Diving in Vancouver - Part II
Posted By Christopher Chin on 25 August 2005
Ocean Quest prides itself on “pure service”, and tries to focus on smaller classes. Greg, the resident Course Director is also the shop’s owner. Before I left the shop to head back to my meetings, I made arrangements for tanks and weights, which Kellie was kind enough to gather before she came to pick me up later that evening.
We arrived at Whytecliff well after sunset. There is not much artificial lighting in the parking lot, so the spots to have are those directly in front of the picnic tables. If you park head in, you can use your car’s headlights to assemble your gear and to later look for things that the gremlins might have moved in the dark. As luck would have it, the moon was nearly full that evening, so gearing up and walking down to the site was pleasant and easy.
As soon as we entered the water, the bioluminescent plankton was evident. Larger, denser, and brighter than any I’d ever seen, some of the particles must have been 2mm in diameter. Every few meters during the swim out to the marker, I’d put my face in the water and watch my fins and legs appear as if they were on fire. Looking over at Kellie, I could see eddies of the current trailing behind her fins.
As bright and exciting as the bioluminescence was, it did remind me that the plankton layer was thick, and just like the daytime dives the previous weekend, the first twenty feet were quite murky. We descended near the marker, and then after checking in with each other, we immediately began descending along the slope and followed the wall towards the cut. Again, .like our previous day dives, visibility opened up substantially past the thermocline at 59 feet. We continued along the metridium covered wall where the crinoids were out in greater numbers because of the dark. We entered the cut and were just descending below 79 feet when Kellie motioned me over to a crevice. Inside was a Giant Pacific Octopus, whose largest suckers were at least quarter sized. It was hard to imagine the animal’s full size because it was occupying such a small space, but it was large! We stayed there and stared for some time --- long enough to notice that there were a number of tiny shrimp in the crack along with the octopus, apparently hired to do some clean up work. As the shrimp would pick at invisible debris or parasites, the affected sucker would “wince” as if it were painful or tickled. It was amusing to see such a tiny and almost insignificant creature affecting another so much larger than itself.
We continued on and descended a little further and deeper into the cut, but the current was starting to pick up, so we decided to turn back and enjoy a more leisurely swim. Along the way, I noticed several large sea pens below. One giant orange specimen was 20” long (measured tip of finger past elbow) and more than 6.5 inches wide (measured against my flashlight)! Did I mention they grow ‘em big up there?
In the shallower waters, the Dungeness crabs abounded. Some were squabbling over mussel shells, some would burrow into the sand as we passed, and others would just run around in wide circles to escape our lights.
We were hoping to see some of the seals that like to play in the cut at night, but they didn’t join us. However, as I often tell my students, “any dive where you see an octopus is a good dive.” Make that a Giant Octopus, and it’s phenomenal. It took days to wipe the smile from my face.
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