11 September 2015 | HOME - Vancouver WA
24 August 2015 | 46 11.4'N:123 51.4'W, Port of Astoria Marina
22 August 2015 | 46 42.0'N:132 09,4'W, 330 West of CR Bouy, Astoria
21 August 2015 | 46 41.8'N:136 13.8'W, 500 West of Astoria
20 August 2015 | 46 22.82'N:140 28.00'W, East end of High
20 August 2015 | 46 22.80'N:140 28.32'W, Middle of High Same as Fish
20 August 2015 | 46 22.79'N:140 28.57'W, Middle of High
20 August 2015 | 46 22.7'N:140 30.2'W, 675 Miles West of CR
20 August 2015 | 45 57.6'N:144 54.0'W, East End of the High
18 August 2015 | 44 38.2'N:147 57.0'W, 1000 NM to Astoria
18 August 2015 | 43 31.0'N:150 28.0'W, 1126 NM to Astoria
17 August 2015 | 41 40.1'N:153 00.1'W, 1200 miles West of Astoria
16 August 2015 | 39 30.1'N:154 53.1'W, West end of the North Pacific High
15 August 2015 | 37 34.5'N:156 00.0'W, 1011 North of Oahu
15 August 2015 | 37 04.5'N:156 23.0'W, 983 North of Oahu
14 August 2015 | 34 12.3'N:157 26.1'W, 800 North of Oahu
13 August 2015 | 31 50.0'N:158 06.5'W, 650 North of Oahu
12 August 2015 | 29 02.0'N:158 51.0'W, 330 North of Oahu
11 August 2015 | 26 32.0'N:158 59.0'W, 330 North of Oahu
09 August 2015 | 23 44.1'N:158 49.4'W, 140 N of Oahu
Diving the Tumakohua Passe.
14 June 2012 | 16 30.4'S:145 27.4'W, Sout Fakarava Pass, Tumotu, French Polynesia
John

Still in southern Fakarava atol. After pizza the night before we searched out a place to go diving. Stopped in and talked to Mathaus at TopDive. The organization has several dive shops in Tuomotos and Society Islands. We scheduled a dive for this morning and went out with TopDive around 0800. This is one of the more spectacular dives and by far the greatest visibility. Clarity to at least 100 feet.
We put all our gear aboard their heavy aluminum boat and we headed out to the outer side of the passe. They have a mooring bouy that we connected up to until we were all ready to go over the side. There was just the dive master, Mathaus, Lisa and myself. The boat captain took the boat to the other end of the pass after we went overboard. All suited up and on three we did a back roll out of the boat and met at the mooring line. From there we went slowly down about 40 feet. When everyone was comfortable and equalized we proceeded to follow the contour of the coral down to the bottom of the channel which was at 80 feet. Even though we were on an incoming tide, there was very little current and we were able to follow the bottom at a snails pace. Every so often, Mathaus would stop and hold onto a piece of coral and we followed. When we first entered the water, we would see a silver shark here and there, but once we were in the heart of the passe, there were hundereds of t hem. They would swim within a couple of feet of us and their beedy little eyes would just look us over and they would swim away. It is hard to imagine that many sharks in one small space.
I think this was the deepest Lisa has dove in all the time I have known her. It was quite amazing because Mathaus had a settling way about his description of the dive as well as his leadership under water that it made it easy for Lisa to be comfortable at that depth and with all those sharks. We were down for a total of 58 minutes. We captured some pretty neat pictures and will share when we have some internet.
So we are off a galvanting around. All for now.
John