On Friday I did a PADI specialty course on Dry Suit Diving. All the diving I have done up until now has been warm water i.e. Indonesia in a light wet suit. There was no way I was going to take to the cold Pacific water without wearing a dry suit so I needed to learn how to use one. Off I went to Aquarius Dive School in Monterey and after an hour in the swimming pool we rushed over to Point Lobos (only 15 dive teams are allowed per day) in Carmel. It is an amazing dive site you walk in from the boat launched and then swim quite a distance trying to not get tangled in the kelp forest and then drop down to 70 feet. I had a bit of trepidation seeing as I hadn’t dove in 53F water before and hadn’t dove in kelp however, it wasn’t as bad as I thought. In the dry suit I wasn’t cold at all and as long as you dídn’t fight the kelp it was fine. The first descent I got really tangled and told myself to calm down and finally made it underwater. The kelp rises 70 feet from the sea floor but down low it is just like a tree trunk with not too many branches so you can swim through it without a problem. I played is an anemone and also a star fish decided to attach itself to me for a while. I actually decided the kelp was great after it saved me from a feet up ascent. With dry suit diving you pump air into the suit not a BCD so if you get your feet over your shoulder while swimming you end up with lots of air in your legs with no way of venting it and then you lose positive bouyancy and start going to the surface. If you feel it like I did you either kick yourself head up and then vent or you cheat and hold on to the kelp and pull yourself upright and vent the air from your shoulder vent!

After two dives I picked up Myles (my brother) and his girlfriend in Monterey and we headed to Santa Cruz to the boardwalk which much to my amazement was not open on a friday night. We found some miniature golf which had a pirate theme and I got well and truely schooled by both of them in golf. Got home late and straight to bed…