & 27th, 2019

Diver's Cove

[Pics] [Map]

I've recently jumped into diving with the intent of maintaining all of my other various outdoor hobbies. As I'm sure you can guess that is a bit difficult since I already struggle to find open weekends and now I have yet another awesome way to spend them. But hey, there are worse problems to have!

This weekend would see Kristen and I hopefully diving some deep wrecks down in San Diego with Sea Stallion and finishing up our Advanced Open Water certifications. We also had tentative plans to head over to Catalina and Casino Point on Sunday if conditions looked good and when the opportunity came up to do a kickoff dive of sorts Friday morning before work we both jumped at the chance.

January 25th, 2019

[Pics] [Map]