There can be only two explanations: either I need a powerful prescription mask or there was really nothing worth seeing that Saturday in Catalina.

That was supposed to be THE event of the year, the one that everybody was waiting for, the one that had a waiting list and stuff: THE Laguna Sea Dwellers' Dive & Luau Party on Catalina! Sure we had the party but what about the dives?

That was an early departure for the Magician out of San Pedro at 6:30am. We woke up at something like 4am to make sure to make it in time to distribute the lays and store the water guns we had purchased for the occasion because we were going to soak the hell out of the other divers who chose to ride on the Bottom Scratcher. The Luau had so much success with Laguna Sea Dwellers and SOCDC members that we had to charter 2 boats: the Magician and the Bottom Scratcher. Rumor has it amongst the diving community that the event was THE EVENT of the year, maybe of the century! Anyway, we were on the Magician and some of our friends on the BS were going to get wet. That was the whole plan...

We arrived about half an hour before the BS. The plan was that the Bottom Scratcher would drop the chefs and the Hula dancers (yes we DID have hula dancers), the food and the booze and anything necessary to bring a Luau to life on the Island. We had the booze, the BS had the rest. A fearless Magician DM transboarded a cooler full of adult beverage from our boat to the BS by the sheer force of her swimming! Amazing! Once done, we played a little cat & mouse with the BS, each team trying to soak the other. Although we had procure some fairly heavy artillery, mega-blasters, water-bazookas and super-piston-force-V, none of us really manage to hit the others. I guess either the advertisement for a 60 ft range were inaccurate or the boats actually stayed pretty darn far from each other...

We left the Bottom Scratcher do the drops and head toward one of my favorite (add ironic tone here) divespot on the Island: the Rock Quarry. As I have already mentioned in one of my previous photo dive report, I never seem to see anything worth a pix in this site and this time was no surprise. Nada. Nichts. Rien du tout.

Actually, I saw the butterfly fishes this time. Even managed to snap a terrible shot of one of them. They're pretty fast and shy.

Visibility was very good, excellent close to the surface with the sun peeking through the kelp. Deeper, around 50ft, it was getting darker and murkier but I did not loose my buddies, so it must have been pretty good. I tried shooting some multiple vertical shots hoping that I could stitch them together to make a cool super-wide angle, but I found out that kelp moves (yeah, big news) and that confuses the stitching software a lot. So if I wanna shoot kelp in wide angle, I'd better buy a new camera or build that wet lens adapter I've been thinking of for quite a long time...

Another thing I found out while trying to shoot sun bursts in the kelp (pretty nice actually) was that air can leak out of my dry suit from the wrist seals. And that makes bubbles, and they go up, right in the middle of my pictures! Dammit!

For the second dive, we went to "Eel Cove". Captain Jerry acknowledged that the name of the site was highly dependent on the boat you are one or the DM who was doing the briefing. This site was actually pretty cool. Not much unusual stuff. Couldn't seem to find any nudi for close-ups. Found a spider crab and had some fun with it, messing a little with him so that others could snap a pix or two, but when it came to me trying to shoot, all he was showing me was his butt... Not terrific. I found a few abalone as well as a horn shark which refused to show me his smiley face... All in all, not much for an hour dive. Viz was great, temperature, I don't care as usual. It was nice and warm in my plastic bag!

We motored back to  Emerald Bay where we were going to have our Luau. We spotted the Bottom Scratcher en route, and figured out we were going to beat them at the dock... Ambush!

We waited a few minutes in the heat on the dock. It was probably 90° outside but there was a little bit of a breeze, so it was still bearable. Most of our group (sissies) went straight to the Luau plaza whereas a few of us (heroes) waited with our guns and bazooka fully loaded for the unsuspecting Bottom Scratcher to dock.

As soon as the moorings were secured we jump out of hiding (sort of) and start firing on the Bottom Scratcher! They fought back! But our accuracy and range was far superior and we managed to take out some high value targets in the form of the President of Laguna Sea Dwellers herself! Other members got soaked. That was going pretty well... Until an evil element jumped out of the BS and throw one of our key gunners in the waters of the harbor! Hilarious!

We all then headed toward the Corsair Yacht Club where THE event was taking place. We arrived just in time for the first serving of an amazing assortment of food. I had bought what was left of a bottle of Bacardi, enough to add some adult flavor to the fruit punch... After a meal that could have feed an entire village somewhere else in the world, we had a Hula dancer dancing for us and giving lessons to one of LSD's former presidents as well as a few other female participants. The came some Hula Hoop demonstrations, a water balloon throwing contest, another water gun fight on the beach and some serious Limbo!

We all came back later that night, exhausted by a day filled of fun with friends, even though the diving was not really spectacular.