Awesome dive on the dry docks today. Toured all four docks as well as the reef, explored a few new place and generally had a great time with great visibility (between 30 and 40 ft). Best of all, the P1 with proper settings was not only quick, but lasted the entire dive without slowing.

High tide, lots of rain and not very warm - neither surface nor underwater. However, it was still a great day for a dive. Today I was testing the Nauticam and Canon 7D with a new Leak Sentinel and a replacement Kraken 3000 ring light/strobe. Both functioned perfectly. Overall a great dive, even if we were cold.

A very nice dive today to the dry docks and back. Toured all four docks, sometimes on the scooter and had a great time with some of the best visibility this year (up to 50ft).

Great dive today. First dive testing Piranna DPV with new default P1 settings. Very fast!. Great visibility and very cold, but overall an excellent dive.

Another nice dive today to the dry docks and back. Toured all four docks on the scooters and had a great time with decent visibility.

A nice dive today to the dry docks and back. Toured all four docks on the scooters and had a great time with decent visibility.

We went Saturday this week to avoid the torrential downpour predicted for Sunday. Tides were high and visibility was really good - much better than past weeks. The ring light would not fire strobe no matter what I tried, but I still got some great shots by using it as a ring light with the camera set on Av and f2.8. Overall an excellent dive.

First day diving in almost six weeks, and it was great to be back. It was a decent day, just a few showers, and good tides. Sadly the visibility was not great; perhaps 5 ft at best. I also spent a lot of time messing about with a new ring light / strobe on my camera and seemed to really suck back the air as a result. Not that many good photos, but a good learning experience and good dive.

Just to spite the weather forecast, instead of 16C and sunny, it was perhaps 10C and quite windy and stormy. After gearing up, headed towards the drydocks. Visibility was less than 5ft the entire way, and just as bad at the docks. A complete tour of all four docks plus the wall was done in pretty much no visibility. After an hour it was definitely time to head back, where the stormy, windy conditions were if anything worse. It was still a good dive.

Strange dive today. The dive started with high tide and excellent visibility, easily seeing 15+ feet. However, at about the halfway mark things became murky and cloudy while on the wall, and all the way back in. Visibility went from 15+ ft to less than 10ft.

The FLX Extreme came back from Edmonton last week with a new T-zip (plastic zipper). The dive today was awesome with no leaks at all. One unexpected benefit of the T-zip was the suit now flexes much more in front, making donning the suit much easier than it ever was with the metal zipper.

Really good dive on all four dry docks today, in spite of low tides and very poor visibility.

I was diving my 2003 TLS350 as my FLX Extreme is in the shop for a new zipper after only 121 dives. The TLS is a nice suit. It was custom fit when I was larger, so it's a bit oversized these days. Still, I was warm and dry, and that's what counts. As it turns out, this was only dive number 12 on the 'new' zipper, installed back in 2009! That also explains why the replaced turbo soles look like they've never been used.

The day started in the best way. As soon as we arrived we saw a family of sea otters sunning and playing on the government dock. We were able to take many photos and some video of them before they all splashed and headed off. Sea otters are so cool!

Once we geared up and headed in, it was clear that visibility was excellent (sorry about the pun). There was an abundance of life out today, both in the shallows as well as on the wall. There are so many rock fish that it's just wonderful! So many to photograph, mostly just lounging about. There was also a painted greenling again, and I managed to get a photo.

My DUI FLX Extreme is in the shop for a new zipper (after only 121 dives!!!) so today I dove my 2003 TLS 350 (custom). I used the silicon neck seal and my "good" zip cuffs, and was almost totally dry. The only damp spot was where I installed a new shoulder dump valve without silicone. I was hoping the rubber gasket would be enough, but it looks like a dab of silicone on the threads is required. Still, the suit fit OK and felt great.

Great dive today at Maple Bay. Visibility was quite good, but this meant the dogfish would not show as they like the murk. The reef was dark so lots of great photo subjects.

Today I dove my 2009 TLS350 to see how it was. I installed a new dump valve in the shoulder. I didn't use silicone, and it leaked. I also used my "teaching" latex neck seal, and it's seen better days. It was loose and bubbled every time I looked up, meaning water also came in. I was quite damp after the dive on my upper body. Still, overall it was quite fine. WIth my silicone neck seal and silicone sealant on the dump valve I am certain I would have been totally dry.

Dove open circuit at Chemainus today because the rebreather was unavailable due to one bad sensor. I took the 40cf tank as a stage, but ended up not needing it. Vis in the shallows was poor, but quite nice at depth on the drydocks. Overall a great dive.

I dove my FLX Extreme today as a final test to firmly prove the zipper is pooched. It is. I had a towel behind the zipper, and it was soaked, as was I in the lower right area. Time to take the suit in to the shop for a new zipper, which is annoying as it's only had 121 dives.

Chemainus Video 

Visibility was really pretty bad from surface to about 10ft, making it essentially a night dive, especially on the wall. However, that was great as all the rockfish were sleeping on rocks, making for some nice photos. The large dogfish (shark) was also again prowling in the shallows today, which was very cool. Overally a great dive!

Maple Bay Octo Video 

Maple Bay Dogfish Video 

These two videos are a bit shakey, to say the least. Taking video with the Canon 7D is complex. You can use the auto-focus at any point (manually triggered), but the focus does not track during video. Realistically this means manual focus is the only practical solution. However, manual focus with a 60mm macro lens presents it's own interesting issues, as the focus range of a macro lens is measured in millimeters, or the tiniest of movements of the focus knob.

A great dive at Maple Bay today. Visibility wasn't great, but we say several dogfish (sharks) in the shallows while looking for bottles.

Maple Bay (dogfish) Video 

Maple Bay (dogfish) Video (color corrected) 

Very good visibility today on the dry docks. Lots to see, so we visited all four dry docks as well as the wall. Overall an excellent dive!

A great dive at Maple Bay today. It started on the surface when we saw and photographed three sea otters swimming about quite near to us. Later on the wall we saw a small octo which I videotaped using the new focus gear on the D7. That was nice! Finally we saw a few grunt sculpins and just had a great dive with good visibility.

Chemainus (octo) Video 

Very good visibility today on the dry docks. Lots to see, so we visited all four dry docks as well as the wall. I even had a look over the wall, but nothing really there. Saw Gord and Kat back on dock one just as we were leaving. Overall an excellent dive!

Great visibility today on the dry docks. Lots and lots of large yellow jellyfish in the water, but only got stung once. In the shallows while my scooter was parked it managed to film a dogfish behind me. Very cool!

Chemainus (dogfish) Video 

Good dive today. Visibility was poor, especially in the shallows. However, with both scooters running we had fun on the wall as well as in the bottle field.

Maple Bay Video 

Great dive today. Really nice on shore gearing up, and pretty warm underwater. We did a long dive on the wall and back to the shallows, even though visibility was pretty poor compared to the last few weeks.

Vis was decidedly better today as we headed out to the dry docks from the boat ramp. The summer life is back on the first dry dock, which is great. Overall a great dive.

Great dive today. Not too hot on shore gearing up, and pretty warm underwater (57F at one on the wall). The visibility was really good but still a bit of debris in the water.

Nice dive today. The visibility was quite good but still a lot of debris in the water.

Nice dive today although the visibility wasn't as great as we first hoped. We were also on the tail end of a very, very low ebb tide the entire dive.

Really nice dive today. Headed to the wall, then over to the far bottle field both swimming and using the scooter. Afer a nice look we headed back to the government dock. Vis was pretty good, making it a great 90 min dive.

Vis in the shallows was pretty good, and on one side of the first dry dock as well as the topside. Vis was also OK on the reef, but going from dock 1 to dock 2 was terrible vis, and it was terrible on dock 2 as well. Still, a really good dive.

The G16 worked perfectly all dive with the new strobe cord. I was also trying out Eneloop batteries which are supposed to be really fancy, and they worked perfectly as well. Not much on the Odrvm footage due to the vis.

Dove today with the 7D and housing. Visibility was really good, with incoming tide; in the order of 20+ ft. I took lots of photos again.

Overall, an excellent dive.

Dove today with the 7D and housing. Visibility was much better, in the order of 15+ ft. I took lots of photos again.

Overall, an excellent dive.

Dove today with the 7D and housing. Visibility was terrible again, but not the worst this spring. You could see 10-15 ft but there was a lot of 'stuff' in the water again. Only macro photography really worked well.

Still, a great dive.

Another dive with the Canon G16 and the NEW sync cord plus the charged, new batteries. Everything worked perfectly, which means the old cord was the problem. My best guess is that it was an intermittant connection on the TTL power wire, allowing it to work on land but failing after time underwater (pressure related?). Anyway, that is sorted so I'm a happy camper.

Again visibiltiy was excellent at 20+ feet. There were lots of critters out making it a fun photo dive. Overall an awesome dive.

Today I dove with the Canon G16 again to test the strobe functionality with the old sync cord and new, freshly charged rechargeable batteries. Again the strobe failed about halfway through the dive, calling for some more tests with various batteries and the new cord. These should confirm my suspicions that the cord, while funnctional, is flakey at least when carrying power from the strobe to the TTL circuit.

However, visibiltiy was excellent today at 20 feet, and with the sunny day the lack of strobe was not a problem in the shallows. I was even able to take some wide angle shots of the dock pilings and my buddy. Overall an awesome dive.

Today I dove with the Canon G16 again to test the strobe functionality with the old sync cord and the alkaline batteries that have been used once a few dives ago (with the new sync cord, where they worked great the whole dive). I also dove with my rebuilt reg set, which was great. Unfortunately the camera wasn't. The strobe failed again about halfway through the dive. In this case however, I am certain it's the batteries. It looks like alkaline batteries are good for only one dive. This was confirmed after the dive when I checked them several hours later to find three of the four were less than half power. Sad, because they are quite expensive.

Still, visibiltiy was easily 15+ feet again, and with the sunny day the lack of strobe was not a problem in the shallows. Overall an awesome dive.

Today was another camera dive using Canon 7D-L "big rig". This was to be a "fun dive" as I figured out the camera issues on prior dives, so today would be concentrating on "getting the shot", especially controlling light with the manual flash. Visibility was great compared to the past many weeks, with 15ft+ at all times. Still some "stuff" in the water preventing longer distance shots, but great for close-up and for "just seeing". Overall, an awesome dive.

Perhaps the WORST visibility EVER!!! While it was about 5ft in the shallows as I scootered from the boat ramp to the float, heading down to the dry dock #1 it became progressively worse until I could not scooter and had to swim the last third of the way. By the block it was maybe 6in and I almost hit the block swimming. Navigating the docks was a challenge that could only be done swimming. Exiting the water all I could taste was "sushi" from the green, green ocean.

Today was another camera test dive, using 7D-L (macro) in manual flash mode. Having solved the issue with camera placement and jammed buttons on land during the week, I verified that all was working properly before heading out. In the water, visibility was terrible; worse than the past two dives. While you could *see* about 5 feet, you could only take a decent photo at about 6in max. Beyond that it was just junk in the water and floating debris. However, the camera operated flawlessly, so I was happy. Overall, a very good dive.

Today was another camera test dive, using 7D-L (macro) in manual flash mode. This time the star button was engaged the entire dive, meaning no menus or photo review. Most annoying and frustrating. Vis was a bit better, between 5-10 ft and lots to see. Once home I checked the camera and housing, and found the problem - the cable from hot-shoe to bulkhead has a bulky connector in the middle, and this was pressed against the front of the camera, causing the camera to tilt just enough to press the star button when the housing was closed. I was able to verify that if the cable is better routed, there is no issue.

Today was another camera test dive, using 7D-L (macro) in manual flash mode. Except for a very annoying "*" button that would freeze the shutter for 3 seconds each time it was pressed, everything worked extremely well. It was a fun dive in spite of 5+ ft. visibility.

A decent dive. Visibility was poor again, but better than the last dry dock trip. Fun diving on the scooters to the reef and back.

Today was a camera test dive. With a new strobe sync cord, I was hoping the camera would be back to it's old self. I was almost right. It worked perfectly in the pre-dive, and for the first half of the dive. Then it started to act up, with the TTL function becoming increasingly flakey. Finally I turned off the strobe and played with natural light and the Sola 1200.

Maple Bay Video 

Another 'OK' dive to the dry docks and the reef. Unfortunately visibility was under 4 ft most of the time which did affect what we could see on the dive. This time the water was so full of mucky stuff that it seemed like I'd eaten a 4 course sushi dinner when I got out of the water!

An 'OK' dive to the dry docks and the reef. Unfortunately visibility was under 4 ft most of the time which did affect what we could see on the dive.

Great dive. We found the reef again and it goes quite a ways. Unfortunately the G16 strobe again failed to operate at depth so any decent photos are lit by the sola alone.

An interesting day diving on the Chemainus dry docks today. We had snow again last night, and today was cool but otherwise OK. After gearing up we headed to the drydocks, but visibility was terrible everywhere. I did manage to find the reef again, but vis was so bad that no photos were taken. Still, a good dive.

A great day diving on the Chemainus dry docks today. It was sunny but there was a very cold wind on shore, but just fine underwater. From dry dock #1 we headed due North and quickly found the small wall / reef that has been reported by others. It's a nice little 10 ft wall quite near the dry dock. Overall a great dive.

Another great dive from the Maple Bay park to Spring St. reef and back to the bottle field. As a bonus, I passed the 400 hour mark on my Prism Topaz. It is a marvelous rebreather.

Maple Bay - Spring St. Reef Video 

Today was a nice sunny day, but there was snow and ice still on the steep path to the water. With careful steps we walked down to the water and entered. After a 17 minute scooter at 24 fsw on med-low speed, we surfaced to see the appropiate landmarks around the Spring St. entry. Heading deeper, it took 1.5 min to find the start of the reef/wall. Once on the wall we kept mostly to 75fsw and saw lingcod egg masses. Reaching the end of the wall we headed back to shore. From this end it takes 4 min to reach shore near the entry. After that it was a nice 11 min scooter back to the pilings of the pub wharf and then back to shore. Overall a great dive.

Starting from the Maple Bay beach park in the rain (again), we headed out to search for the Spring St. reef. This time we headed further along the shore and into the little bay by Spring St., then back at 50ft until we found the reef. It's actually a very nice wall that extends from 50ft to 90ft with lots of cool cracks and stuff. Lots of rockfish and other life. Overall, a really great dive.

Starting from the Maple Bay beach park in the rain, we headed out to search for the Spring St. reef, but came up short. Still, it was a great dive.

I dove the dry docks again today on what was a very nice sunny day. I met Mark Hiebert while gearing up and again on the dry docks. I scootered all four docks and had a great dive.

Well, the weather persons got it partly wrong again. It was supposed to be sunny and 0C. It was sunny, but 0C was a long way above the actual temp at the dive site. It was freezing!

However, the parking lot was dry as we parked and then geared up. I tried out my newly made neoprene case for the close-up lens to my G16 in it's Ikelite housing. Last night I decided I wanted to be able to remove the close-up lens and not get it scratched, so designed and hand sewed a nice case out of some scrap neoprene. It ended up fitting perfectly and worked equally perfectly on today's dive.

The dive was very cold, and not many critters braved the cold water. We saw a few grunt sculpins, as well as a very shy painted greenling, but no baby octos. Still, and great dive.

It was cloudy but not below zero today, so we headed out to the Chemainus dry docks on our scooters. I took my rebreather as we wanted to do some maintenance on the lines as well. The dive was great, and line maintenance went as planned. When we got out it was a blizard of big, wet heavy snow. Still, a great dive.

Chemainus Video 

A New Year's day dive is a tradition on the west coast. We chose Maple Bay as it's good parking and a very nice photo dive. Today was windy and very cold, proving again that weather forecasts can be wrong. The parking lot was very icy and even walking was dicey at times.

After gearing up we headed out and had a good dive. Vis was decent if not spectacular and there were enough critters to keep us entertained. Overall a good dive. It would have been excellent if we weren't so very cold.