The Ocean...Finally

Ok. Finally get wet after a long absence from the water. This past weekend I went with Scuba Greenpeace to Seokcho, Kangwan Do. I've made the trip a few times before. The water is cold but it's clean because of the absence of factories. It's so close to the border to the North that they don't build much there. There is no night diving allowed because of fears that North Korea could kidnap people or also to guard against attack. I guess this way, if they see divers lights, it could only be North Koreans because the people in the south aren't allowed to be there. You can see different types of cold water coral there but unfortunately, we weren't diving in any of those places. Temperatures ranged from 12 degrees celcius in 10m down to 6 degrees at 18m. These are the coldest temperatures I've dived in but I was pretty comfortable in my drysuit thanks to the new additions to my underwear setup.



Our dive sites were still good. Since it's the spring there isn't much plankton in the water which allows lots of light to reach the bottom which cause the kelp to grow like crazy. Most of it will be gone in a month when the water warms up and the plankton begin to block the light. Personally, I like the good vis (12m+) and tall kelp though sometimes it feels (or atleas I imagine it does) like navigating through a cornfield.


Not a lot of critters but there are a few around. Unfortunately, I didn't take my camera on the first two dives so I missed a lot. There were very small (1 inch) trumpet fish that swam in little schools in amongst the kelp. I saw a huge octopus.


Here are a few photos. I have done some work on them in photoshop but it's mostly just getting rid of all the green by putting the red back in.




Nothing too life altering here but some friendly little snaps.














Here's one of many little jellies.








A sea anenome.










Here's a link to a video of the jelly's friend.

VIDEO: Jelly


That's it for this week. I should be out again next weekend so hopefully I'll have more dives to report on.