Cottleston Pie

Destination

The Texas Flower Gardens , also known officially as the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary are the northern-most coral reefs near the U.S. They're about 105 miles directly south of the Texas/Louisiana border. The reefs sit down about 20m (65 ft) deep at their top and descend from there, with lots to see in the 20-30m (65-100 ft) depths.

NWS Forecast

GMZ080-192130-
NW GULF N OF 25N W OF 90W
INCLUDING FLOWER GARDEN BANKS NATIONAL MARINE SANCTUARY
1030 AM CDT FRI AUG 19 2005

*THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT
W OF 94W SE TO S WINDS 10 TO 15 KT. SEAS 2 TO 4 FT. 
E OF 94W SE TO S WINDS 10 KT OR LESS. SEAS 1 TO 2 FT. ISOLATED TSTMS.

*SAT AND SAT NIGHT
N OF 28N WINDS VARIABLE 10 KT OR LESS. SEAS 1 TO 2 FT. 
S OF 28N E TO SE WINDS 10 KT. SEAS 1 TO 2 FT.

*SUN
VARIABLE WINDS 5 TO 10 KT. SEAS 1 TO 2 FT. SCATTERED TSTMS.

Pre-boarding

I arranged a trip with my local dive shop (LDS), Tom's Scuba , as part of my advanced certification training. We'd meet down in Freeport, Texas to board the M/V Fling or the M/V Spree at 8:30 pm on Friday, 19 August 2005. My instructor, MW, was also the group leader from Tom's for our group.

On Friday at 2:30 pm, I left Austin for Freeport, Texas. I didn't know how long it would take, and I didn't want to run into traffic. The boat boards at 8:30 pm, no earlier or later. I took 183 to 71 to I10 to 36. It took about 3.5 hrs to get down there. 205 miles.

I had a couple hours prior to boarding, so I parked in an empty commercial parking lot and did some reading from a dive training book I had with me. This is what I'd planned to do since I imagined that I'd be plenty early.

After some time, I had a knock on my window. The police had come to check me out. Sitting in a car reading in an empty parking lot is apparently a suspicious activity. The funny thing was when the policeman continued to seem suspicious after I said that I was reading the "Deep Diving" book in my hands, with a scuba diver on the cover, and was waiting for the boarding time to take a trip out to the Texas Flower Gardens on the M/V Fling or M/V Spree. Freeport, Texas is a small place where divers descend all the time almost year round to take these boats out to the Gardens. How weird that he looked like he didn't recognize what I was talking about. In any case, after a few more questions, he left.

As the light began to fail around 7:30 pm, I went to find the actual boats. I found them, but no sign of MW or anything that would let me identify anything as Tom's. I still didn't know what boat we were on yet. So, I sat in my car between the docks for the two boats and read some more. Closer to boarding time, I took a little walk by the boat docks and found MW who'd been wondering where I was. Uh huh.

Tom's web site did not have a link to the boat's web site which would have answered some of my questions, such as how the parking situation works. Also, I could have filled out the long Gulf Diving release/waiver forms prior to arriving.

Boarding

We were on the M/V Fling. At 8:30 pm, after a very brief intro to procedure, we boarded. First with some personal item to place upon and thus claim a bunk. I wasn't particular and got a top bunk in one of the bunk rooms amidships. There were four single-bunks in the room. Turns out, the two bottom bunks were taken by a couple other Austinites who had booked via Tom's and with whom I tended to hang out during the trip, SM and BB. The last bunk was taken by another dive leader. There were three dive leaders on board, one from each of the three shops who had booked the groups (the boats only sell spots wholesale to dive shops). On the boat, the leaders' primary duty was to do tank refills between dives.

The bunk number is one's identity on the boat. Even when or if the crew learns someone's name, on all the non-alphabetical lists of names (such as keeping track who jumped off the boat in dive gear), they want to know the bunk number.

After claiming a bunk, I loaded the rest of my gear, including claiming a tank spot. Since I was diving Nitrox , a tank rental was included with the Nitrox fee and I put my stuff by one of the Nitrox tanks.

After that, it was into the dining room to finish up the paperwork: hand in the release/waiver forms, tell them my bunk number, show them my c-card with Nitrox credential, and prove that I had a surface signaling device (aka safety sausage). I didn't know I'd need an ssd, but I had one, and had I not, they'll loan you one while holding your c-card ransom.

Underway

The boat cast off toward the gardens and we were called into the dining room for a long briefing, standing room only, so I was glad I had gotten a seat. The briefing went on at length about sea sickness and how to handle it (like: even if you don't get sick, take a 13 gal vomit containment device (aka VCD aka trash bag), in case you need to hand it to someone who needs it or protect yourself if you're on the bottom bunk). Captain Ken Bush gave the briefing. We had another captain too, but he was quite quiet. Unlike ex-school principal Captain Bush. There were two galley hands, Mike and Scott. And two divemasters, Mike and Steve.

There were 32 of us diving passengers on board. Only three of whom were women. (And all of whom were married. Though I found myself interacting with all three of them. You'll read about KW shortly. BB was a joy who also works at IBM. JB was cute, didn't smile much, and had a surprising but pleasing Mississippi accent.)

The only thing left was to go to bed and wake up at 6 am the next morning at the West Bank. Several people were already beginning to feel sick.

Saturday Pre-dive

I'm not a morning person. Getting up and ready at 6 am was tough! I did get up a bit early and managed to use the bathroom and shave then, which is good because things were a bit frantic as everyone worked to get ready as they woke up and the seas tossed us about.

The seas were not that rough, 1 to 2 feet, but enough to cause some stumbling and some people to have continued sea sickness. At some point, I heard some people saying that the movement of the ladder was as rough as they'd seen. The ladder movement was much more significant on a previous trip to Hin Daeng and Hin Mouang (Red Rock and Purple Rock) in 2003. There, my sister, dad, and I came up to find our boat rolling in 3-5 foot seas, I think. This 1-2 ft stuff was easy. I've no idea what people were talking about on this trip.

All us Nitrox users had to analyze the gas in our tanks to make sure it was as expected. Mine was a slightly rich 33+%, which is what it would be for most the fills. As we filled out the Nitrox log, I noted a similarity of names..."MW, are these your parents KW and LW?" I don't know why he hadn't mentioned it earlier. The four of us would dive as a group. My instructor MW and I as official buddies and MW's mother and father, KW and LW, as official buddies, but of course, MW kept a sharp eye on his parents. The four of us got along quite well for the whole trip.

Saturday, Dive #1

Dive #1, 2005-07-20, 7:07 am, EAN33, 24 minutes, 26.8 m max, 19.8 m avg, 30℃

The currents for the first couple dives were quite strong on the surface. The trick was to immediately swim to a "down line" (rope that crossed the path of the current from stern to where it was tied off to the mooring line about 30 ft underwater) and pull oneself along it and down under until the current had dissipated about 40 ft down. The entry was a giant stride from a deck about 5 ft about the surface of the water. It looked higher. I thought the entry was a bunch of fun. I jumped in at 7:07 am.

The lines were rough on the hands in the strong currents. We were down just 24 minutes. I didn't record gas usage, but I had plenty when we surfaced, maybe as much at 1400 lbs. (We started out with ~3000 lbs and the recreational diving guideline is to ensure one climbs up on the boat with 500 lbs. Divers tend to say "pounds" as short for "pounds per square inch" aka "psi") MW's father used his air (nitrox) pretty quickly. Both MW's parents appeared to have a inefficient bicycle kick style, plus a lot of arm usage, but his mother seemed to do better with her air. (It's been my observation generally that woman have substantially better natural air consumption without any obvious reason. My guess is they have less oxygen consuming muscle-mass. Some muscles, like upper-body muscles, just consume oxygen underwater without much contribution to the diving experience--until it's time to pull oneself up on the boat.) In any case, this short dive was an outlier. We managed to get times of 35-45 minutes on all subsequent dives.

Coming back up the down line, holding for a safety stop as we were tossed in the current, which made holding depth tricky, and then holding on extra time while waiting for a ladder line to become free did quite a job on my hands. I'd thrown my water-skiing gloves in my dive bag, just in case (the same one's that I forgot to bring to Maine this summer when I went water skiing!). I wore them for every future dive.

Hanging onto the down line in the current was also a game of dodge-the-jellyfish. I didn't know if these stung, but I didn't want to test. I learned topside that at least some of them do sting, since Mr. SM had been stung on the face. On later dives, several others suffered minor stings. It was good to be wearing a full suit (3 mil) and, on all future dives, gloves. A skin-hood would have been nice to have too, just to be extra protected, but I managed to avoid any stings in any case. The in-water temperature was 30℃ (86℉) and I was comfortable. I wore 14 lbs of lead, which was probably just a little heavy.

I had a little fun getting on the boat. A divemaster on the deck immediately wants to know: bunk number, bottom time, and max depth: #13, 24 minutes, 26.8 meters. "Huh?" "26.8 meters. 30 1/2 meters is 100 feet." I think I was the only one using meters. "Can you switch to feet?" "No." The divemaster was friendly about it. It wasn't really a problem. Just threw him for a loop -- and the other divemaster just laughed at the whole exchange.

I can switch my dive computer to use feet, but then I lose the granularity of depth control that I like. I'd learned this explicitly when I tried switching to feet while doing some limited-vis, no-top-or-bottom-reference navigation training ("flying on instruments") just that past week. Seeing my depth change per 0.1 meter (about 1/3 ft) gave me much indication when I started to drift up or down and allowed earlier and easier correction.

Underwater, the reef was mostly hard coral. There were some of those neat, colorful "Christmas tree worms" that disappear in a shell when you wave your hand near them. Of those I could identify by name, there were lots of parrot fish, large angel fish, trigger fish (but not protecting nests), butterfly fish, trunkfish, pufferfish, and barracuda. Lots of friendly barracuda, some of whom got pretty up-close and personal. :-) That was most of what was seen on all four of the day dives on Saturday, as well as various other interesting fish that I cannot name.

After all other divers were on board, two were still missing after being recorded down for a long, but not unreal, 45 minutes. The divemasters were beginning to worry a little though and starting considering that they might need to run a search. Then we noticed a dinghy coming over from the Sea Searcher II . Yep, there were three boats out there at the West Bank: M/V Fling, M/V Spree, and Sea Searcher II. And two divers came up on the wrong boat. The boat with a different parent company. The boats were not that close together. Those guys travelled some distance.

Surface Interval

There was a mandatory 2.5 hour surface interval between dives. I took a nap on every interval! People were relatively quiet and low key for all the surface time until all the diving was done and we were motoring home. Even then, people were talking more and were more animated, but it seemed naturally low-key crowd overall.

Saturday, Dive #2

Dive #2, 2005-07-20, 10:15 am, EAN33, 39 minutes, 27.4 m max, 18.3 m avg, 30℃, SI 2h43m prior

Similar to the first dives, but the seas were a bit calmer. The surface current was still strong, though not as deep, and there was a weak current on the reef itself. The current on the reef was noticeable, but not a problem.

At the end of the dive, with my gloves on, it was really fun to hang on in the fast current. Climbing out of the water, a big clump of seaweed on the surface came floating right to me. I saw some fish, so I plunged through as I reached for the boat ladder. I saw two large brown fish feeding inside the clump. It was awesome. I couldn't identify the fish.

Saturday, Dive #3

Dive #3, 2005-07-20, 2:07 pm, EAN33, 35 minutes, 21.6 m max, 16.2 m avg, 30℃, SI 3h11m prior

During lunch time, we moved over to the East Bank. It took a while and at one point we stopped a while for no discernible reason. Did we get lost? I don't know. For some reason the M/V Spree didn't come over to the East Bank. It had headed directly to Stetson Bank, where we would be Sunday. That's all the divemaster that I asked knew.

The current on the reef was stiff and this dive was quite a bit of work! I think this is the only time I surfaced with 500 lbs.

Saturday, Dive #4

Dive #4, 2005-07-20, 5:30 pm, EAN33, 42 minutes, 22.9 m max, 17.1 m avg, 30℃, SI 2h47m prior

On this dive, we were amongst the first in the water, and us being near-first was the trend for the rest the trip. The current on the reef had lightened again, allowing another more relaxed looksee. We saw a couple sea urchins in holes in the reef.

Saturday, Dive #5, Night Dive

Dive #5, 2005-07-20, 8:52 pm, EAN32, 43 minutes, 21.6 m max, 17.1 m avg, 30℃, SI 2h37m prior

Armed with my new dive light, a backup in my pocket, and a chemical glow-stick on my tank, my crew and I descended. Pulling myself along the down line while holding the light proved tricky. I turned it off for a bit so I could let it dangle on its lanyard from my wrist without spinning around and shining light in others eyes.

The reef was much more visibly alive. The hard coral opened up and waved their little tentacles about in the water. The coral bottom was covered by all kinds of little hermit crabs in colorful little shells. There were pink translucent shrimp, small and large. The shrimp eyes glowed bright red as they reflected my light back. I saw a small crab, with a diameter a bit bigger than a quarter. I also saw a big crab that was maybe 15 cm (6 in) in diameter. I saw a big lobster that scuttled back to where I couldn't see or follow, but it wasn't big enough for him to completely hide and the front of his face peeked out with his large antennae waving around. I also spotted a long fuzzy-looking worm-like-thing. It looked a bit like a Christmas Tree Worm but was at least several inches long (the ends weren't visible) and was black and gray. The urchins that we saw earlier were out and about.

After this dive, I wandered for a bit to the top sun deck (moon deck?) for a short bit where MW, his parents, and a few others were all talking. And then I descended to sleep.

Sunday, Dive #6

Dive #6, 2005-07-21, 6:54 am, EAN33, 33 minutes, 28.7 m max, 18.9 m avg, 29℃, SI 9h18m prior

Overnight, the boat moved to Stetson Bank.

Sunday morning turned out a bit crazy. I got up just a couple minutes before a divemaster came below yelling, "Everybody up! Dive briefing at 6:45!" I went to analyze my now-full Nitrox tank and discovered...24%! Not good. I analyzed someone else's: 33%. The analyzer was working. Someone had refilled my partially empty Nitrox tank with air! (Air is ~20.9%) That's why we use the analyzer. Not a problem except that there was so little time to get ready. Fortunately, a full, extra Nitrox tank was available so I was able to swap my gear to the new tank without waiting for a drain and then a fill, which would have taken a long time. It took long enough what with discovering and handling the problem and then moving my equipment onto the new tank. Remember, my group was moving to get down early.

The plan was just to do two morning dives on Sunday, and things were hectic enough, so I skipped a shave. I also noticed during those two dives that my mask was leaking much more than ever before. Oops. I don't think that that was a coincidence. I'll have to keep that in mind for future dive trips.

Stetson doesn't have as much coral, but had some nice, different sea life. We saw a large spotted moray eel, maybe a meter or so long, both free-swimming along the bottom and also in a hole. We also saw a cute small one of the same in a hole right near where the boat's mooring anchor (the Garden sites have large, implanted U bolts for permanent moorings).

Sunday, Dive #7

Dive #7, 2005-07-21, 10:02 am, EAN33, 45 minutes, 29.3 m max, 20.4 m avg, 29℃, SI 2h34m prior

Last dive of the trip. There was now a bit of a current that took some effort to overcome. I saw a good size scorpion fish. For this dive, LW and KW went up a bit earlier than MW and I who continued until I indicated we should go back because of my own air. I thought we'd be swimming back against the current for a short bit back to the mooring U bolt. MW started ascending almost in place. The boat was right above us!

Home Again

We motored back and arrived at the dock a short bit before 6 pm. I unloaded my stuff into my car and drove home: 3.5 hrs, 205 miles, with just one brief stop for some red beans and rice at Pop-Eyes for a dinner that couldn't be beat.

Final thoughts

I definitely don't need to pack as much. I brought a lot of stuff that never left my bag. I didn't get to see any mantas, spotted eagle rays, turtles, or any sharks at all (not to mention whale sharks)! I know people see such things at the Gardens, so that just means I've probably another trip in my future.

I don't have an underwater camera. Thanks to Dave Read who let me use his excellent Flower Gardens photographs for this report.