My 35th Birthday

Had a great birthday last night. Was supposed to follow it up with a boat ride to Catalina Island and some diving today. After much consideration we decided against going (insert sad face) - there were wind advisories and we didnt want to get all the way there for nothing. So instead we checked out some new dive sites in Palos Verdes... found a couple new possibilities for beach dives. (Wait, didnt I say I never wanted to do a beach dive again?) Ugh.. here we go again! Even though we were at the beach all day, I didnt see ANY wind- and the view of Catalina Island was spectacular- just a tease seeing it - since we couldnt be there :(

Anyway, since I havent been able to post many cool underwater shots lately- here is me and my bday cake and a shot of us at one of the dive sites we found today.

We're thinking of trying again next week- so stay tuned...

Dive Food

For most of my diving-life I have been on Atkins. This means I need to eat alot of meat. After you dive you are starving! So we made this "ritual" early on. We always stop at an all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ on the way home. You cook at your table. Its alot of fun and super YUMMY!!!

First's

Starfish

Shaw's Cove, Laguna Beach

Water Temp 57 Degrees

Today was my first beach dive (All my other dives were either off of a boat, or at the Dive Park where the entry is by stairs and there is no sand).... and it was also my first dive for 2009.

Unfortunately, I am not so sure I liked it. My mask and snorkel got knocked off by a big wave as I entered the water. I lost them. I really liked that mask too!!! Oh well. Surprisingly the water was not cold- at least with the wetsuit on. Going down - and staying down- presented the major challenge for this dive. I dont know if it was the new tank, the water, the weights or what- but neither of us could stay down and it was really difficult not to surface. The neat part of the dive was all the sand dollars! They were scattered every 12 inches... all over the ocean floor. They looked like cookies. I have never seen anything like it. And so many shells. Huge shells with little creatures living inside. And we saw a couple starfish... I was so scared as I swam over them that I would accidently kick them with my fin. Unfortunately because we had trouble staying down, we couldnt take alot of pictures.