Wednesday, September 26 2007
New York State establishes diving trails for scuba enthusiasts
Posted By at 7:47 AM
OSWEGO, N.Y. - A kilometre offshore, about eight metres below the surface of Lake Ontario, the hull of the David B. Mills lies wrecked in three large sections, broken apart by a violent October storm 88 years ago after running aground on Ford Shoals.
Strewn about the flat, rocky bottom are the 61.5-metre-long barge's propeller, anchors, winch, engine, boiler, rudder and various pieces of machinery. Around the debris, perch, whitefish, bass, pike, drum and alewives - joined by a few curious scuba divers - dart through the lucent water.
Typically regarded as a paradise for hikers, climbers and campers, upstate New York also offers some of the finest freshwater scuba diving in the United States - a cloistered natural attribute state officials and scuba enthusiasts are trying to promote through the creation of two "diving trails."
http://canadianpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5gQ-UJv4dhbet3rP0plBGTDLH_ihA
Wednesday, September 19 2007
ECDT Block Island 2007 - Trip Report
Posted By at 4:34 PM
For those that were unable to join us on the trip, here is a quick recap of our recent ECDT Block Island Trip.
The ride out to Montauk from Farmingdale took just about 2 hours. Once past the Hampton's it's a single lane road with varying speed limits.
Charter Boat and First Day Dives
Docked very close to "The End", the Sea Turtle is nice boat but because of space constraints, geared more for day trips. The benches held 3 sets of doubles per side and were a good seat height with ample room underneath for our bins. For overnighters, the lower sleeping area is a bit snug for 4 people and all the additional required overnight bags, pillows, sleeping bags, etc. The lower bunks were comfortable padded with 4” mats. 2 unlucky others had to sleep in the pilot house on thin air mattresses. The Mate and Captain slept on the floor in sleeping bags.
http://www.seaturtlecharters.com/boat.html
The weather on Friday was great. It's a bit over a 2-hour boat ride to the U-853, our first site. Vis, which can be hit or miss was, a slightly disappointing 10-15 feet with bottom temps in the upper 50's. The wreck is big, upright, and impressively intact. With better visibility it should be awesome. There is penetration potential but being our first dive on the wreck, we did an external orientation only.
http://njscuba.net/sites/site_submarines_2.html#U-853
After almost a 3-hour surface interval, our second dive was on the Grecian. Mostly a debris field but the visibility was about 40 feet - real nice. We followed an existing line leading to the bow section and had fun trying to catch (and release) a few lobsters. We also saw a large flounder.
http://njscuba.net/sites/chart_li-2_east.html#Grecian
http://www.seaturtlecharters.com/wreck_dive.html
Block Island
Listed in the travel book, 1,000 Places to See Before You Die, Block Island is a very quaint island with impressive bluffs up to 200 feet high. There are 800-1,000 year-round residents. Old Harbor where we docked, is a nice, quiet, Rhode-Island (Block is part of Rhode Island) type town and is where the majority of shops, hotels and restaurants are concentrated.
After CMors prodding, we all rented mopeds for about 1 hour and toured about 3/4's of the island - the North end beach to the Southeast Lighthouse. However, besides the beaches and restaurants, there are not a whole lot of attractions or things to do on the island. It would probably make for a nice romantic overnight non-diving trip for those who want to treat their significant others. There is a high-speed passenger ferry from Montauk and passenger and car ferries from New London, CT.
We had dinner at the National Hotel, seated outside overlooking the Harbor and Atlantic ocean. A consistent but light breeze kept up cool and bug free.
http://blockislandinfo.com/
http://www.blockislandchamber.com
We took showers in a public restroom / shower facility. The shower was token operated (5-minutes/token) which the Captain provided.
Saturday Dives
Rain began overnight Saturday morning as a front was coming though and continued throughout the morning. We did 1 dive off Block on a site called the Pinnacle. An interesting underwater acre of strewn about (really big) boulders in 70-feet of water. The Captain had previously run a line path over, around, and under the boulders which we followed. It was a nice dive but the surge coming up the mooring line was ridiculous - literally arm-out-of-the-socket potential horizontal jerking movement. Good thing it was a shallow dive and no stops were required.
With the winds picking up and the forecast looking grim, we decided to head back to Montauk and decide if there were any spots near there we could hit. After stopping over 2 potential spots that would have required a 1½ to 2½ hour surface wait (the dives at these locations are tide dependent) we decided as a group not to get beat up (or seasick) waiting in the building seas and headed back to dock.
Back at dock, 4 of us headed into Bay Shore and had lunch at Smoking Al's - a Zagat rated ribs restaurant.
http://www.smokinals.com/
During the season, The Sea Turtle runs wreck charters on Friday and Sunday and Shark Dives on Saturday if you are interested in day trips. He also posts a few overnighters on his site.
Select pictures from the trip can be viewed here: http://picasaweb.google.com/jvafeas
Overall, it was a good trip and one we will run again in the future.
Jim V.
Tuesday, September 4 2007
Six Italian scuba divers to live underwater for two weeks
Posted By at 10:26 AM
Six Italian scuba divers are set to live underwater for two weeks at a depth of fifteen metres (49 feet), in an effort to demonstrate it is possible for human beings to colonise the sea-bed.
http://www.eitb24.com/new/en/B24_64605/life/LIFE-UNDER-WATER-Six-Italian-scuba-divers-to-live/