Five good reasons to dive La Jolla Shores. 18 May 07

Our second attempt to find the Wolf Eel at Vallecitos point turned out to be unsuccessful with regard to our initial intentions but really quite rewarding for what we actually found. Friday after work would usually have meant that the beach was quite busy but since there were no waves there was not the usual quota of surfers. Furthermore, since the visibility in the upper 25 feet was only a few inches due to a present plankton bloom there were no many divers either. Nonetheless we had a mission to try and find the Wolf Eel that was last seen in the clay wall at 65 feet, well below the plankton layer.
La Jolla Shores
La Jolla Shores 		Scripps Pier
Scripps Pier line up
It is quite a long swim out from the carpark and with 2 wetsuits on and 27lbs of lead weights the 10 minute swim seems to take a good deal longer. Yueng with her slimmed down one wetsuit and less weight configuration was hard to keep up with. But I was able to steal rest stops in order to watch the harbour seal that playing in the water not 20 feet from us. It didn't seem to mind us going by but it didn't want to play with us either. We swam on and eventually made it to the drop down point with involves lining up trees on the shore and lining up the end of the pier with a features of the cliff behind.
Halibut
Halibut 		Painted Greenling
Painted Greenling
We decended through 30 feet of green gloomy water to the sandy bottom. After checking everything was okay we following the compass due west towards the canyon wall. The sandy bottom slowly slopes down and as we emerged out of the bottom of the plankton layer we spotted a good sized halibut. Usually these fish slide away if you get too close but I guess this one was half asleep and was hoping no one would spot it. It was about 3 feet long. Shortly afterwards we made it to the canyon edge and Vallecitos point at around 55 feet. There we found a nice Painted Greenling, which I think is a permanent resident to this part of the wall.
Spanish Shawl
Spanish Shawl 		Dendronotus Iris
Dendronotus Iris
The canyon wall does not appear especially spectacular. It is at most a 5 feet high clay wall with lots of holes for things to hide in and at the base there is a sandy bottom that slopes away into the depths. However all the beasties seem to love it so it is always worth the visit. Yueng spotted this 3/4 inch Spanish Shawl sea slug munching away on some vegitation (the orange bits are gills). On the wall there were numerous larger sea slugs grazing. These are about 3 inches long and not very tasty.
Octopus
Octopus
Well we didn't find the ellusive Wolf Eel but we did find several octopuses out hunting. With the thick plankton layer above us it was quite dark at 60 feet so these boys were out hunting dinner. This octopus especially liked us and wanted to pose for a photo.