Well, you were warned. Imagine what a creative eater could pack up. We always bank on a group of fellow divers to get together Saturday night and cook up the day’s catch. We have had Scallops Alfredo, Bottom Fish in Lemon, and Gravity Defying Fish Tacos, just to name a few. We have also organized Dive Cook-offs in advance so a diver might come prepared to make a killer chili or an original fish stew to share and be critiqued by his fellow divers. Great food and good fun.

Now that your mouth is watering, let’s get back to diving cold and having a great time by drawing you a mental picture of a typical weekend of diving and camping in late fall.

I like to pack Friday afternoon and drive the gorgeous three hour road to Port Orford, Oregon so that I arrive before dark. My buddy and I have agreed on our campsite at the local state park in advance. There is always plenty of room in the fall because no one believes it can be so warm and clear on the coast when it’s raining buckets in Eugene. We set up our beds, make a noodle high carbo dinner, crawl into our respective sacks with those handy little book lights and have a read before the crash of the surf and the whispering winds close us down for the night.

"...even after thirty minutes at sixty feet, it’s time to start warming up. The best plan is to get out of the water before you get really cold."

First thing in the morning the coffee is essential. It is also a great way to get your buddy up without resorting to the ax method (that’s another story). Because caffeine is a diuretic, and urinating in your drysuit is a truly bad idea, limiting the coffee intake to just enough to pry your eyes open is prudent. Next I heat up a big pan of water to boiling and put it in the big thermos. Then another pan of water is heated for making instant hot cocoa, hot ginger tea, hot cider, or whatever hot beverage we choose that is not caffeinated. This goes in the second thermos. These should go into the car so they are not forgotten.

Breakfast is very important. If you are boat diving and are prone to seasickness, an empty stomach is almost worse than eating biscuits and gravy with a side of bacon at the local cafe. Breakfast also tells your body to go ahead and start pumping out the heat. This meal works best if it’s bland, high carbohydrate, and a little sweet. I like a carton of yogurt in a bowl with a bunch of granola dumped in and mixed up. This makes my buddy and all the animals in the state park gag, but it won’t spill in my sleeping bag and it really sticks to the ribs. Our friend, Big Bill carries a two-quart plastic bowl in his van that he uses just for his breakfast. His meal consists of an entire box of Captain Crunch with a quart of milk splashed over it. He swears by it and he’s too big to argue with.

Right after breakfast I like to set up my dive gear, get my drysuit on up to my waist, and assemble the cameras I’ll use for the day. Plan enough time to mentally rehearse your dive. It’s amazing how much more organized and how little you forget when you think it through.

Down at the dock, if we’ve planned a boat dive, I gather all my gear in a big pile. This includes my BC, regulator, and tank assembled, waist and ankle weights, cameras and bucket, two jugs of water, both thermos’, and a big dive bag. In the dive bag goes the mask with snorkel, fins, gloves, hood, a large garbage bag to separate wet from dry later, a big jacket (open the chemical heaters now and stick them in the pockets to start heating), hat, wool gloves, a small jar of peanut butter, crackers, a quart of juice drink, a bag of scuba cookies, and a towel. Obviously, this is a lot to carry, and so I recall the words of my late father, Spike Africa (AKA President of the Pacific Ocean), “A big man uses his back, a small man uses his head”. I know these shine wisdom for either gender and as a small female, I make two or three trips to load the boat - taking a little more time but ready to dive with a smile and a healthy back.

When we’re nearing the dive site, I take my hands out of my hot pockets, shrug into my drysuit, take a long drink of hot ginger tea and finish suiting up. By the time I’m ready to backroll into our refreshing 45F waters, I’m usually a little on the warm side, even if it’s only in the 60F’s on deck. This is good because the stored heat will dissipate like a battery over the course of the dive.

I’m in the water, well fed, plenty of sleep, a belly full of warm tea, and a camera in my hand. My buddy and I are searching for invertebrates to photograph. There are walls of strawberry anemones littered with tiny nudibranchs. The giant acorn barnacles stretch their feathery cirri out to catch a drifting meal. The ghostly forests of Metridium anemones loom around the corner harboring dense clouds of black sea bass hovering just beyond their stinging reach. While sneaking up on a huge lingcod, we notice hundreds of tiny shells filling the crevices around the monstrous fish (primary ingredient to fish tacos). The shells are all moving, filled with toddler hermit crabs exploring the boundaries of their nursery. As usual, we are both out of film long before we have half emptied our tanks. We return to the surface not only to change cameras but even after thirty minutes at sixty feet, it’s time to start warming up. The best plan is to get out of the water before you get really cold.