9.13.2004

so i guess i'd promised i'd write about this weeks dive.
let's see. went over to the eastside, my old hood, kirkland.
drove down market to where it deadends in downtown and jumped off the piers there around the argosy cruise. the water didn't seem as cold this time as it did the week before way down south. maybe it was more shallow or some shit, who knows.

so we dove around the piers, the same old shit, bottles and cans and just clap your hands.....
where its at!

uh yeah.
found some empty oyster shells, a blender, and some dirty undies of the male persuasion.
those we flung out of the water and onto the bow of the argosy ship. i think they appreciated it.

i guess there were two highlights of this trip. the bottom was dredged, so there wasn't a whole lot down there. so the exciting shit was actually just the toy that manuel brought.
it was a depth gauge. so we could actually see how far we were diving. i ganked the gauge from manuel and took it down to the bottom: 27 feet. it was actually pretty deep. something i'd probably have guestimated at 40 feet before we got our hands on this thing.

we went out a bit further and touching bottom the dial read 30 feet. very cool. did the dive in different spots around the area and came up again with exactly 30 feet. i guess that area doesn't get too much deeper. it was kinda disappointing because i think i could have gone at least another 10 feet, if not more. my ears weren't hurting at that depth after already clearing them like they were when we were back around seward park. so i'm still curious as to how far i can take that little bugger down. well. i guess it went to about 190, but if i didn't want to die, i guess i'd try for 40 or 50 feet.
so that was that.

the other highlight was the protector. i was looking to find a picture of it (my bad, this is the best i can do) and found this site that says its lease is up next month (oct). wonder what they'll do with it. send it to the penninsula like the klakalaka? or whatever the shit it was called. ok, i guess its kalakala. anyway, back to the story.

we got up to that big boat, fighting every huge wave the wind was throwing at us, and we dove down to see if the boat was really 14 feet under water, as told by its markings on the hull. yeah, so it was. but the interesting part was that the bottom tapered, as expected, but the very bottom flared out like a step parallel to the water's surface for about 3 or 4 feet, them curved back down to end in a flat base. i dont know if thats for added stability or to keep from tipping, or if thats even common in all boats that large. . .

around at the stern, i dove down to see the propellors, which i couldn't find. i guess a boat whose sole purpose is to prevent waves from crashing into smaller, docked boats doesn't really need propellors. although there was even a sign up on the lake side of the boat warning about propellors, so i was all sorts of confused. but while looking for the propellors underwater, you could hear the creaking of metal and water sloshing around. something that i only heard at the stern of the ship. it was a bit eerie. reminded me of noises you hear when watching documentaries about pearl harbor's USS Arizona, or sounds from a haunted ship, like the Queen Mary. i went back to the surface and was a bit more comforted when the noises ceased.

yet back on the lakeside, there was fun to be had. there were three sets of anchor lines heading diagonally off the ship and into the water. they went probably about 50 feet out and that damned 30 feet down. they were tethered to the ship probably about 20 or 30 feet out of the water. manuel and i vigorously tried to scale those fuckers and show we were true pirates in search of booty, but alas, swashbucklers we were not. however, i'm now certain that anyone who has climbed an anchor line in a movie is full of shit. ive been working out a bit at work, and granted i'm still a weakling, but i've done enough pull-ups to be proficient at it, but you just get to a certain point while climbing the line, where your weight on the line makes the angle too steep to climb up. i guess we need more practice. maybe if we weren't climbing in fins it would have been a different story, but i doubt it. so we both got maybe two thirds up a given line, then had to drop down about 8 feet into the water below. no harm done, other than a few calluses.

after we were done with the protector, we headed toward shore to the apartments sticking out over the water. nothing much there but seaweed. however, manuel did find a toilet and there were some long, cylindrical orange cones around. we found this long, thin piece of metal that maybe looked like a duct with one of the larger face pieces missing. we threw it around and got yelled at by one of the people living in the apartments. i guess he thought we jacked it, even though it was underwater 15 feet where nobody knew where it was. he had us put it on the dock so he could pick it up. we did that, and he just left it there. jackass. . . in his swanky apartment. . .

heading back to our starting point, along where there were some docks, we found a plastic patio chair, and at another, one of those foldable chairs with two seats, like the kind you find at REI, or the kind you jack from your landlady's daughter. anyway. both were slimy and green, but we graciously put them back up on their respective docks so people can once again enjoy them for sitting. or yeah. rather they probably just got kicked back down to their watery grave.

at the last dock we stopped at, i happened to come upon something glittering. diving down, i couldnt belive my eyes. paraphenalia for those that are herb-friendly. about 5 feet away from that: a full Sparks can. you know, that shit thats caffeine and alcohol mixed into a "yummy" concoction. i guess some punkass kids were enjoying themselves until they cops or other authorities showed. the stuff wasn't slimy at all, so it must have been recent. i wonder if i got to the stuff before they had the chance to. their loss.

that's pretty much the whole damn tale of that day. the only other thing is that my golfball collection went up by another 3. why the hell are those things everywhere? i guess its fun to not know where your ball lands. or maybe the thought that you don't have to clean up after yourself.
i'll never understand. . .

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