Captain Steve Juarez Maui Diving Log

Tyler and I have been shooting a new camera system out on the boat this week. My friend Ian Pinkham has a Nikon D60 camera and has been asking about housing for it so I thought what if we brought in the new RDX series housing from Sea & Sea and put the housing and the D60 camera to the test. I set up the camera system with two Sea&Sea YS110 strobes a dual sync chord and the standard RDX port with the AF18mm-55mm 3.5-5.6 VR zoom lens. This system cost about half of what my Nikon D200 system cost and I am really pretty happy with the results. The problem is I let Tyler shoot it and he won't give it back or ever go back to shooting just a point and shoot camera again, he is really spoiled with the new DSLR system. We offer this system for rental or purchase it is a used unit or come and join us and take a Underwater Photography specialty course and see if shooting a digital DSLR isn't a lot of fun and an awesome way to capture your diving adventures.

Gallery Album: Nikon D60 Camera System

Aloha! Hoku went in the water at 4:04pm March 9

^{th, 2009, in a blinding snow storm and 28 degrees here at the New England Boat yard. We worked all day getting ready for the Boat Hauler and getting her in the water for the incline test tomorrow at 0700 with the naval architect and Mr. Ray Rock USCG. I don’t have all of the feeling in my hands and feet yet so my typing is worse then usual, I remember why I moved out of the mountains and the snow I hate being this cold. After we got her tied up at the dock for the night I raced down to the local West Marine Store to buy flares, paddles, first-aid kit, boat hook and odds and ends we needed to finish up with the safety equipment. Tomorrow will be another long, cold hard day moving the lead around on the boat and doing the test hopefully the USCG doesn’t cancel do to the weather it has snowed about 4" this afternoon. Enjoy the pictures of the old man freezing his you know what off!}

Tech Week Maui was fun and exciting but some what reminiscent of my days at Boot Camp. Robin Jacoway a TDI Instructor Trainer for Technical Diving International (TDI)and the owner of Deepoutdoors flew out to Maui and stayed up at my house for the week to teach and certify Neal, Tyler and myself for TDI Advanced Nitrox, Decompression Procedures, and Extended Range & Trimix. We started each day at 7:00am and finished about 10:00pm each night with 2 dives each day and then all the classroom and TDI PowerPoint presentations and yes tests it made for some long days. The wreck of the Carthaginian was great for doing many of the drills and to hone our technical diving skills. Todd Wynn from North Shore Explorers had given me some coordinates for a PB4Y-1 Navy Bomber that ditched June 26^th 1944 off Olowalu Maui and is laying upside down on the bottom in 190’ of water which we did a 20/40 trimix dive on 1/20/09. We programmed the coordinates into our GPS and as the boat ran over those coordinates we dropped a small sand anchor with 300’ of line and a fender for a surface float. Robin was diving his Revo Rebreather and Neal, Tyler and I were all diving doubles with 20/40 trimix and two stage tanks, one with 36% nitrox and the other with pure O2 for decompression. The day turned out to be perfect, flat calm and no current just a little hazy and a little overcast with pods of Humpback whales providing a reverberating song for our dive. The dive went according to plan and the wreck was amazing with black corral trees growing out of the rims of the landing gear wheels laying flat against the bottom of the wings. A 50 caliber machine gun sticking out of the rear turrent pointed towards the surface with schools of fish darting in and out of the wreck with the plan calling for 25 minutes bottom time our dive was way to short and with all the decompression our total dive time ran 78 minutes. As I ascend to my numerous deco stops I could reflect on what I had seen and I knew I would have to make more dives on this wreck and next time I want to bring down the HD video camera and film this amazing piece of history. We are planning our next Tech week for May so if you’re interested in getting certified for technical diving give us a call or shoot us an Email. We will be bringing in some of Deepoutdoors technical harness systems, back plates and bladders for divers interested in buying the best in Technical Dive gear and we have quite a few sets of twin steel tanks with isolation manifolds and stage tanks for doing decompression dives. Many thanks toRobin Jacoway for coming out and teaching us Yahoos the right way to do these dives.

Captain Steve Juarez

Gallery Album: Technical Diving Maui

I have been taking a closed circuit rebreather class( Inspiration) and we have had divers and camera men here from the BBC out to see the Maui Mantas. We did a Manta dive with most of us on rebreathers which allowed us to be less obtrusive to the Mantas and get some amazing shots. Between my class and all the diving I haven’t had a day off this month and it is just flying by. Next month we are leaving on the 4th-19th for Papua New Guinea with a group of divers from the store which will be a lot of fun. We have been busy entering some of the products we carry to our on-line Quick Shopping Cart Store for those of you that are looking for an easy way to shop for dive gear on line and can’t make it into the shop. Go to WWW.shop.stevedives.com to visit the web store.

Looking forward to seeing you on your next trip to Maui.

Aloha,
Captain Steve Juarez

Gallery Album: Maui Mantas

Today was our lucky day, we were diving at Shark Fin Rock and an endangered satellite tagged Monk Seal decided she was lonely and wanted to play with our divers.Monk Seals are very rare in the main Hawaiian Islands with a population of only about 100, the majority of the population lives in the Northwest Hawaiian Islands and still there are only about 1200 of these beautiful seals left. She swam right up to the camera and wouldn't leave me alone rubbing her head against me and hugging me with her flippers it was hard to take her picture she was just to close and in my face. After entertaining us for about a half hour she swam over to Lighthouse point to check out some of the other boats. This was a fabulous encounter and one I won't soon forget. We have been busy entering some of the products we carry to our on-line Quick Shopping Cart Store for those of you that are looking for an easy way to shop for dive gear on line and can’t make it into the shop. Go to WWW.shop.stevedives.com to visit the web store. Looking forward to seeing you on your next trip to Maui. Aloha, Captain Steve Juarez

Gallery Album: Monk Seal Photos