Urchin Rocks/Northwest Island with Uncle Pug
Posted: Sun May 09, 2010 2:58 pm
Yesterday's dives were classic springtime in the P N Dub ... gorgeous weather, lousy vis. I hooked up with Uncle Pug at the Lowe's in Everett at 9:30 in the morning and headed for Rosario Beach, just a couple miles northwest of Deception Pass. Our destination ... Northwest Island ... a tiny island about a quarter-mile offshore from the beach. We had four 130's, a pair of Sierra's, and a plan ... and the weatherman had promised us a beautiful, sunny day with highs in the low '70's ... perfect.
Got to the dive site around 10:30 ... reconnoitered the area, and got ready for our first dive ... which we'd decided would be Urchin Rocks, a small spit of boulders that juts out into the south part of the little bay formed by the arc of the beach. Neither one of us had done this dive before, so it was a bit of an exploration dive. The Northwest Shore Dives book described it as a shallow reef.
Geared up, took a heading, and dropped down right off the beach for what should have been a scant few minutes run across the bay to the rocks. Vis was on the order of maybe 10 feet, but we had no difficulty seeing where we were going. After about 9 minutes I was beginning to get the idea that maybe we missed it ... by now we were at 45 fsw, and according to the book it wasn't supposed to be that deep. So I stopped and signaled to Ron that we should ascend to see where we were. Two minutes later we were on the surface, looking back at the bay ... and Urchin Rocks ... we'd skimmed right past the end of the reef and were on our way to Lopez Island. No problem, take a heading, drop back down and ... about 30 seconds later stumble onto a submerged reef that was just covered in clown dorids and vermillion and white sea cucumbers ...
We spent the next 40 minutes or so slowly making our way back along the boulders and ledges that comprise the reef. I also found out how the reef got its name ...
Just before heading back I discovered what I at first took for a nudibranch ... but what proved to be some kind of flatworm ... or is that two flatworms? Or is it just some kind of confused worm with his head up his ... ???
Ron's suit was leaking, so after a while he signaled it was time to go ... and off we went, back to the beach. Oddly, we didn't have any trouble navigating back ... we surfaced right in front of the trail we took from the car to the beach.
Surface interval ... a time to dry out, lounge around in the sun, eat lunch, kibbitz with some friendly people, and thoroughly enjoy being in the PNDub on a perfect spring day. Life is definitely good. But tides wait for no one, and before long it was time to head out to our prime destination of the day ... Northwest Island ...
The bay going across in this direction is a bit more interesting than on the previous dive ... crabs, sea pens (LOTS of sea pens), and other critters made for an interesting 10-minute scoot out to the island. We arrived on the north side, which is shallow and rocky ... clipped the scoots off, pulled out our cameras, and started kicking out along the east side of the island, getting progressively steeper and deeper as we went.
This is a gorgeous reef, that gets prettier as you approach the south end of the island ... which is exposed to the currents that flush daily into and out of Deception Pass. I could feel the tug of current increasing as we got closed to the island's south end, and before long it was work to be able to stop and take a picture. But I was looking, in particular, for the colorful snakelock anemones that, in this region, often provide a home for candy-striped shrimp. And although the anemones were in abundance, I only found one candy-stripe shrimp ... and it was far too small for a picture in those conditions.
I did, however, find a rather large scaly lithodid crab guarding one of those anemones ... and it didn't seem interested in letting me in for a closer inspection ...
But the prize of the day ... for me, at least ... was an abundance of tiny white dendronotid nudibranchs ... barely a centimeter or two in length ... clinging to the tips of hydroids waving furiously in the current.
At about 50 minutes, Ron signaled he was getting cold. Ah, I thought .... his suit's still leaking. We put away the cameras, unclipped the scoots, and headed back across the bay ... this time dead-reckoning mid-water as we stepped slowly shallower ... 3 minutes at 40, 3 minutes at 30, 3 minutes at 20 and suddenly there's the bottom. We followed the contours in only to discover we'd overshot our entry ... ah, but there's another trail. Hiking back up it proved more effort than we bargained for, but we managed to make it back to our picnic table, unload the gear and go back for the scooters.
Turned out Ron had a bit more than a leak ... he took off his suit, dumped the water out, peeled out of his Weezle, squeezed about two quarts of water out of it, and gave thanks for the fact that it was a warm, sunny day.
Overall though, a great day of diving ... and although I had done Northwest Island from a boat before, this was the first ... and definitely not the last ... time from shore by scooter. I can see a bunch of trips to Rosario in my future. All I'll need is a buddy with a scooter ... this has become my new favorite scooter shore dive in the P N Dub ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
Got to the dive site around 10:30 ... reconnoitered the area, and got ready for our first dive ... which we'd decided would be Urchin Rocks, a small spit of boulders that juts out into the south part of the little bay formed by the arc of the beach. Neither one of us had done this dive before, so it was a bit of an exploration dive. The Northwest Shore Dives book described it as a shallow reef.
Geared up, took a heading, and dropped down right off the beach for what should have been a scant few minutes run across the bay to the rocks. Vis was on the order of maybe 10 feet, but we had no difficulty seeing where we were going. After about 9 minutes I was beginning to get the idea that maybe we missed it ... by now we were at 45 fsw, and according to the book it wasn't supposed to be that deep. So I stopped and signaled to Ron that we should ascend to see where we were. Two minutes later we were on the surface, looking back at the bay ... and Urchin Rocks ... we'd skimmed right past the end of the reef and were on our way to Lopez Island. No problem, take a heading, drop back down and ... about 30 seconds later stumble onto a submerged reef that was just covered in clown dorids and vermillion and white sea cucumbers ...
We spent the next 40 minutes or so slowly making our way back along the boulders and ledges that comprise the reef. I also found out how the reef got its name ...
Just before heading back I discovered what I at first took for a nudibranch ... but what proved to be some kind of flatworm ... or is that two flatworms? Or is it just some kind of confused worm with his head up his ... ???
Ron's suit was leaking, so after a while he signaled it was time to go ... and off we went, back to the beach. Oddly, we didn't have any trouble navigating back ... we surfaced right in front of the trail we took from the car to the beach.
Surface interval ... a time to dry out, lounge around in the sun, eat lunch, kibbitz with some friendly people, and thoroughly enjoy being in the PNDub on a perfect spring day. Life is definitely good. But tides wait for no one, and before long it was time to head out to our prime destination of the day ... Northwest Island ...
The bay going across in this direction is a bit more interesting than on the previous dive ... crabs, sea pens (LOTS of sea pens), and other critters made for an interesting 10-minute scoot out to the island. We arrived on the north side, which is shallow and rocky ... clipped the scoots off, pulled out our cameras, and started kicking out along the east side of the island, getting progressively steeper and deeper as we went.
This is a gorgeous reef, that gets prettier as you approach the south end of the island ... which is exposed to the currents that flush daily into and out of Deception Pass. I could feel the tug of current increasing as we got closed to the island's south end, and before long it was work to be able to stop and take a picture. But I was looking, in particular, for the colorful snakelock anemones that, in this region, often provide a home for candy-striped shrimp. And although the anemones were in abundance, I only found one candy-stripe shrimp ... and it was far too small for a picture in those conditions.
I did, however, find a rather large scaly lithodid crab guarding one of those anemones ... and it didn't seem interested in letting me in for a closer inspection ...
But the prize of the day ... for me, at least ... was an abundance of tiny white dendronotid nudibranchs ... barely a centimeter or two in length ... clinging to the tips of hydroids waving furiously in the current.
At about 50 minutes, Ron signaled he was getting cold. Ah, I thought .... his suit's still leaking. We put away the cameras, unclipped the scoots, and headed back across the bay ... this time dead-reckoning mid-water as we stepped slowly shallower ... 3 minutes at 40, 3 minutes at 30, 3 minutes at 20 and suddenly there's the bottom. We followed the contours in only to discover we'd overshot our entry ... ah, but there's another trail. Hiking back up it proved more effort than we bargained for, but we managed to make it back to our picnic table, unload the gear and go back for the scooters.
Turned out Ron had a bit more than a leak ... he took off his suit, dumped the water out, peeled out of his Weezle, squeezed about two quarts of water out of it, and gave thanks for the fact that it was a warm, sunny day.
Overall though, a great day of diving ... and although I had done Northwest Island from a boat before, this was the first ... and definitely not the last ... time from shore by scooter. I can see a bunch of trips to Rosario in my future. All I'll need is a buddy with a scooter ... this has become my new favorite scooter shore dive in the P N Dub ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
!