So yeah, life kind of blows right now. But, hey, at least I'm not stuck in a 1 bedroom apartment in a hot zone with travel restrictions and no access to the ocean. But still, it sucks to stay at home for months even in sunny California, because, well, up to now, it hadn't been that sunny and the ocean had not really been cooperating with crappy conditions all throughout the early days of the quarantine, basically continuing up until these last few weeks.

So on Friday, I took a day off while I still have a job and drove down to Laguna Beach hoping to avoid the crowd of un-masked week-end beach goers. It worked. Got a parking spot just in front of the access path to Shaw's Cove and was ready in no time. A couple of divers were already coming back from the water and reported an improvement in viz and lots of nudibranchs out but a drop in temperature. I did not think much of it, the viz could have been improving but the last time I dove there was in January. And temperature can't be that bad...

Despite 6 months of dry dock, I did pretty good on the gearing up part, just forgetting my weight belt... Anyway. The beach was almost empty, a few people here and there, no lifeguard on duty yet and no significant surf. I walked past the non-surf zone, donned my fins, checked my camera and off I went, swimming towards the snorkel area above the crevice.

The water at the surface was a balmy 63F (17°C). I dropped to 15ft and start swimming towards the reef and almost missed the entrance to the crevice, the viz was green 5-10ft. Not great. But it opened past the archway to 10-15ft and could start exploring. I found tons of Hopkin's Roses on the walls and one giant Felimare californiensis sitting on a rock at the bottom of the canyon where the lobsters usually congregate. It took me 10 minutes to get a shot right, and still it came out pretty soft. Lighting was challenging and the constant surf in this channel did not help. I also found a couple of Porter Dorid bur they were so minuscule that I didn't even bother trying to get a shot. The ride through Star Wars Canyon was kinda cool with a school of Sargo (I think) at the entrance and a couple of Sheepheads, including a giant one I decided to name Oscar. Oscar followed me the whole freaking dive, getting in the way of most of my pictures, but not as aggressively as the nesting Garibaldis. They were out for blood!

I swam towards turn around rock and I hit the meanest thermocline at 25ft. Water temp dropped a good 5 degrees and I started regretting not putting the extra layer on... I ended up yoyoing between 15ft and 45ft, going back up to warm up. On the way to the end of the reef, Spanish Shawls were out in numbers and I got some cool shot of them riding the current or rearing like horses.

I started to shoot in M 1/125, f/8 then Tv 1/125s with flash on, then turned the flash off and used my two 800-lumen video lights instead. As I was still getting soft shots, I went what-the-hell and just turned the dial to P. I did not turn aut way better but it was not much worse.

So, not a bad day to be out in the water. At least the people I saw there were all wearing masks.

hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data
hold on fetching EXIF data	hold on fetching EXIF data