Chanb77's Weblog

Saturday, June 28th, 2014 ~

Well, it’s about time that we got on a boat, this year, so we made our way down to St. Lawrence Park, to do exactly that. We were using Under Where? Dive Charters (Tom Scott), and were getting on Pork Chop, with Ryan at the helm, and Alex as crew!

Raphael had driven up from NYC, and Frankie had driven from Quebec City, so the four of us packed the night before, and made tracks, early’ish…

At St. Lawrence Park, we met Chris Phinney, Neil MacMillan, Kevin Abe, Eric Vermette, James Young, and Hong Phan, and loaded up the boat. It was a very busy day at the park, since they had a “Breakfast On The Island” event, going on. There were line-ups of folks, waiting to get on the shuttle boats, to take them for breakfast, on one of the 1000 Islands (Refugee Island). There was even a camera crew, that was catching all of the action, and even caught me carrying my scooter to the boat. My 15 seconds of fame, perhaps? 😛

Once we finally got all of our gear loaded, and parked all of our cars across the street from the park, we were off! To the DARYAW!

Scootery Goodness, alongside Captain Ryan!

I was buddying up with Raphael; Steve was with Frankie and Eric; Chris, Hong, and James teamed up; and Kneel and Kevin Aaaaaaaaaaaabe were buddies.

As we tied up to the mooring, we put our stages and scooters in the water. We noticed that the surface current was absolutely ripping, and it was probably the strongest that I have ever seen it there, in the times that I have dived the Daryaw.

Kev, Raph, James, and Eric V., just before gearing up.

Buddy teams took turns getting in, clipping on bottles and scooters, and dropping down. Raph and I were the last team to descend. It was Raph’s first time on the Daryaw, so we took it easy on the descent. We did have to hit the triggers, in order to get back to the wreck, which was not bad, at all.

Looking out, from underneath the shelter of the overturned wreck…

We made our way underneath, and Steve was taking pictures of everyone, as we swam around. The wreck is upside down, so we are able to swim “up,” into the holds. There is one hold that you can surface in, thanks to the giant air pocket. Steve, Raph, and I surfaced in it, giggled for a little bit, then back down.

Frankie, peeking under the wreck…

Kev and Kneel…

Eric V….

Hong and Raph…

Chris, peeking out of the wreck, with Raph, below. Not sure who the other diver is (there was another boat that pulled up, as we descended)…

One of hundreds of eels, on this wreck…

The plan was to drift off of the wreck, and one of each buddy team was to blow an SMB, as we came up, and the boat would pick us up. We stayed on the north wall, to be safe (and not drift into the shipping channel). Raph and I started our drift a little bit earlier than we had originally planned, but still had a nice, easy drift along the wall.

The stern of the wreck, as Steve was drifting away…

Frankie, Eric V., Steve…

Raph and I surfaced, and Ryan and Alex saw us, pretty quickly. They zoomed over, picked us up, and we waited for the others to pop up, which they did, only minutes after us.

Bottom Time: 1 hour, 1 minute
Max. Depth: 96′
Water Temp.: 62F

Raph and I…

Hong, Chris, Raph, James…

Steve, Eric V., Frankie Boy (the one and only)…

Kev and Kneel…

We made our way back to St. Lawrence Park, and unloaded. Even though there isn’t as much gas in the tanks, as we get back, it still seems like the gear gets heavier, after the dive! 😛

Thank you, Ryan and Alex! You guys were awesome, and we couldn’t have asked for a better day!