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Double-whammy today . . .
FATHER'S DAY & THE SUMMER SOLSTICE -
Father's Day is/was all day but the solstice
actually happened at exactly 1:24AM earlier this
morning. This is the longest day of the year
with official sundown at 8:09PM resulting in a
14-hour 25-minute length of the day. Hope you've
enjoyed it because it's all downhill from here
(at least until the winter equinox on December
21st at 12:49PM).
VISION DIVE
BOAT CLARIFICIATION -
I mentioned last week that the Vision has
moved to San Diego. I got a polite phone call
(and follow-up e-mail) from Frank Ursitti, the
owner of H&M Landing which is who bought the
boat. Frank took some exception to how I
characterized things and explained that,
contrary to what I thought, the e-mail blast
came not from them but from an employee who may
have let his enthusiasm for keeping the Vision diving
get carried away a bit. Frank also asked me to
point out that what I termed a "single day trip"
is really a day and a half. Traditionally, at
least from San Pedro, boats would depart for San
Clemente Island around 1AM, arrive at Clemente
at 7AM and start diving, leave the island around
1PM (6-hour dive window), and arrive back in
port around 7PM for a total trip time of 18
hours. (This sked also allowed them to do two
weekend trips.) The San Diego plan is to leave
at 7PM Friday night, dive the entire day and
even evening on Saturday, and then arrive back
in San Diego at 7AM Sunday morning for a total
trip time of 36 hours, or twice as long as the
traditional sked. (That also means they can only
do one trip per weekend.) They also list some
2.5-day trips which leave on a Thursday at 7PM
and return on Sunday at 7AM (60 hours long). If
this is something you're interested in, you can
book directly through H&M Landing. Here's the
website for their upcoming trips: VISION IN
SAN DIEGO SCHEDULE.
GoPRO IN FINANCIAL TROUBLE? -
GoPro has just introduced their latest camera,
the Mission 1 series, which comes with a larger
sensor and higher resolution (up to 8K). At the
same time, they issued an interesting warning
saying they're in financial trouble and may have
to file for bankruptcy or at least get some new
investors. (Thanks to Carol Behrmann for the
heads-up.) Costs for memory have skyrocketed and
they're not the only (or dominant) player in the
game anymore. There are a number of articles
about this floating around but here's one from
DPReview: GoPRO
MIGHT BE IN TROUBLE.
IF YOU'RE TRAVELING, THINK ABOUT NITROX -
Who would have ever pegged me as a proponent of
nitrox? But as long as you understand it's
limitations and that's it's not a Wonder Gas, it
serves a purpose as a bottom-time-extending gas.
Generally, most foreign trips have a dive time
limit of one hour. As long as your air
consumption is good enough (and you can help
that by diving shallower as your gas depletes),
most divers can make the one-hour mark without
much difficulty. What they run out of, even with
modern dive computers (don't get me started
doing tables calculations), is bottom time. And
that's where nitrox can be of be of value as it
allows for greater bottom time with the same
relative risk (very small) of decompression
illness as diving on air, especially when you do
a somewhat extended safety stop at 15 feet at
the end of the dive (I
like to do five minutes).
So this is all a long way saying that if you're
got a summer trip coming up to some exotic
locale, and you're not currently
nitrox-certified, give some thought to doing
that before you leave (the class is relatively
simple and short) so that you can get the
extended bottom time and more bang for your
diving buck. And yes, Reef Seekers does offer
nitrox classes on a semi-regular basis. The next
one of these is on the books for July 22. But
I'm also happy to set it up for you on an
individual basis if need be. You do some of the
study on your own, we do a Zoom session to go
over over things, you pass a test, and we're
pretty much good to go. So give this some
thought if it fits your diving needs.
STOP THE BLEEDING!!! -
A tourniquet wouldn't have helped nor would CPR.
Suffice it to say, I suffered greatly today at
Dodger Stadium watching the Orioles massacre the
Dodgers 12-1 (although it was fun seeing Miguel
Rojas pitch the 9th inning). That we were also
sitting in the direct sun - at our backs
mercifully - for the entire game didn't make it
any more tolerable. Even dynasty teams have
meltdowns every now and then and hopefully this
was the nadir of the Dodgers despair. Enough
said.
And that'll do it for now. Have a great week and
let's go diving soon!!!
- Ken |
