Two More Solo Dives on the Little Coral Knoll and my first 162 minute dive

Got to the beach early and got in the water with enough time to swim out to the swim buoy to descend.  Found the Big Rock and set up my camera and dive gear. I set the camera up for super macro and couldn't test it before getting in the water because there was too little light to qualify an exposure.  So I discovered underwater that although I had formatted the CF card, I had forgotten to put the card in the camera.  Just great.  I found the knoll and cruised around several times.  I swam 50 degrees out to the Porthole Rocks.  Everywhere I looked I saw super macro shots.  On the other hand, my air usage was good and I got 143 minutes out of a 3140 psi tank.

While I was on the surface for 44 minutes, I was not out of the water for 15 minutes before I had to gear up and get back in.  As it was, the life guard got there about 9:20 am, but saw me and sat in his car until I was in the water and almost to the swim buoy.  Thanks for that.

This time, I had an 8 MB card in the camera and I took some pictures: 247 of them. Just downloading them now, so I don't know if they are any good.  Once in the water with a card in the camera,  I did not see as many super macro shots.  Imagine that.

I did find some 2-3 inch Peacock Flounders just to the NW of the Big Rock.  I spent some time getting the exposure right and trying to get a shot of the whole fish, but with a +10 diopter on a 100mm macro lens that just was not happening.













Got lots of shots of Knobby Sea Rods.  I'm fascinated by the 8-point stars.












Got a close up picture of this Seaweed Blenny.














Got many more shots of Knobby Sea Rods.










Spent a lot of time looking for nudibranchs, but didn't see any.  Went to the knoll and poked around nearby, but otherwise just hung on the knoll.


Got this shot of a Black Spotted Feather Duster.










Took pictures of a few Christmas Tree Worms.













Also got a few pictures of Fire Coral.



At 1000 psi, I headed back to the Big Rock.  The current may have set me or I just wasn't paying attention, but I went by the Rock and had to surface to see that I was North of where I wanted to be.  So I swam back.  Hung at the Rock until I was down to 400 psi and then went in.  Came up at 162 minutes.