XIII: The best cruise is a Juan Cruise.

Juan Cruise was a page boy we "met" while waiting in line for the "Price is Right."

Before you read this blog, you need to watch this video. Ya' know. To get ya' in the mood.

While working in Utah...I mean...trying to escape the clutches of the evil Zak, I was spending some spare time taking an online SCUBA certification course.

I passed the course. It was a real pain in the ass trying to download all that water.

Just kidding. I passed the classroom oriented stuff online, but I still had to complete pool training and open water dives.
The pool training was fun, I spent 8 hours watching idiots trying to apply what they learned from the books. It's funny. You'd think people would take a little more time studying the material. Ya' know. Considering it's generally a manual on how not to die when you're 75 ft. under water.

The weekend after, our class would go to Catalina island and spend two days diving to complete our open water portion of the certification.

July 27th & 28th
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We took the "Catalina Express" to the island. It's a super sonic boat built using state of the art engineering. It even has a tv in it.

Valerie is super excited. I told her we were getting picked up by the hotel limo.

You may remember our previous camping trip to the island with Marnie. The majority of the island is extremely protected land, hardly none of which can be built on. Low and behold, the town of Avalon is the life of the party.

The thing about it is...everyone drives golf carts in Avalon, very few people can get a permit have a car.

I present to you! Our limo!

Um. It's basically a tiny pickup truck fitted with two wooden benches and a steel pipe roll cage.

Avalon's town central. Oh the hussle and bussel! So easily mistaken for Times Square.

This would be Chris. One of four of us to enjoy our lovely honeymoon suite.

What's that you say? What's on that window? Let me translate it for you.

All I can say is...four people. One room. You do the math.

Our lovely balcony, featuring a front row view of the jacuzzi (wooden structure in bottom right). Oh. And I guess the ocean is right there. And some palm trees. Meh.

Although it's an island. Floating in the middle of the ocean. 37 miles from the Los Angeles shore. You still get full cell reception. (I get more bars there than in my apartment)

So a "No Technology" ban was put into effect. It was time to enjoy TRUE nature.

And nature has yet to offer anything more beautiful than Kenny Loggins.

Avalon's harbor. You may recognize the circular building in the background, it's the semi-famous Casino Point. As seen in the end of the movie "Stepbrothers."
The Catalina wine mixer. "The fucking Catalina wine mixer."

(Coincidentally we went to see that movie the night we left the island...it was like it followed us.)

Boats.

N' hoes! Boats n' hoes! Gotta get me my boats n' hoes!

How looooovely.

This is the Catalina Dive Park.

I mean. It doesn't look like much of a park. But when you get underwater it's a lot more impressive. Apparently considered one of the world's finest places to be under the water.

IN FACT! Jacque Cousteau has a memorial plaque at the bottom, since this was one of his favorite places to dive.

That's a picture of me. Except...I'm about 60 ft. down.

Ah, there we are. Topside with all ye land-lovers.

By the end of the weekend I had done 6 dives, three each day. Everything went really well, I could definitely tell it would be a new addiction. Well. There was one incident that didn't go too well.
I was about 60 ft. deep. Chris and I had started at around 30 ft. but made our way gradually down a slope until it reached a drop-off. We swam a little past the drop-off so the only thing you could see in front of you, or to either side, was complete blue. We stood there for a couple seconds to take it all in. I'd imagine it must be similar to be floating in space.
A huge school of fish came swimming out from one side, and the cloud of silvery fins eventually settled a ways out in front of us. Our air was getting pretty low, and Chris began to turn around to swim away. Just as I turned to follow, I noticed the school of fish disappeared very suddenly. The kind of sudden that would have you assume they were scared.
I noticed a dark mass starting to form against the blue wall in front of me, slowly getting bigger and bigger. I turned to see if Chris was watching it, but he had already begun to swim away. I knocked on my tank a few times, but it didn't catch his attention. Almost afraid to turn around, my curiosity got the better of me. So I turned back around.
A fish the size of a VW Bug was about 60 ft. away from me. And to make sure we're crystal clear, I don't like when anything bigger than 2 feet is swimming within 60 ft. of me. I turned back towards Chris, swam as fast as I could, grabbed his fin and yanked him around.
He stared at me.
I looked back to the fish...it was gone.

After we had surfaced I told him the story as we waded back to shore. The divers who were more familiar with the area informed me that I had likely seen one of two local black sea bass. And that apparently they are super curious, typically following divers around all the time. And that they are so friendly, in fact, that it is illegal to spear hunt them because it's too easy (and they are endangered).
That would have been nice to know BEFORE I almost had a large fish induced underwater heart attack.

This is a picture of a black sea bass taken off of Catalina Island.

I'm pretty sure I saw the grandfather of this one.

August 7th
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A week later Chris and I decided to do a shore dive at Malaga Cove.

We had booked lanes 4 and 5.

JuST KidDiNg! We went in the oceannnnn!

The visibility was really poor. So we didn't see too much. Then we went back home.

August 20
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Chris and I had charted a dive boat. The "Spectre." Ooooo. Creepy! Actually, it was the only one that had a hot tub on it...
It was a sleep-over dive boat, so...if you can't figure that one out, we slept on the boat the night before the dive.

I was bunk 1J2!!!

Say hello 1J2!

A true pinnacle of comfort when it comes to aquatic-based self-induced unconscious body supports.

The boat was docked near Santa Barbara, so we drove up there in the evening. We grabbed some food, and then just hung out on the boat. No one else really chose to sleep there, so Chris and I had the deck to ourselves. The restaurants and bars lined the harbor in a way that they echoed very clearly. So we sat in plastic lawn chairs, on the top deck of the boat, and listened to a guy who was playing guitar on top of a bar (outside roof patio thingy).
It was really awful, but like, so awful it was awesome. He was playing all covers, but could never play more than the first 20 seconds of any song. He would then try to make an excuse, like start laughing at something someone shouted at him, or telling a really lame joke.
The pinnacle of his set was when he covered "I kissed a girl and I liked it."

A bold song to play with an acoustic guitar.

The next morning we prepared our gear and waited for the other divers to show up.

Is that two grills you see on the boat? YEEEUP!
Lunch was included with the price of the trip. Nothin' like an ol' boat-on-ocean BBQ.

This is quite possibly the smallest boat in the world, that also has a spoiler.

This fishing boat was docked next to our dive boat.

I'm pretty sure Stikine is pronounced, "stinkin'."

I can't imagine being a fisherman. That's either got to be a really fun job...or really awful. I'm pretty sure the latter of the two.

Chris bought an underwater housing for his camera, so we actually have something to show for on this dive trip. For example: those are my feet.

I was going to type the rest of this like I was talking through a regulator, but it doesn't really come out readable.

We would have 3 dives today, all of which would be off the island of Anacapa. (It's a smaller island next to Santa Cruz)

Our first dive was similar to that of Catalina's. I suppose it would be considered a "kelp forest" type of dive.

It sounds kind of scary, because like "what if you get tangled." But really it's not that bad, you just have to be careful not to struggle. It's really surreal swimming through all the tall stalks of it. Or when you're way down and look up, and just see the sun shining through the water, and kelp pillars reaching up to the surface.

At first watching this little bugger glide at me was kinda freaky. Not in the sense that it was going to hurt me, but moreso that it really made me feel out of my element. It was like floating in the sky and watching a bird slowly fly by you.

It was pretty amazing how quickly they swam, and also how graceful they were. It was nothing like seeing one in an aquarium. It was so relaxing to just float there and watch it glide by, with no noise around me or people to bother me.

Because it was an overcast morning, this is what it looked like if you looked up.

California diving isn't very tropical, but it's still damn fun. Now that it's what I've learned with I'm sure I'll probably always like it the best.

Mr. "I'm too good to pee in my wetsuit." (Chris)

Kelp!

God Chris, stop breathing so much.

Don't mess with this nasty motha' WATCH YO' MOUTH!

MySpace SCUBA picture!!!

We should have held it a little more above our heads...

Looking up again, at only like...25 ft.

Fishies!

Big fishy!

Aw, don't hide Mr. Sheephead!

A sea cucumber. If you've seen the "Jackass" movie then you know what these are capable of.

It's hard to make a silly face when you have hoses in your mouth.

That's what she said?

Another fish.

Kelp.

Ah the Garibaldi. California's marine state fish. Not only is it pretty, but it can also change it's sex multiple times throughout it's life. So it might be a pretty guy. It might be a pretty girl. Ey, ya' neva' know.
Kinda like in Hollywood...

Oh! Hello there Mr. Sheephead! I see you're back again!

This one was a very curious one, as he seemed to keep following us.

After about 5 minutes it was clear he was our new underwater BFF.

When they open their mouths you can see that they have teeth like sheep. It's kinda weird. (Google "sheephead" and you'll see right off the bat what I mean)

Mmmmm. Dinner.

No you jerk! That was my lobster! (Sheepheads eat crustaceans. Cause they're big jerks.)

Ugh! You look so retarded! I just want to slap your head against a dock and end it.

Me. Mono e mono with the Jerkhead.

I won. Because I have people teeth.

Fish.

Kelp.

Fish.

Fish...and kelp.

Our second dive spot was a place called...something...trenches.

They should have called it, "place with a ton of fucking urchins."

And some sand.

So yeah, it was like flying over a valley of urchin forests.

Or. Something.

I wonder if this one is a guy or a girl.

Hm. Don't sink! (Ow...that would suck so bad)

That's me, gliding graefully like a swan!

Chris doesn't swim underwater. He runs.

I think Chris is trying to say something about grabbing someone's nuts. I dunno.

Hahaha...he's magic handing.

Me, swimming through the trenches.

Like a stealth bomber. Silent. Deadly. BLACK.

It was fun to swim around in these. I felt like if a giant whale tried to attack me I'd be safe in here.

Our third, and final, dive was at a place called thhhheee seeecccreeettttt iiiiisllllllannnnd!!!

It was like a tiny volcano in the middle of nowhere, with tons of stuff growing on it.

We swam around, and over, the whole thing in about 5 minutes and there wasn't too much to see as far as...things that were alive.

So Chris fashion a hat out of this shell.

Took a couple more pictures of starfish (there were a few big ones).

A voyeuristic shot of this urchin, doing naughty things.

And then it was decided that we should spend the rest of our time dicking around at 50 ft. below the surface. That's my, "I conquered this island" pose.