Motor DOESN’T work…again
LONG STORY…
So about camping. Our plan was to camp on playa la lancha so that we would be close enough to Punta Lobos (the spawning site) to access it in my boat. I met with the Parque director to get permission to conduct my research in the reserve sin collecta (without collecting) and camp on the island. Isla Carmen is actually private property so you would need permission from the owners to go inland but the shoreline and beaches are under the auspices of the park so we could permission to camp on the beach and dive along the shoreline. We were supposed to leave early Thursday morning but the letter still wasn’t in the office and I didn’t want to leave without it. Plus we had so much packing and organizing to do AND i was getting sick. That really pissed me off. normally i don’t take medication but i wasn’t going to miss out on this just because i was getting a cold so i pumped myself full of meds and took a one hour nap hoping it would take the edge off the really crappy feeling i had in my sinuses and head. That seemed to do the trick and i went to get water and ice and check the park office again and there still wasn’t a letter. Finally i went to see Rafa to tell him i still didn’t have the letter and so he said i’ll go with you because if you got the permission from the director maybe we can just go and get the letter when you get back but i’ll ask the people in the office. Well, when Rafa walked in everybody was hey Rafa what’s up? Rafa knows everybody and he’s such a nice guy everybody loves him. So he explained the situation and they said it shouldn’t be a problem but to check with the other office near the harbor. Long story short, the letter was available at 2 pm so we got it and took off. of course, leaving shore after noon means you are most likely going to have wind and waves and it looked like it was going to be a long wet ride out there. if i hadn’t been so sick and so tired from all the running around and packing i would have had the presence of mind to take a picture of all our stuff on the panga. My boat was up top on the metal grating that normally supported a canopy for shade. The motor was on the bow and everything else we owned was all over. There was a young guy named Alberto who had borrowed a mask from Rafa that day and was returning it. His mistake was waiting around while we were packing the panga. He started helping us and I thought he was one of the many cousins that Rafa had in town because I recognized him from last year. Next thing this guy knew he was going to the island with us and holding the motor up on the bow the whole hour and a half out there. Before we left the muelle (harbor) i asked Rafa who he was? And he said i don’t know! Just one of the chavos that hangs around the muelle hauling gear for tips (that’s where i remembered him from).

When we got to the cove we were staying in, the swells were pretty big and it was tons of fun getting the boat off the top and putting the motor on the boat in that mess. Then we used the boat to carry stuff from the panga to shore. Brad and Jeff were looking at me like “nice beach, dork.” I said i swear i’ve passed by here so many times and seen gringos dropped off for picnics here and it was never like this. just my luck i guess. The swells were still up and the wind was blowing until 6 so we called off diving for that day and decided to get up early the next morning for some dives in. Alberto helped us a lot and i think i had about $6-8 dollars worth of peso coins in my pocket i just pulled out and put in his hands. I told him that was all i had but thank you so much for the help and then Brad gave him a $50 peso bill (~$5.00) and off he went with Rafa.

The next morning, the dive plan was for me to install the Aquadopp on the earth anchors I had put in last week and then do fish counts while Brad just killed killed killed.

He kills me because he’s this short dude and a nice guy but he cracks me up when he’ll say stuff like “oh saw a giant golden grouper! They’re so gorgeous! Next dive I’m going to DRILL that sucker!” and he just talks about spearing fish with such glee. So of course when i’m diving and counting fish i tell them that i’m done counting now and here comes brad so RUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!! FISHY RUN!

*ahem*

so the first dive that morning was amazing. I have NEVER in all my years diving here seen such clear water that shallow. Normally at this spot it’s super productive. The current is ripping towards the ocean and if there are big winds coming through it causes all this upwelling and the thermocline is down around 60 ft and the vis above that is usually guacamole. But this day, even though there were swells on the surface, it was amazing, the thermocline was really shallow and i could see for days. And so guess what? That’s right, i didn’t have my gawwwwwwdamn camera! Of course not! Grrrrr. So i put the aquadopp in and then did my fish counts. We only planned on doing one dive that day so we had a tank each and a reserve on the boat. When we pulled anchor and headed back we stopped at the entrance of the cove and looked down in the water. It was about 20 ft deep and was sooooo crystal clear. Brad said how much air did you come up with? I came up with 1000 and so did he so we dropped anchor and did another dive here on the 1000 psi. We were under another 45 minutes and it was stunning. It was so clear but sooooo cold (62F), even for me. I typically don’t get so cold so i wear a 3 mm shorty wetsuit, while everyone else, including Rafa, wears a 5-7 mm full wetsuit with hood and everything. But i prefer to be unencumbered by all that.

The wind picked up at noon that day and didn’t let up so we didn’t do an afternoon dive to look for the aggregations. I was getting frustrated because the whole point was to do afternoon dives to see if they were spawning. And i was holding my breath that the winds would die at least on the full moon. The plan was to get up early and do two dives. That way even if we couldn’t get the afternoon dives in i could still do fish counts and watch the groupers’ behavior. And then if it stayed calm we’d go out in the afternoon.
On the first dive I took pictures of the aquadoppler because peeps love the photos in the powerpoint. The viz was still decent but of course not like the other day.


I know it probably doesn’t help all that much but I put rocks around the base of the ground anchors because in my mind it helps them stay buried. And now not even a week later a couple of barred serranos have taken up residence in my little rock fort i built. The barred serranos kill me because they are cigar shaped little groupers that only get as big as 10” but they think they’re so tough!

They were all agitated when i came down to check the anchors and connections. Like they’d just bought a brand new house and found out the airport’s going in right behind them. lol

On my second dive we went to the other side where i’ve seen grouper and also the infamous “garropa,” the Gulf Grouper (Mycteroperca jordani). These beasts have become quite rare in this area and may be ecologically extinct in the park, in spite of the fact we know there are four living here at punta lobos and maybe 8 or more farther north on a seamount near Isla San Nicolas. These four are distinguishable from each other by their different tail shapes

Well it was a perfect day and we got two more dives in the afternoon. So this is sunset on the day of the full moon, April 23 after our fourth dive of the day. hmmm, wonder why that date just sticks out in my head? Lol. And i don’t want to name names or anything lest KRISTEN think i wasn’t going to give her a shout out before i gave *coughsandycough* another shout out…


Anyway, for the afternoon dives the visibility had degraded so much. There was no current or wind so there was no thermocline and it was puro guacamole all the way down to the bottom. It was difficult to see clearly more than 2 meters in front of you. I was able to see the silhouettes of some BIG grouper and i was able to see if they were circling overhead, but for the most part i never saw more than 25 at a time and they weren’t all that frantic, just circling/meandering in the water column every once in awhile. Nothing like last year where there were hundreds chasing and acting frantic and bumping into each other and then racing all along the bottom. It was cool though because the leopard grouper grow to a maximum of 1 meter in length and normally on the reef you would be stoked to see a 60 cm grouper but here during this time there are lots 60 cm or larger and you think “wow, that’s big!” and then on the first dive i was on the southern side of punta lobos where the garropa are and i saw some grouper cruising around and i thought “damn, those are big fish!” and then from the left i saw two garropa swim by and pass behind one of the bigger leopard grouper and in comparison you could see that the garropa were easily a meter and a half in length and almost twice as high as the leopard grouper. Just took my breath away.

Here is a panoramic view of our camp on the last morning during sunrise-moonset

I hurt my left ankle and broke my little toe on my right foot this week on the rocks in the intertidal. don't laugh. you would have too. here is my mexican bandaid on my ankle.


So considering this is a hella long post and i have tons more to share, i’ll just cut to the point…the motor got swamped by the waves in the cove, we couldn’t get it turned around bow first into the waves fast enough and it took quite a few breakers over the stern. It sucked because you’re there with the boat and you realize there’s nothing you can do but just hold it to minimize the damage. So it got even more water in it but we still had plenty of fresh water and doused it and wiped it down and then wd-40’d it and just chilled til our ride came to take us back.

I took it to the same mechanic that fixed it before and told him what happened. He gave me a stern lecture, said this was a good motor and he hoped he could fix it and he’d see us tomorrow in the afternoon. Well, he passed by this morning and said that they got it running about 1 am in the morning and i said oh, no i’m sorry you had to stay up so late and he said well, they couldn’t stop because he was afraid if they stopped it might not run because there was so much water inside, so they worked until it ran. And he apologized for using all the gas (a gallon! Big deal!) and then he said “i know you’re students so i’ll make it cheap (i never told him we were students, but he said he knows Galis, the head filet guy, who was the one who told me to go to this man in the first place, so he must have told him)”

So for $80 he (and his son) cleaned the entire engine inside and out and got it back to me around 9 am the next morning. We were going to take it out, but then the @#$% van kept stalling out. And THAT’S another story (but i fixed that too… so it’s cool…just starting to think how much more am i supposed to deal with before i give up and go home and start over next year). But i’m a glutton so here i still am, so far. =)