Beautiful dive in Monterey

It has been toooo long since we've gone diving! Even though winter is generally a good time to dive Monterey, we had trouble finding a weekend when good conditions were predicted. We took a chance this Saturday and were rewarded with 30 foot visibility (5-10 feet is quite common for the area) at the San Carlos Breakwater. Not only was the vis great, we saw scads of sea creatures! One of the first things we saw upon descent was a harbor seal jetting by! Scott then eyed a huge sea lion, which I unfortunately missed. Of course there was the usual assortment of anemones, starfish, and sea cucumbers (see below). Also what was possibly a nudibranch, bright white and about as big as my foot. As soon as our camera space ran out we found more incredible animals (of course!). Under the slant of a boulder was a humongous sun star--like a star fish except they grow up to 40 legs and eat everything in their path--this one was probably a meter wide! An odd-shaped rock turned out to be a very large crab covered in algae. We poked him a bit but all he did was cautiously shuffle to one side, reluctant to reveal his true identity. More crabs later--four or five little decorator crabs traveling in a row, each like a bit of walking kelp.

Our friend and fellow diver Jesse recently had a bad fall off his bike, breaking several ribs. Get better so's we can all go diving!

Ooo, look! This is not a staged gesture (wink)!

Some underwater thingies. Had to adjust the colors a bit--when you're down 40 feet it's hard to see the reds and oranges.