New England Diving Not for Wimps! Part 1 of 2

Like all other blogs in existance, this one doesn't get the ongoing attention it deserves. Partially this is due to my schedule, but really I seldom find much to be blogworthy. Memorial Day weekend activities were blogworthy, and now I'm getting around to blogging them. Aqua Shack, the local dive shop, put me in touch with a gentleman looking for a fellow diving lobsterman. He and I setup a meeting time for Friday, and we were off in his 18' Glastron to pickup some ocean roaches. It's been a while since I had been underwater (and the first time I'd done any "spring" diving in New England.) I was a bit hesitant about going out, the previous four days had seen the worst nor'easter in nearly four decades. I knew vis was going to be poor, and checking the buoy data out of Gloucester harbor I could tell it was going to be C-O-L-D (46-ish degrees.) Friday morning was a gloomy, fifty-something degree day (hey, it's truly *New* England,) and this only served to dampen my spirit even more. In spite of that, I loaded my gear onboard, and we were off. Up the Annisquam River into the Atlantic Ocean right off the northwestern most point of Cape Ann. Our first site was just south of Lane's Cove, and after a backroll off the starboard gunwale I found myself in a brisk 48 degree aquatic environment. On the way down I realized that vis was worse than I expected ... I honestly couldn't see my hand at the end of my outstretched arm. If I was going to stay with my dive buddy, we were going to have to stay right on top of one another. With this vis, the only lobsters I'm going to get are the ones which walk up and pinch me in the ass. The first spot was my buddy's "lucky spot", but once on the bottom all I found was sand. For those of you unfamiliar with the habits of Homarus Americanus, let me tell you, they don't live in sand. These guys are only found in rocky caves, cracks, and crevises. So after a short 20 minutes of swimming around at 30' in 46 degree water I signalled that I was ready to surface, and Greg had no objections. Surfaced with 2000lbs still in the tank, and ready to find a spot which has a chance at producing some lobster. The second dive was better. We found a spot heavily populated with pots (a good sign!) between Plum Cove and Lane's Cove. This spot was all rock which helped the vis improve to about 5 feet. Didn't switch tanks during the server interval, but was doing well enough on my consumption to squeeze a 30 minute dive out of my remaining air. I hadn't warmed up during the surface interval, and about 20 minutes in I found that I had gotten hypothermic (when I stopped shivering I knew I was in trouble.) We surfaced from this second dive with no keepers. Lobsters 1, Divers 0 ... but there's always tomorrow.