God's Pocket

[YellowEye]

Hi
We just got back from 6 days of great diving at God's Pocket! God's Pocket is a fantastic dive resort up near Port Hardy at the north end of Vancouver Island for those who may not have visited.

It was super fun catching up with owners Bill and Annie, and a group of photo friends I've now done 4 trips to there with!

Diving was great with around 30-60' viz. Weather was variable.

Some quick top-side highlights: wolves, dolphins, whales, oyster catchers, bald eagles, sea lions etc. Great food and hospitality at the resort!

Diving highlights: beautiful reefscapes, candy stripes, octos, ps king crabs, warbonnets, nudis (diamond backs, orange peels, opulescents), and lots of cool little jellies and salps in the water column. Sadly, no sunflower stars, and less rockfish than I remember from years past.

Also cool, was that there was a film crew up there from the BBC, doing a new series. They were filming GPO's!

Here were some of my captures:

1. Red soft corals on Browning Wall

2. Reef scapes

3. Basket Stars and sponges

4. Opulescent Nudis

5. Octos at Landslide / The Aquarium

6. Glove Sponges

7. Barnacles

8. Hooded Nudibranchs

9. Seapens

10. Octo encounters

11. This guy spent quite a bit of time with us

12. Compound mushroom tunicates

13. Opalescent on a soft coral, with crab

14. Octo on the top of Browning Wall

15. Lots to look at

16. Kelp forests

17. Snowfall

18. Some rockfish living on 7 tree

19. Bloodstars and some ochres were the only stars in abundance

20. Browning wall

Thanks to several nwdc members for what turned out to be some very useful loans for this trip!

[Scubie Doo]

Very cool. You are going to have to start paying scuba Jess for her excellent modeling skills.

[deep diver]

great shots, nice to see all the octopus out running around

[Jan K]

Thank you for sharing the wonders you captured so well. What a place! What a great collection of photos!

[Grateful Diver]

Gorgeous photography, Eric ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

[ScubaJess]

Hello Yellow Eye!

It was fantastic diving with you!!! You are such an amazing photographer. You really captured the beauty & Color down there!! It was just crazy plastered with life!!! I will post some of my above water shots soon. What a blast! I love the Gods Pocket Resort and Browning Pass dive spots!! 7 Tree was spectacular! It was so much fun making friends with that GPO!!

Cannot wait to see more pics from the trip!

Also a shout out to JohnDo88 For letting me use the Wheezle Extreme Plus!!!!! It was amazing!!!!!!! I stayed so warm! I cannot wait to get my own!

Happy Diving everyone!

[LCF]

Wow, you had amazing viz at the hooded nudibranchs site. The last time we dove there, we had about 5 feet

Amazing photography, as always. You made me want to start looking at the calendar to figure out when I can get back up there.

[oldsalt]

Thank you. Since I have had to give up diving, posts such as yours permits me to relive some of the best parts. Your mention of the topside highlights reminds me that good things still await me as I wander up there in my boat. Having a humpback surface abeam, or whitesided dolphins bow ride, or watching a grizzly hunt on the shore, or listening to wolves cry in the forest while anchored, all stand as memories of the magic of that area. ScubaJess did some outstanding modeling for you. The girl may express some enthusiasm as well.
-Curt

[DecidedlyOdd]

Amazing photos! I gotta get back up there again soon.

[dlh]

Great photos Eric! Looks like a wonderful trip. I really like your Octo on Browning Wall (#14) pic! Looks like the conditions were pretty great with some sun and clear water. I'm looking forward to hearing more about your viewfinder.

We had a few windy days down here. Did you have any problems getting out to sites?

[YellowEye]

Hi Dave
Weather was variable -- sometimes great, sometimes rainy or surgy. We were hoping to make it out to that dive site you went to last time and found the hard corals (I requested it ), but we had to scratch. I *still* haven't seen a rock greenling either. Supposedly there were a lot of rockies out there this year, but we didn't feel much up to hanging out in the strong surge. I also had to miss out on the ochre stars and green anemone shots due to this.

Thanks for the strobe loan!

[YellowEye]

Glad people like the pics! Here are a few more octo shots for fun!

[deep diver]

nice! Thanks for sharing. looks like the octopus was reaching for you in the picture one up from the last

[ScubaJess]

Hey Deep Diver!
He did, he grabbed the camera twice, it was awesome! YellowEye did a great job staying calm and taking amazing pics! I can't belive he let us hang out with him for like 40 min!! It was a real honor! I was trying not to blind him with my light!

Thanks for the epic photos YellowEye!!