The first SCUBA dive in over a year! The last time I was in the water was in April of 2006. Since taking the job with Dow Jones I’ve been so busy that I had to take a sabbatical from diving.
Mark & I went in at the railroad bridge in Point Pleasant. I have to say it was awesome! Water temp was 55F degrees. Visibility was 15 to 20 feet. We both dove using wet suits. I had forgotten how heavy all the gear is out of the water.
We had originally decided to stay east of the railroad bridge so I could run through some basic drills. After 5 minutes the drills to find my gear and gauges had become “old”. The one drill I didn’t perform was to flood and clear my mask. Maybe next dive the water will be a little warmer.
After practising the drills I motioned to Mark to head for the bridge. On the other side we found a small 12″ fluke. We then went into the little bay area on the other side of the bridge. There were millions of baby shrimp floating in the water column near the bottom forming a cloud. The shrimp were about 1/4″ long. It was pretty cool to swim through the shrimp cloud. We started to head back to the bridge and came upon a puffer fish. Mark watched in amusement as I poked the fish with my light trying to get him to puff out his spines. I guess I’m not much of a threat. The fish just turned and slowly swam away. We also caught a glimpse of a 18″ long striped bass as we played with the puffer fish.
As we were heading back, we watched a fellow diver spear a black fish under the railroad bridge. He got a good sized fish. At least we know what he had for dinner!
It was definitely a good dive! And it felt great to be back in the water.