What a scorcher! Tomorrow is going to be sunny and HOT! Luckily, I know how to cool down and convert all that excess summer heat from nuisance into a relief! Swim with the club tomorrow at Golden Gardens’ North Beach in the early afternoon. Nordic Joe’s aiming to get there around 1:00 pm. So far, there’s going to be three of us, and more are welcome to join in the fun. Afterwords we will do some cooking on the beach. Burgers, beer and blue limbs unite for an afternoon of fun in the surf and sun.
Ok, it was the day before New Years eve, but close enough!
This juvenile Lion's Mane Jelly Fish can grow much larger.
Weather: Mostly Cloudy
Air temp: 45 f
Water Temp: 45 f
Current: Undetectable
Tide: Very High, ebb
Vis: ~50 feet
Time in: 11:30 ~ Solar Zenith
A few new things on this swim. First off, we found a better way to organize our outings. Utilizing the new twitter feed, it was easy to put together a team of three for our second serious evaluation of winter conditions at one of our favorite swims – the pipeline at Alki. Secondly, I was bundled up in my new 3-mil shorty over the 5-mil wetsuit and I borrowed my wife’s gloves and dive-socks to guard against the chillier winter waters.
One of our number hadn’t been here yet, and I warned him:
“I’ve read about a few cases of divers, usually without a buddy, drowning out here. Last I heard, they don’t know why. The story I remember is a diver coming up, crying for help, and then sinking back down – discovered drowned ten minutes later when divers reached him.”
We wondered if it was angry Octopus, pulling the divers down and taking their masks and regulators. With a shrug, we affirmed the commitment to swimming with caution, respect for the sea, and with a group – or at least a buddy. We vowed to stay close and look our for each other.
Of course, anywhere that there’s this much dive activity, there’s going to be accidents. The location is very safe overall – maybe one of the safest, but with full disclosure, we can be on our best guard.
Putting in was as easy as ever. The tide was so high that the wheel chair access ramp actually lead straight into the water. This is surely the only wheel-chair accessible shore-dive in the sound. The convenience and clarity of these conditions weren’t just luring we brave snorkelers into the brine, as we spotted dive boats out near the buoy where the pipeline ends, and others were just putting in from shore. Still, we felt like we had the place to ourselves.
After getting in, I noticed that the new layer REALLY took the edge off the cold and made me just perfectly comfortable as our team set out for the “Reef Rocks”. It was soon clear that this location also was in the grasp of winter as the fish we spotted could be counted on one hand. Before, we swam with several schools of hundreds of fish here, but now we grew excited when we spotted a few big crabs, an impressive skulpin, and a few other oddities.
The Reef Rocks, as the name suggests, shelter a diverse array of life.
Every sqaure inch of this rubble is covered in life.
At a glance, this was another boring winter swim, yet closer inspection showed that as the big exciting schools of fish left, other ecological systems bloomed. The reef rocks were absolutely covered in uniform layer of hermit crabs. This brought me closer to inspect the smaller life here and I discovered some really interesting stuff in the crevices of the reef rocks, including this brightly colored mollusk.
Life continues to flourish in the realm of the very small.
A pleasent surprise was this molusk.
Here's a closer look at this shy little guy.
A few circuits of the rocks revealed that the winter swim offers a different focus where the small and unusual come to the biological foreground. Perhaps this is the seasonal cycle of the Salish Sea. (Any visiting biologists, feel free to comment!) While I might have been content to spend hours exploring this new face of the reef, I was lured out toward the pipeline feature itself as I needed to survey the entire area and learn how it changed in the winter.
Swimming out to the pipeline, we didn’t see any of the giant schools of fried-egg jellys as we had in the past. The water was super clear, blue, and beautiful. I was surprised to see what looked like 2-foot-high forests of sargassum muticum far below. This gave way to the eel grass that characterizes the region and soon we found the pipeline and followed it out. The tide was too high to make out much, but it appeared mostly unchanged. Still, there was far less activity all around.
We decided to expand our range of exploration after spotting some loose kelp in the area. I’m guessing that the fish winter in the all-season kelp forests, and this belief was boosted as a whip-like stalk floated by me with several small and brightly colored fish pursuing it.
We went north, about 500 feet out along the coast, finding mostly barren eel grass, tons of moon snails, a few star fish, and little else. Some of my buddies were starting to feel the chill. A flotilla of birds another 500 feet out from shore hinted at the location of my kelp forest, but instead we turned back – and it turned out to be a lucky thing.
As we crossed a line of flotsam, we discovered some juvenile lions mane jelly fish among the branches, grass and other floaty bits. These were about 2 feet across the bell and absolutely mesmerizing in their baroque excess of frills and decoration. This chance find lifted our spirits greatly even as it gave me a clue as to what dangers could have felled more experienced divers than I in this location. This is one of the few things in the sound that can kill you. Most resources describe this sting as “Rarely Fatal” – which is a ton more fatal than I want to mess with.
Video Credit: Fellow Swimmer, Alex Williams
Lessons:
1. It is confirmed: The sound in winter remains changed and strangely vacant. The next swim should really be at a kelp forest to determine if there’s a more lively winter spot to explore.
2. Look out for lion’s mane jelly fish and KEEP YOUR DISTANCE. We used a zoom to get these shots.
Follow NordicJoe on Twitter and never miss a swim. I’ve been looking for a way to make Twitter useful, and I’ve found it. I’ll be posting all my planned swims on twitter ahead of time and if you are the adventurous sort, you can join us as we map the art of Snorkeling Seattle and the Puget Sound.
Location: Ballard, Golden Gardens Right-Rocks / Mermaid Forrest
Braced for the cold this time, I brought my wife’s gloves and swim socks to afford me some protection against the cooler winter surface water. I also made sure to wear the longest undies I could find, and added my snorkel bob rash-guard for good measure. Not the most bundled up guy in the sea, but for me it proved to be enough that I enjoyed a 2 hour swim with only minor discomfort (easily outweighed by the joy of swimming in the sound).
I was determined to revisit Mermaid Forest at Golden Gardens in the winter so that I could observe what seasonal changes might occur there. For the newer readers, I’ll explain that Mermaid Forest is a line of Sargassum Muticum that edges coast on the north side of golden gardens. When we discovered it this summer, it was the best location to be found for snorkeling in Seattle, bar none. The diversity of marine life there was simply astounding and it was all within a foot or two of a waiting camera. Huge schools of sea perch, giant emperor stars, fat sun-stars, all kinds of crab, ling cod, rock fish, perch, eels (actually eel-like fish) – you name it. It was entirely like visiting a tropical reef where all the fish just had better fashion sense.
These Anemones cling to rock features and convert piles of rubble into living reefs.
The only issue that swim ever had was that on the hottest days, the dark sargassum would absorb the sunlight and actually heat the surrounding water to around 65 degrees, and this could cloud it up a bit as the plankton and algae bloomed in the warm and nutrient rich waters around the forest. I had heard that in the winter, this effect is eliminated, so I was VERY eager to introduce this fantastic spot to another swimmer.
We struck out from the shore, pleased to see the vicious current we encountered last time was completely gone, and made our way through VERY clear and beautiful waters. There seemed to be an uptick in star-fish and moon snails along the bottom, but there was little else to see. As we paddled out, checked our progress against the shore and my own instructions for finding the forest again:
1. Put in at the rightmost rocks at golden gardens. Swim out directly toward the sea until you are getting nervous that you might be too far out (around 700 feet). You should still be able to see the bottom. If you can’t, you are too far out.
2. From there, proceed parallel to the shore and you will find the forest when you are parallel to the feature that we named “mermaid beach” – where long slabs of concrete from a jumble on the shore. The forest stretches from this point, all the way past the feature called “green joe”.
Yet here I was, moving along the coast, almost to Green Joe, and there was nothing but water, sand, star fish, and a few dark spots on the sea floor below.
Had somebody removed the forest? S Muticum is an invasive foreign species from Japan that competes with the local eel grass and kelp. There had been talk of eradication…but last thing I had read suggested this was truly impossible. Had some environmental disaster fallen upon the area?
My swim buddy proposed that the forest dies in the winter. I doubted that as I’d read just how tough this stuff was to get rid of.
After an hour or so, we gave up on the clearly absent forest and headed in toward Green Joe. The system of rocks around it functioned like a reef and there was always a bounty of life to bee seen there. Yet as we neared, I spotted nothing but larger and larger star fish – apparent refugees from the missing seaweed forest. Some crabs that I had only seen clinging to seaweed before were on some of the rocks. What was most notably missing was the huge school of sea perch that used to shelter in the lee of the big rock itself as if on-break from the goings on in the relatively urban environment of the nearby seaweed forest. I circled the area – looking for any sign of larger life – but the place was just abandoned.
We made our way back along the shore-break rocks and looked for gunnels in the rocks. We spotted a few bold crabs, some penfish, a small school of perch that mocked the once grand display the area offered. This place in winter was the same as on land – an animal can still be seen here and there, but it is primarily in hibernation. This is an observation confirmed after some research when I got home. I looked up more information on S Muticum and discovered this:
S. Muticum’s Lateral branches detach in the summer or autumn, leaving a short perennialbasal stem to overwinter.
So the forest will return in the spring -and it remains for now as a forest of deciduous trees in the winter – spare and barren.
Lesson: Winter swims will require more stable ecosystems such as rock-reefs, ship-wrecks, or perhaps kelp forests.
This refugee from the missing forest is making due on a near-by rock.
I spotted a kelp forest right by the Seattle Aquarium – I might ask them for permission to explore the vicinity of their building! Otherwise, I may have to suck up my pride and try a swim at Discovery Park. It’s one of the few public beaches I haven’t ventured into yet. There’s a reason, and I’ll share it in my first post on Discovery Park, coming soon this winter.
The frosty shoreline added a sense of accomplishment to the winter swim.
Air Temp: 21 F
Weather: Mostly sunny
Tide: Low, ebbing
Date / Time: 1:00pm – 1:40pm – December 7th
Location: Ballard, Golden Gardens Right-Rocks / Mermaid Forrest
My first attempt to venture into winter waters was brief.
My buddy showed up this weekend, and as a birth-day favor to old Nordic Joe, he’s agreed to try out the winter water so that we can see what’s what with a winter snorkel here in Seattle. I’m told that the water doesn’t change temperature much and that it’s all the same when we get in, so it may be a way to beat the crowded beach parking and get the whole place to ourselves. My questions were: How will the conditions differ? Given that the “unchanging temperature” advice I’ve gotten about the winter waters of the sound all comes from Scuba divers, How will the water temperature differ nearer the surface? What’s the life like at this time of year? Does it thin in the winter like life on land, or continue to flourish as usual, 365 days a year? Is the water really more clear in the winter?
To answer these questions, we suited up on a frosty morning and by 1:00 pm, we were at the water’s edge – looking upon a choppy and temperamental sea-scape. The sun goes fast in the winter, and of the first things we noticed planning this trip was that it would be a challenge to align the ideal water conditions (ebbing high tide) and the proper light conditions (as near solar zenith as possible). AS such, we found ourselves near zenith, putting into a VERY low tide.
Heedless, I splashed into it and quickly assumed the snorkeler’s position. My face ached terribly for a long time. There was almost no visibility at all. I was reminded of the terrible Tacoma swim. Pure green pea soup. Of course, this was low-tide and I was still near the shore. I began to swim out from shore and found clear water surprisingly close to the breaking waves. I looked to shore. My buddy was slowly acclimating, stepping sideways deeper into the sea. My face continued to send me ice-cream-headache twinges of pain as my sinuses adapted to the chill. Eventually I was conditioned to it, and my buddy was comfortable proceeding. Neither of us appeared brave enough to call this thing off.
We both observed that the water seemed significantly colder. Low 40’s. My 5 mil suit, sans gloves or footies, seemed extremely spare now. I wondered how I would fare over a longer swim.
Yet the winter also provided some merciful gifts to the Seattle Snorkelers. The low tide yielded quickly to bright and clear water and we made out quite a distance from shore and prepared to head along the shoal’s edge toward mermaid forrest. After about ten minutes of strenuous paddling, kicking, and full body swimming, we both observed that very little progress was being made along the shore. The wind-driven current today was too much. We could go out from shore, or toward shore, but any progress northward seemed impossible.
We met as two bobbing torsos in the middle of all this freezing chop.
A-a-a--ah-awe-sss-s-s-so-me
“What do you think”? my buddy asked.
“I think we are much farther from shore than we meant to be.”
“Yeah. These currents are terrible.”
I put my face in and observed the bottom streaking by as floated rapidly south and out to sea.
“Let’s give it one more try.” I suggested.
So we again bent our backs to the sky, bobbed our heads and legs like dolphins and swam with all but the last of our strength. We made it maybe 300 feet in 10 additional minutes.
Giving up, we decided to let the current take us back to shore, swimming only against the outgoing tide, and we took our pleasure in the moon snails below which I tried several times to dive toward for a close-up photo. We saw some needle fish, crabs, stars, and tons of moon snails on the sandy flats just near the beach itself.
Our final conclusions: The water temperature is bearable, even in my modest suite, but gloves and dive socks would be a big help. Maybe also a jacket. Visibility is indeed better in the winter, even in low tide. The sea’s temper however, is more of an issue during the winter when storms can roll in easy and strong winds can drive swift currents that could easily foul up the unobservant swimmer.
We decided, after playing near the beach for a while, to return on a day with calmer currents.
Swim Buddy's 14 mil core protection has him sitting pretty.
As much as I enjoy a quick jump into the frigid water, many of my friends or their wives who want to hang out on the weekend don’t. What I needed, was a place to swim where my non-sea-otter associates could tag along in the relatively dry refuge of a sea kayak.
Google searches and calls around town revealed dozens of places to rent a kayak. It wasn’t until the day of the outing that I discovered the deception: They rent sea kayaks, but not on the sea. There is literally only ONE place in all of Seattle that would rent us a sea kayak, and that was Alki Kayak Tours. After a half day of incredulous calls to every renter of sea kayaks, I confirmed that there was no other place in Seattle to get a kayak for the Puget Sound. So the stretch of beaches between the commercial waterway and Alki Beach proper were the only choice for such a group outing.
That's one fast drop-off.
We arrived and easily located the rental office. They liked the idea of snorkeling the sound and were very very forthcoming with advice. They warned that large passing boats would create surprise wave surges that made the area surprisingly treacherous – so we were told to avoid the nearby pier where the water taxi lands in West Seattle. The ammount of fishing going on over there added to my hesitation to plumb the depths beneath the ferry landing. Soon the kayakers were given a basic orientation and procedures speech and then in the water. My swim buddy and I soon followed.
Just before getting in, we observed bubbles not 20 feet out from shore. Perplexed, we stood and watched them as they drew nearer. Soon divers emerged in full regalia. I started asking them questions right away. They told us that the visibility was fantastic here and that they had just been down below where they spotted a giant octopus. I couldn’t believe that this would be 20 feet from shore, but as soon as I dove in, the precipitous drop-off was obvious. Visibility was maybe 50 feet, but after paddling a small distance from shore, the bottom disappeared completely.
This was a huge Jelly.
Just 40 feet out, the effect was disconcerting. I found myself swimming in a sea of pure greenish-blue nothingness. I guess that’s just a sea of…sea. I don’t know how deep the water was, but it was very deep. I could see distant jelly’s beneath me, all around me, and some of them were startlingly huge. Their long trailing tendrils were easily 20 feet long in some cases. This put me on edge. Without any other visual cues other than the snowlike litter of tiny white marine critters, punctuated at times with the looming yellow menace of yet another giant jelly, it was like swimming in endless space. You couldn’t tell if you were seeing into 1000 feet of clear water, or two feet of cloudy murk. I often found myself sticking my head up out of the water just to make sense of time and space itself. I had no way to gauge my speed, direction, or much of anything else. A creeping fear of the unknown began to assert itself. Then came the strange noises.
Being so near a shipping lane, the water was alive with the sound of clanking, banging, gurgling large boats. I played for a while at trying to match sounds to certain boats. A dodgy looking old ferry made the sound of a giant metal chain being dragged over a pile of cans in hell. A large cargo vessel sounded like it was propelled by somebody hitting a dumpster with a bat.
Maybe 20 feet beneath the camera.
Thus, although we began following our Kayak friends we soon broke off pursuit and made for some interesting-looking pilings that were sticking out of the water nearer to shore.
I remembered my earlier Tacoma swim and the potential hazards around broken pilings, so we proceeded with extreme caution towards them – mindful of the unpredictable surge of waves that could come at any time.
I continually dangled my arm and camera as low as I could to make sure I could still see them clearly – having a hard time believing that the soft green we proceeded through was really clear water.
Eventually the clarity was evident far beneath us, the first broken pilings covered in giant anemones other sea life. As we neared the pilings that still emerged from the water, we saw a dramatic uptic in the diversity and energy of the water around us. Broken remains of an ancient dock emerged scores of feet below, and as we neared shallower water the pilings crept closer to us until we ended face to face with one large trunk that was absolutely covered in comically large marine organisms.
Check out the size of that star fish!
HUGE sea stars of every kind hugged these ancient logs that swayed menacingly back and forth in the tide. That motion made me wary of this place as being trapped beneath a falling piling entered my already heightened imagination. Still, it was worth checking out. We made sure to avoid touching the pilings as they seemed as alive as any coral that I’ve ever seen.
We followed them all the way back to shore where a particularly nice, already fallen, piling lays across the bottom. It’s covered in spindly legged crabs, giant sea stars, feeding sea perch, and huge anenomes. We lingered here for some time.
This star fish has big buns.
Eventually we followed the coast and discovered, upon rounding a headland, that our further progress was barred by a boat ramp and dock. We beached ourselves and walked north along the shore until we found another place to put in.
The second beach along the “Alki strip” is a sometimes-beach that only really shows up when the tide is out. We had to scramble down a talus field of rocks to get to it, but once in, we discovered beds of sea grass, schools of sardine, and lots of amazing life. Of particular interest was a VERY dense school of some kind of long finger-sized fish that moved like a tornado into the deeper water. The word that came to mind was ‘bait ball’. Sadly the camera had already been filled, so instead of filming of photographing them, we had to just enjoy the show and frolic with the salty little fellows instead.
"Second Beach" has very clear water.
The water here was clear and deep. As we proceeded neared a rock wall that separated us from the nearby boat ramp and dock, the bottom once again quickly disappeared from sight.
As we were getting out, we finally witnessed some of the surge that the Kayak shop had warned us about. Large waves more suited to hawaii than Seattle came crashing to the shore and I was glad that this hadn’t rolled in while I was near one of the pilings.
Huge Spindly Crab.
It was a thoroughly interesting area and a great three-hour swim. Given the location’s proximity to some truly top-notch swims as well as it’s proximity to shipping lanes, I probably won’t be back any time soon for a swim – but I will definitely go there again to get my Kayak on in the near future. Then again, its popular for divers and if you are in mixed company, you can swim while others can boat. If you find yourself here with nothing to do, drop on in – the water’s fine.
Jenny got off work early at 5:30 pm and so we took off, picked up with another rental suit for Jenny at ChekaLooka and into the water at Golden Gardens by 6:00. There were the usual lookers-on and questions to answer for people before we put in:
“Yes, there’s amazing stuff to see out there.”
“Yes it’s cold, but not with a wet suit.”
And one new question:
“Yes, you need a wet suit.”
I forgot my hood but the water was extra warm today. It felt like around 58 degrees at the shore, so I abandoned my boots and tried to go with naked head and feet. My feet took it just fine, and that’s great news since my boots don’t really fit in my fins anyway. I can probably skip boots for most of the summer if I am lucky. Yet for me the hood was NOT optional. I did a test swim of about 2 minutes and the ice-cream headache effect came back in full swing. I ended up running down to ChekaLooka for rental. On the way back, I noticed a lot of glass in the beach. Be careful running barefoot at this spot as it seems to be the place where under age kids go to drink beer (or I’m just getting old) and there’s evidence of broken bottles in the sand near the right-rocks put-in. Buy some cheap flip-flops to leave on the beach while you swim or comfortable dive shoes to wear on the beach and beneath your fins.
After rushing back with a hood, we put in and began our swim out. Conditions were promising as it was hot, sunny, and the water was very calm but with a steady current at an extra high tide. Yet two things dampened the quality of this run:
1. The late afternoon sun was at an angle that really seemed to reduce visibility by about 75%. Conditions that I would expect 100′ visibility were producing something more like 25′ visibility. Also, the fish were extra jumpy at this time of day, perhaps because it’s the feeding time for larger predators. If we floated with the current, we could see all kinds of neat stuff, but every time they saw us move, they scattered.
LESSON: Don’t go too late or too early in the day when the sun’s angle will cause most of the light to be traveling horizontally, casing everything in glare or shadow and nothing in visible relief. The fish are jumpy a these times anyway, so it’s best to let them be. 6:00 is probably too late to put in at Golden Gardens.
2. I know that I have been advocating for going at high tide only, but this time, the tide was maybe TOO high. I’d been in out in 9′ high tides at this location twice and had a great time with lots of stuff visible. Although AyeTides on my iPhone told me this was just a 10.5 foot high tide, it was about 6 feet deeper on the coast than a reported 9.5 foot tide. The rock we call “Green Joe” was completely submerged with two feet of water over it and the seaweed forest was quite distant from the surface as we swam over it. Mermaid beach was totally submerged and I could barely stand at the most shallow location by the sea-wall. During other high tides it is an exposed sandy beach. Given that there was a solar eclipse on the other side of the planet, this must have been a spring tide. As a result, we lost some of our navigational bearings and went much farther up the coast than we usually do. This also made the deep water stuff more boring in the reduced afternoon visibility. Coming back, the life in the rocks along the sea wall was much more interesting.
Lesson: There’s such a thing as too much of a good thing. When the tide is too high, and you are farther from the action in the seaweed forests off-shore. Take it to the rocks along the shore during high tides and low visibility. Inversely, I must test whether this means that at LOW tide, when the rocks are terrible and the in-shore swimming is so bad, if the views out 200 feet are significantly better. It’s possible that the axiom I have been following of “never at low tide” is wrong and that I should be saying: Long beach? Extend your reach. Distant locations such as Mermaid Forest might look best at low side when surface plunges your closer to the action – or maybe it will be a murky algae bloom.
Famed Dive Spot. Great Snorkel Spot! Sorry, no photos on this trip as we didn’t bring our camera-having buddy along on this one. Once again, your loss!
The guys over at DiscountDivers.com suggested this spot to me, and boy am I grateful.
Jenny and I were surprised by two things when we pulled up to park on Beach Drive.
1: The water was crystal clear and we could easily make out submarine life and features from our car.
2: The water was FREEZING. While Golden Gardens was 53 degrees the day before, this water felt more like the mid forties. If you plan to go out in this water, bring your dive skin, hood, and any layers you have. A 4/3 wetsuit will not be enough. I suggest a minimum 5 mil wetsuit, and a 7 mil for the non-nords among us.
Divers have known about this area for decades. Follow the pipeline, about 50 feet below you, through cold but crystal clear water. You will be treated to giant stars galore, plentiful large dungoness, nudibranch, large eels, and all sorts of fascinating fish. The convenience of on-street parking is matched by the easy suit up sitting on logs 1 foot from the water’s edge. This was the easiest place to access of any so far and when that’s combined with the delightful big-fish conditions of the area, you have a real Seattle Snorkel Gem.
We started out by looking for the pipeline and headed South, toward a promising looking rock feature. Halfway there we found the conditions were just amazing. Beneath us, sub-ocean rubble created a kind of artificial reef where some new types of fish that I hadn’t spotted before were doing their fishy thing. After checking that out, we confirmed with one another that is was defiantely colder here than in other locations so far, and decided to skip the rock feature and find the pipeline. The pipeline was to the North of where the ramp to the beach lets out. It protrudes from a concrete structure that is visible from the road as you approach the beach.
We followed the pipe out for about 40 minutes to a point about 700 feet out from shore. Beds of eel grass along the sides produced and unending parade of fascinating creatures who would come from their seaweed pastures to the pipeline thorough fare. On this trip, we saw an amazing large “Toad Fish” which is basically a swimming mouth, a green Conger Eel, crabs that were 1′ across the back of the shell, schools of the usual fish, some interesting spiny rock fish, tons of giant stars, moon snails a’grazing, and lots more. We were near the end of the pipe at an area where boats were coming and going – presumably with divers. I observed my swim buddy shivering. I called it then and we headed back for shore at a quick pace, as much to keep warm as to get warm.
I can see why this is a famous shore-dive location. Next time, I will wear a dive skin or a jacket or at least tuck in my hood or something.
Impressions: Given the extreme visibillity, strange and plentiful marine life, and the ease of access here, this run is easily the equal to the Golden Gardens Right Rocks and is currently one of my favorite swims, but bring your 7 mil suit or some kind of layers – it’s a bit nipply.
Caution: Note that there is a bit of a current here. Nothing major, maybe 1 or 2 knots, but if you don’t pay close attention, you can get moved off the beaten path while surfacing to chat about what you have seen. Keep an eye on your location.
Safety Note: As you follow the pipeline, you will be heading out about 750 feet into the open water. Divers will be arriving on boats and trafficking the area so please keep an eye, and an ear, out for boat traffic. Take your “Diver Down” flag! I also would lift my bright red fins high in the air on occasion to try and lend extra visibility to my presence.
Holy cow. I didn’t know Seattle Snorkeling could get this good.
What a great way to test the new wet suit!
Walk the scenic path to the North-most beach access or plod along the sandy way to this northern most part of Golden Gardens Beach and put in for the Northward “right rocks” run.
We put in at the far North-East side of the beach and made our way out about 50 feet and saw an amazing life-scape in the seaweed beds. Here’s where the crabs have been hiding. We lingered here watching the sole, sanddabs and other flat fish as well as hermit crabs and dungeness. We had 30 foot visibility at this point as we played in 20 foot water.
We headed North along the rocks but about 40 feet out from shore, our eyes on the shifting bed of loose seaweed below.
Striped Sea Perch near "Green Joe"
Swimming over this sea-lettuce will shorten your trip unless you are immune to all forms of motion sickness. This stuff has a way of moving in the water that makes the rocks appear to swoosh back and forth in a rhythmic tide when it’s really you and the sea-lettuce moving. Once you realize this, you don’t have long before you start feeling woozy. My buddy and I had to beach ourselves on a piled of long concrete slabs like mermaids in the pounding surf until out stomachs stopped lurching. I nick-named the place “mermaid beach”.
Seen here, the "Green Joe" feature is named for its sea-sick discoverer.
After recovering, we went on to an interesting rock feature that drew our eye. As we rounded the headland, the character of the water and the life changed DRAMATICALLY. Visibility opened up to about 100 feet. The characteristic green of the sound turned Hawaii blue on us and suddenly there was life everywhere. A school of juvenile Steelhead kept checking me out. Then there was a dense school of what looked like Pacific Sardines. Then we rounded the rock and were stunned to see a school of about 50 large Surf Perch hiding in the shade of the rock. It was amazing.
When my buddy and I were looking at the photos over pints at Kings Hardware, I asked the waitress where she thought the pictures were taken:
“Well it’s Hawaii isn’t it?”
I proudly corrected her, “Nope. That’s Ballard – two hours ago.”
I’m not sure she believed me.
UPDATE: SWIM 6, Golden Gardens Right Rocks 2
7-18-09 5:00 pm
Sunny 85 degree
Ebbing High Tide
Choppy
53 degree water
100 foot vis
I went back the next day and made an important discovery.
I didn’t bring my friend with the camera this time, so no photos and trust me when I say that’s a shame.
But at least I FINALLY convinced my wife to come with me. She got outfitted at Cheka Looka with a 4/3 wetsuit and some new fins and a snorkel from DiscountDivers.com (their physical store is over on Westlake). We walked up to the beach and faced a fairly brisk in-shore wind that whipping up the surf into something even choppier than what had made me sick yesterday. I resolved to power through it.
When we got in, the visibility was passable @ 20 feet, but not as good as yesterday. The surf was just churning things up too much and we were swimming in sea-salad. Still, we decided to press on and see if things got better to the North. We learned in swim #3 to never accept poor conditions but to check farther along the shore. I told her about the shifty sea-lettuce and its affects, but she wanted to go and see it for herself while I followed the nice and stable sand and rocks down to “Green Joe”. So I muddled along, seeing the occasional Sole skittering away beneath me and feeling a little down that the visibility wasn’t as good as the day before, but I hoped there would still be a show around the corner like the day before.
When I looked up to check on her, she was pretty far out. Maybe 100 feet from shore. That made me nervous since I have read a lot about the currents up here and don’t know too much about the boat traffic either. I REALLY wished I had brought a “diver down” flag with me to float near by, and will do so on my next trip. I put my face down and swam farther along the coast, past mermaid beach, and wondered why she wasn’t seasick yet from the dancing weeds. They were a lot worse today as the surf was really churning. I looked up and she was…gone.
I spun all around, anxiety creeping up as I couldn’t make out any sign of her at all until – ah, there she was, 250 feet out from shore. What could she be DOING out there? It had to be WAY too deep to see a thing in this mess, so I wondered if she was in trouble maybe. Well, I would have to go out and get her to show her the real places to swim – or at least to check on her.
I took a deep breath and put my fins together for some full body swimming and was out to her in 30 seconds or so. But as I got near, I knew why she was out that far, and it nothing to do with distress. She had discovered something amazing…a Forrest that was every bit as filled with life as out best trip in Hawaii in water with 100 foot visibility. Long spindly legged crabs that would span two feet if stretched out made their way among ling cod. Huge purple and sun-burst stars defied normal scale and that school of Striped Sea perch from Yesterday…was just the small handful from the REAL school that lived out here.
Large eels, Rock Fish, Ling Cod, big Crab…And the plants here, they are just beautiful. If I get a camera, I’ll post images of this place right away.
We have nick-named the forrest “Mermaid Forrest” since it’s right by “Mermaid Beach”.
Impression: Quite simply, it blew the doors off of every other trip so far. Golden Gardens Right Rocks is the best run I’ve found.
Lesson: Try more sights that are farther off shore. The water is more clear and the variety more amazing than the surf-hugging that I’ve been doing.
Safety Note: I will need to bring a “Dive Flag” with me on any trip where I’m venturing into waters where there may be boats.
Oh yeah. No more messing around at shops before jumping in.
After testing a ton of 4/3 suits and comparing to a 7 mil, I have concluded that the best suit for me to use snorkeling in the Puget Sound is a 5 mil. My father in law was kind enough to donate to the cause and so I had a $200 budget. I found a Neosport by Henderson that is 100% xSpan material at 5 mil and is an XLS ( Extra Large, Short = ME ). Even though their sizing guide says it’s for a 200 lb guy at 5′ 8″, it’s a damn good fit for me at 5′6″ and 225. In fact, if anything, it’s a bit loose. Still it’s about 10000 times better than any rental I’ve tried on and I can really say that I’ve put this thing through 55 degree water and 45 degree water and been fine in both (a little chilly in the colder water, a little warm in the warmer water). If I get chilly in the winter or want to dive, I can throw a jacket over it and *poof* I have a dive-ready suit.
When I first put it on, I was surprised that it was a 5 mil. It was a lot easier to get on than the rental 4/3 suits that were supposed to be much thinner. I can wear this suit comfortably in the car on a warm day as I drive to the beach, which means an easier suit-up at home. I felt like wind was going right through it, and for sure this would not keep me warm in the water, but it really did the job. I really shopped around before chosing this suit and I’m terrifically pleased with the results.
