CLUB DIVE! CLUB DIVE! CLUB DIVE!

[Geek]

I had a fantastic time , It was good to meet a few new people and dive with some old ones..... sorry Bassman, that didn't come out right...

Of course, NEXT time I think every one should wear a name tag.... Like I hear one person did...not naming any names..

The surface swim wasn't that bad at 3pm, no current at all, Thanks Bob for the warm water and thanks all for the munchies everyone!

[BASSMAN]

Well, I showed up to the party later in the day. I didn't get a chance to say "Hi" to a lot of old friends there.
But it was good seeing some old and meeting new faces of NWDC members.
The dive I went on with kitsapdiver, renoun, geek and sungurl was fantastic, Thanks to all of the buddies on that dive!
Dive # 348 and that was my first time diving Saltwater State Park. Looking forward to many more as this site matures and gets even more life on it. I missed out on the Lumpia!

Maybe next Time I'll get more involved with the food end of things.
Thank you to all who helped out and arranged this club event. Looks like it was a great success!
I hope we can do a Hood Canal, week-ender soon!

[Grateful Diver]

Well for me it was more about the socializing than the diving. Only did one dive with Penelope. It was great. Scootered out towing Penelope on my left and camera on my right. The current was a bit stronger than anticipated ... so we pretty much decided to just go with it for a while ... but apparently there's not much reef where the current was taking us, so we got back on the trigger and let the scoot do all the work pulling us back against the current. Before long we were back on the reef.

Since the reef is still new, there wasn't a whole lot to see ... until Penelope started waving her light furiously and pointing straight down below me. Crikey! How'd I miss seeing that huge GPO draped over a boulder ... apparently sleeping off a happy meal. So out came the camera.

Poor thing ... woke up when the strobes started going off in his face.



A ling cod came by to see what all the fuss was about ...



Finally the octo got tired of all the flashing lights, and slithered underneath a boulder. So the camera got tucked back away, the scooter came back out, and we were off again.

We made our way up shallower, continuing south, till we hit the eel grass beds. Tons of hooded nudis to see in there. We found a pair who were apparently deciding it was time to breed. One had lovely white spots. Got this pic of the two of 'em biting each other in the ass ...



Then it was time to head in. At about 5 fsw we hit the surface ... looked at each other and said "where the helll ARE we". Looking north .... waaaaayyyyy off in the distance, we could make out the park. Guess I misjudged that one a bit. Took us about 8 minutes of scootering to make it back to the party.

Once on shore, with all the food and friendly buzz going on all thoughts of a second dive went out the window. As much fun as these club dives are, I'm kinda glad they don't happen more often, or I'd outgrow my drysuit in no time. Fantastic day ... a little bit of diving, lots of food, and way too much fun.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

[lizard0924]

Then it was time to head in. At about 5 fsw we hit the surface ... looked at each other and said "where the helll ARE we". Looking north .... waaaaayyyyy off in the distance, we could make out the park. Guess I misjudged that one a bit. Took us about 8 minutes of scootering to make it back to the party.

Imagine doing that surface swim WITHOUT a scooter. Oh wait....I don't have to imagine it.....

It was great seeing everyone yesterday, meeting new people, putting faces to screen names, and enjoying all the food. Plus, I got a work out in without ever going to the gym.

Had a great time and am looking forward to the next club dive.Thanks to the organizers for putting this together. You guys rock!

[Nwbrewer]

It was great meeting some folks, though I know there were a few people there I wanted to meet that I didn't get a chance to. Hopefully next club dive!

I tagged along with the scooter crew for my dive. We wound up North (I think) of where the new reef is, though it sounds like we didn't miss a whole lot. Somehow we wound up in the old tire reef, so there was quite a bit of life to look at, though I don't think most of the group noticed because they were to busy dodging each other on the scooters. I took a short spin on Mattleycrue's scooter, but spent most of my time just hanging out watching the chaos and taking video.

Enjoy -

[vimeo]http://www.vimeo.com/7008953[/vimeo]

Jake

[Mattleycrue76]

Nice video Jake! Of course 40 ft viz didn't hurt. I had a great time yesterday. I got to put some faces to names, had a blast diving, tried lumpia for the first time - and loved it, got to see pez on a scooter with a **** eatin grin on his face, I wish these dives happened more often. BTW If anyone is missing an inflatable dive flag bouy thingy I have it.


Thank you Chris for setting this in motion and to all of you who helped plan and organize. So is it too early to be setting a date for the next one?

[mz53480]

Hey, it was a fun day. And got to dive a new site also.
Here's a quick video of the 1 dive that Winter & I did with JenB & Matt.
Forgot to take off the lens cap, but realized just before going out. Whew! (huge props again to Winter for being the "field-expedient in-water worktable" ) But in process of removing said cap, I accidentally zoomed in quite abit. Thus, the footage is more 'close-up' than normal. Decent shot of a grunt sculpin though.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocnos570O4M[/youtube]

And, yeah--how about that surface swim! My legs are tired today...
Great time, awesome food, and Scottsax seemed somewhat ok about getting his mask back. Maybe we'll see them on Jerry Springer sometime: "divers and the masks who leave them for another diver only to be reunited once again".

Bob--thanks for posting those pics. First time of seeing a hooded nudibranch for me. I thought it was some kind of nasty mutated Ciona thing and was about to call Janna to tell her that they were starting to munch on the new site!
Nice shot of the GPO & lingcod too.

Hoodcanal would be awesome for the next club dive.....bring it on.

Happy diving!
MZ

[sheahanmcculla]

Nice video Jake! Looks fun. Who was showing off with double scooters at the end..it was pretty cool?

[dwashbur]

the club dives today were wonderful. It was great to reconnect with old friends and make some new ones. And the tater tot casserole was FANTASTIC! My only regret is that I didn't get to try the lumpia; by the time it was cooking I was so full I knew I didn't dare eat anything more then or I wouldn't be able to do the second dive. Next time for sure!

I did have one small problem: I loaned someone a high-pressure hose and neglected to get it back. Bigger problem: I can't remember who it was! So if I could get you to PM me so we can hook up, that'd be great...

skinny blonde kid? StanKeech maybe?

D(B)

He was wearing an orange hoodie-type sweatshirt or something similar, that's all I remember. His name may have been Matt, but don't hold me to that. He was about to get a regulator setup from Gratefuldiver when I mentioned I had a spare hose. He asked what he owed me for it and I said I'd just get it from him at the end of the day.

We did two dives, one in the current and one in the afternoon when things had settled down. For the first one we swam into the current and went over to the first reef (south-most one), then for the second one we went straight out to the middle reef where we found not one, but two GPO's. On the first dive we ran into huge schools of perch and tubesnouts, and we hit a massive school of shiner perch on the second one. The new reefs are definitely coming to life! I had a good talk with Ranger Mark and he was very excited to hear about all the life that's moving in down there. He did tell me he hasn't gotten out there since the new structures went in, because his days off are during the week and he can't find people to dive with. I told him to hop on here! Maybe some of us can follow up on that and get in the water with him; aside from the fact that he seems like a really nice guy in his own right, it can't hurt to have an ally in his position

I don't know why so many people are crying about the surface swim/walk. Hey, I did it twice with a combination of 60 pounds overweight and a gimpy leg. If I can do it without griping, you young folks can do it (And that was without a cheater - I mean, scooter!) And the payoff in that viz and on those reefs is worth it.

[Sounder]

Well for me it was more about the socializing than the diving.

Me too!

One of the great things about having so many tanks is that you're able to share them when friends need them. One of the awful things about having so many tanks is that sometimes it's quite a chore to recover them. I missed the first dive because I was transferring tanks, a light, a scooter, a bp/w, deco bottles, chargers, hardware, etc., etc., etc. from one truck to another. Once everyone had finished their dive, we had a delicious meal... then I watched as the food coma tsunami started to engulf everybody there, one by one. By that point Baby Sounder was starting to get tired... so instead of a dive I opted for a frosty adult beverage (thank you Matt), stripped out of my (still dry) drysuit, and after a nice visit with friends, we headed home.

Turns out not diving was for the best anyway as I'd had a questionable ear-clearing issue while gearing-up, which became progressively more clogged yesterday and is completely blocked today. Sometimes things just work out the way they're supposed to.

All in all, it was a really fun day. It was good to meet some of the new faces, and it's always good to see old friends. School has been a killer the last two years, especially over the last few months, and I was really looking forward to getting wet, but I still thoroughly enjoyed myself without the dive. The upside was I didn't have to rinse any gear when I got home and could get straight to watching UW and UA square off in an awesome football game.

I will be putting together a little club dive day sometime in the next month or so at Cove 2 for the dedication of the AED... so stay tuned for details on that.

Finally, I need the recipe for Tater-tot Casserole... I need it in a bad way. That was amazing. The rest of the food was delicious too, especially the lumpia and the "noodley stuff" which I had seconds of.

Thanks again to everyone who came out. I wished I had met more of the new folks, but I enjoyed meeting those I had the opportunity to meet. Also, a big thank you to all my friends who sympathized with me and offered to clear their calendar on short notice when I find I have a couple hours to go get wet... I will be calling, likely on short notice, because I really need to get wet. School's finished March 17th, and it can't come fast enough.

All in all, a very fun day filled with good food and interesting people.

[Pez7378]

Thanks to everyone who showed up and made this Club Dive a huge success! Next time, I promise to do a better job. A group of folks asked me for a site briefing and all I could do was point at the water..... We're going there......to dive....

I woke up this morning, and as soon as my feet hit the floor, I collapsed. I guess my legs didn't have the strength to hold me up! See the post regarding Atrophy

...got to see pez on a scooter with a **** eatin grin on his face,

That was research, and I wasn't grinning until after I punched Joe in the face with the scooter . It was kind of an accident but it's okay. After he assessed the damage , he promptly took my mask. I assumed by his reaction, that it must've hurt a bit.......sorry dude. (I told you guys those things are EVIL!)

At any rate, how can I, in good conscience, promote the Evils of scooters, if I've never tried one.

It was great to see everyone there to check out the new site! It seems I've still got some exploring to do as we only saw a small fraction of the Park. Other than the surface swim, Saltwater State Park is a great location for a club dive. Huge site, plenty of Parking, Tables, Rinse Station and central to North and South Puget sound.

[Tangfish]

Well, I showed up to the party later in the day. I didn't get a chance to say "Hi" to a lot of old friends there.
But it was good seeing some old and meeting new faces of NWDC members.
The dive I went on with kitsapdiver, renoun, geek and sungurl was fantastic, Thanks to all of the buddies on that dive!
Dive # 348 and that was my first time diving Saltwater State Park. Looking forward to many more as this site matures and gets even more life on it. I missed out on the Lumpia!

Maybe next Time I'll get more involved with the food end of things.
Thank you to all who helped out and arranged this club event. Looks like it was a great success!
I hope we can do a Hood Canal, week-ender soon!

Bassman, I *thought* that I saw you in the parking lot at the end of the club dive, but I was like "naaaah, that can't be Bassman, no way he still has that grey drysuit" and I guess it was!

I had a great time meeting everyone and yeah, that was a brutal surface swim! That'll teach me not to bring the scoot. Bomb ass food everyone, thanks to anyone who brought grub - and yeah, defied's tater tot casserole is da bomb!

[revstr]

You guys are a great bunch, had a great time. Thanks to the "skippers" for helping me out on my 10th dive while figuring out new gear. Great food, new friends, awesome dive-- I look forward to more of these.

Erik

[renoun]

I had a great time and look forward to diving this site again once some time has passed allowing more to grow on the reef. Hopefully the fish populations will continue to grow, I certainly saw some decent sized lings. My only new species sighted was a stripped neudibranch that wasn't actually on the reef. There are still remnants of the tire reef that are located North of the new reef and continue to at least 80fsw.

If you were given a oxygen cylinder be sure to check out my post on DIY Emergency Oxygen.

[Grateful Diver]

I did have one small problem: I loaned someone a high-pressure hose and neglected to get it back. Bigger problem: I can't remember who it was! So if I could get you to PM me so we can hook up, that'd be great...

He was wearing an orange hoodie-type sweatshirt or something similar, that's all I remember. His name may have been Matt, but don't hold me to that. He was about to get a regulator setup from Gratefuldiver when I mentioned I had a spare hose. He asked what he owed me for it and I said I'd just get it from him at the end of the day.

HOLY CRAP! You mean nobody knows who those two guys were?

And Dave never got his hose back!

Glad as hell I didn't loan 'em my whole spare reg set, like I was gonna before Dave offered to loan 'em just a hose.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

[dwashbur]

I did have one small problem: I loaned someone a high-pressure hose and neglected to get it back. Bigger problem: I can't remember who it was! So if I could get you to PM me so we can hook up, that'd be great...

He was wearing an orange hoodie-type sweatshirt or something similar, that's all I remember. His name may have been Matt, but don't hold me to that. He was about to get a regulator setup from Gratefuldiver when I mentioned I had a spare hose. He asked what he owed me for it and I said I'd just get it from him at the end of the day.

HOLY CRAP! You mean nobody knows who those two guys were?

And Dave never got his hose back!

Glad as hell I didn't loan 'em my whole spare reg set, like I was gonna before Dave offered to loan 'em just a hose.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Oh well. If it turns up, cool, if not, it's just stuff. There's always more just over the horizon.

[defied]

I'm quite confident it was StanKeetch and Graeme. StanKeech was the blonde kid.

Okay folks, here it is..... Imo give you the recipe...... I'm openSource like that:

2 lbs of ground beef.
1 whole brick of cheddar.
2 lbs of tatertots.
1 whole onion.
1 mutant large can of Cream of Mushroom soup (Or two regular cans)(These can be replaced with cream of celery, and I like 1 celery, 1 mushroom).
3 celery chutes.
2 tablespoons finely chopped garlic.
1 cup of awesome.
2 teaspoons of magic.
eye of newt.

Directions:
Mix the magic with the awesome, add eye of newt (optional), and drink.

Now onto the the cooking directions:
Preheat oven to 450.
chop celery
chop onions

Heat a pan, add a drizzle of olive oil.
add diced onions to pan.
add garlic to pan.
add meat to pan.
stir until meat is fully cooked (Very little pink).
Strain meat (all that grease could give you a headache bigtime [It's sad that I know this])
Put meat back in to pan.
Add cream of mushroom to pan.
Stir in good like. let simmer

Shred the entire block of cheese (My wife found a big a$$ bag of pre-shredded cheese, which was the weight of an entire block).

Get a big oven bake pan (y'all remember it, I don't know what it's called).
Pour in one bag of tatertots.
Take meat pan, and pour in to pan over tatertots.
Put chopped celery over meat.
Pour 1/3rd of the cheese on to the meat.
Pour in second bag of tatertots.
Stir until the meat and gooey cheese are all mixed in evenly with the tatertots (This does take a little patience).
Even out entire mixture across the pan.
Pour the rest of the cheese on top evenly.

DIRTY NOTE: (If you want to really mess with peoples minds, sprinkle brown sugar all over the top of the casserole. I did not do this, because I figured I didn't have enough, and there would be an uprising for seconds, and relying on my dubs to get me across the bay from people with scooters is just crazy talk).

This is important!: Put tin foil over the top of the pan (this can be tricky, as you don't want the tinfoil to touch the cheese if possible (otherwise you'll have to scrape the cheese off of the tinfoil before you put it back in for it's second run).

Put covered casserole in to oven for one hour.

After one hour, pull casserole out, and remove tin foil (scrape all the cheese you can off of it if it gets stuck, because that's just wasteful, and you know what mamma says...).

Drop temperature to about 375.
Put uncovered casserole back in oven for 30 minutes, or until done.
You can tell if it's done by using the knife in the middle of the casserole and seeing if it's hot.

Now for the most important part... don't shovel a heap in to your mouth when you get a pile on your plate. Hot burnie suckage will occur.

Bam.
D(B)

[StanKeech]

Yes it was me and matt. After our second dive we looked around for you but couldnt find you. Let me know when you want to get it back. Had a great time and loved the site.

[Dashrynn]

Awesome viz! This is the best viz I have ever seen!

It would have been a better dive but I busted my neck seal when getting out of the suit. So, as a great dive buddy, Renoun and his friend basically fixed my neck seal and I learned a new thing!

It was great meeting new people but I was overwhelmed by how many divers there were.

A special shoutout to renoun for going above and beyond as a dive buddy and helping me fix my suit.

I concur with a cove 2 club dive 3 weeks from now.

[Nwbrewer]

Nice video Jake! Looks fun. Who was showing off with double scooters at the end..it was pretty cool?

That would be fishstiq, who else?

[scottsax]

Of course, NEXT time I think every one should wear a name tag.... Like I hear one person did...not naming any names..

HEY!!!

I happened across the name tag while I was cleaning, and thought it'd be funny to wear. And people did know who I was...

Very current-y but relaxing dive in the morning with Tom Nic and the other 2...I'm sorry, I'm terrible with names (see? Name tags would've helped!) Amazing visibility-nice way to end my diving for the fall. I can't wait to see that site in a few years when more inverts have moved in and set up housekeeping.

[dwashbur]

Yes it was me and matt. After our second dive we looked around for you but couldnt find you. Let me know when you want to get it back. Had a great time and loved the site.

Yep, the site and the company were awesome, no? Anyway, we're PM'ing now. I'm glad I could help out so you could enjoy the day!

[dwashbur]

We made our way up shallower, continuing south, till we hit the eel grass beds. Tons of hooded nudis to see in there. We found a pair who were apparently deciding it was time to breed. One had lovely white spots. Got this pic of the two of 'em biting each other in the ass ...

Ah, c'est l'amour! Just ask this guy, all decked out in his breeding colors and on the town, lookin' for love:

And this gal has already been on the town once too often, judging by the size of her belly:

Looks like we can expect lots more critters on the reefs. YEAH!!!!!!

[StanKeech]

Lol @ everyone calling me the "skinny blonde kid"

I guess its okay

[Tom Nic]

Lol @ everyone calling me the "skinny blonde kid"

I guess its okay

That would be in contrast to all the fat old guys with grey or no hair. Trust me, it's a compliment. :biggrin: