June 13, 2008 Santa Barbara and Catalina Islands

We enjoyed a beautiful 100 mile crossing to Santa Barbara Island last night. Flat glassy calm seas and zero swell made for a wonderful nights sleep.

Shortly after 9:00am we arrived at the island and positioned Horizon in the sea lion rookery for two dives. Our group of Utah divers enjoyed interacting with these gregarious pinnipeds.

During the lunch hour we moved 20 miles east to Catalina Island and finished up our dive day at Big Geiger in the Isthmus. The kelp forest was alive with reef fish and large lobster! I had the chance to hop in for a quick dive and was amazed at the quantity and size of the spiny lobster hiding within this dive sites cracks and crevices.

Within 1/4 mile of shore, the Isthmus is an invertebrate no take zone, which was very evident at Big Geiger as the lobster were all very fat and happy in knowing that they were off limits during lobster season. I happened upon a couple in the 6 - 8 pound range that are probably 40 - 50 years old!

We’ll be spending the night and will travel to the east end in the wee hours for the final day of diving.

Adios,

Captain Greg

June 7, 2008 Diving San Clemente Island

After an agreeable crossing to the island, we got an early start and two dives completed at Little Window by 10:00am. Schooling sardines, marauding yellowtail and the ever vivacious garibaldi fish made for a fantastic start of the day.

This departure, an overnight 1 day quick getaway, affords us the time to get in 3 - 4 dives before heading back to San Diego. With that said, we repositioned quickly late morning and opened the pool at Pyramid Channel to finish off the trip. This site allows us to dive two separate sites from one location as we set up the mothership over a sand channel between Twin Peaks and Pyramid Head.

Beautiful walls, sea fans, swim throughs along with sunlit plateaus were the highlight of our final dives. The water temperature for the day hovered at 62.5 degrees surface temperature with minimal thermocline and the vis was in the 30 foot range. All typical for this time of year.

Captain Spencer will lead our next adventure departing this evening and destined for 4 days at San Clemente Island…as long as the military is willing.

Adios Captain Chris!

With our 2008 Channel Islands and Baja season ahead of us, Captain Greg Grivetto will be at the helm aboard M/V Horizon. Captain Chris Thompson, Horizon’s Captain of the past 4 years is moving on, working toward securing a position as a teacher in the San Diego County school system between intermittent stints sailing around the Pacific with his better half aboard their new sailboat! You may see Chris aboard Horizon from time to time as he fills in for Captains Greg and Spencer.

Horizon Charters and the entire Grivetto family wish Chris and Lori all the best in their endeavours and look forward to seeing them offshore as they sail the seas!