A weekend dive with Nathan at La Jolla Shores
When we moved to San Diego we were seriously looking forward to spending lots of time scuba diving, and we have at La Jolla Shores. We had learned to dive in Oklahoma where the only option was lakes where the visibility was maybe 4 feet, and that was a GOOD day at the dive site. We went to dive in Cozumel and when we experienced 200+ feet of visibility it was magical. We of course thought that was going to be the same here in San Diego as well.
Obviously we were mistaken. It was a little surprising to us that not only is the visibility not 200+ feet but the water is much colder as well. But as usual we try to make the best of our situation. So we bought the appropriate wet suits and go diving when our schedule allows.
While the visibility at La Jolla Shores isn’t akin to Cozumel it is much better than in the inland lakes that we learned to dive in. The dive site at La Jolla Shores is a sand bottom with a gentle slope out to a depth of about 40 or so feet before you reach the canyon.
Typically we will swim out 500 yards or so before we drop down as that will get us in a shallow 15-20 feet of water. Once on the sandy bottom we will see small fish and crabs scurrying around on the ocean floor.
The canyon starts about 1000 yards off shore and drops down a few hundred feet. There you can explore the wall and its outcroppings. We just stayed fairly shallow on this dive and just took it easy as we hadn’t been in the water in a while.
Here’s a short video of the dive.
As usual no dive is complete [or safe] without Brick’s lucky Twinkie.
After the dive and gearing down we hit up Ale Smith here in San Diego for a quick after dive beer before heading home to wash off the equipment and get on with the day.
