Mount Chamberlin South Annex

As we were closing upon the 4th of July weekend, we somehow managed to not really have any dive plans.  My parents were visiting, plus we had a wedding to go to.  Then luckily Jim had an opening on the boat on that Sunday, so we pulled together a last minute tech boat.  Woohoo.  Conditions were even cooperative, and we managed to get down to Yankee Point with much trouble.  Rob brought his camera, and I know he took at least a few pictures, but he hasn't produced any photos, so I guess I will post the report anyway (with some hero snaps).  It wasn't a super eventful dive, so I will keep it brief.

We dropped on the South Wall of Mount Chamberlin, with the plan being to head over to the south annex if the viz allowed.  Seems like the standard thing to do these days when we end up at the south wall :)  Viz turned out to be pretty decent, though it was relatively dark.  Not super dark, but just not super bright either.  I guess you could say the same thing about the viz... not super great, but not bad either.  So we made our way over to the south annex, where we were greeted by quite a few fish.  A big school of juveniles, plus a decent number of adults as well. Not the insane throngs of juveniles that we've seen on a few recent occasions, but still a nice-sized school.  We hung out on the "back" (south) wall there for a bit, just looking down at the wall of fish.  After we'd had enough of that, we headed back over to the main structure.  We must have been scootering 50 feet from the bottom on the way back over, and I could see the bottom.

We got back to the channel that leads to K2, and then we meandered up that path.  Along the way, just off to the side of the channel, on the little rock plateau above it, I found a pretty big juvenile wolf eel out in the open.  I was pretty proud of the find.  They are so pretty with their spots.  And he was completely out in the open!  It was grey, but still very speckled.  Rob took some pictures, though I haven't see anything come from that :(  After watching him for a while, we continued on up the channel, and once we got to the section closer to K2, where it is more wallish, Rob found another juvenile wolf eel, this one just peeking out of the side of the wall.

As we approached K2, we saw a lot of fish.  There's pretty much always a big school of blue rockfish (and a few big sheepshead) hanging out on top of K2, but today they were joined by a big school of juveniles as well.  If you looked out from the peek to the north, it seemed like the water was filled with little fish as far as you could see.  Very cool.  We also happened upon the other team at K2.  I was pretty amused with all of the fish, so Rob went ahead with putting up the bag, while I marveled and video'd.  Then we started our ascent, which wasn't too eventful.  No whales or dolphins or anything :P  I passed the time by video'ing Rob :)