St. James Pit

[flyboy65]

A bunch of us from Innerspace are tentatively planning a camping trip to OreBGone the third weekend of Sept.  Would be a good time to meet up wit' some of ya's!

(Oh yeah, don't forget, if you need air up around that area, see the post about air on the Range.  Beats the heck out of dragging 5 or 6 cylinders for the weekend!  Let's support Rick!)

[LKunze]

We had an excellent day of diving today at St. James.  Believe it or not...with the sun high in the sky and with the sun spot in view, surface ripples could be seen from 115 feet down!  :o 

[Maka]

After getting Beat up at the Hesper this morning -- 
I decided to go to Aurora and dive St. James. 

I walked down the road to the pumphouse to start my dive.  I had to swim about 50yds before it really dropped off, and when it did, it did.  I met up with Kevin and Bill after I surfaced.  After chatting for a while we drove over to the North side of the pit and found another access.  It is very challenging to get down to, most vehichles probably wouldn't get there.  Once down there it looked pretty nice. 

We then went over to Lake Mine and dove the buildings and the wall to the North.  Vis was not the greatest at depth.  We picked up a lot of trash, but barely made a dent in what is down there.

Some pics of Lake Mine and St. James.  --

[Roger Southwick]

Nice photos, Matt!  I'm looking forward to checking out those pits October 14-15.

[WeatherPaparazzi]

Great photos, what was the water temp at the bottom?

[freedivernd]

why are all these great visibility ponds so darn far away from me??!! > >
google maps estimated over 6hrs to get there.. well, 2 hours from our camper at leech, near Bena, and leech is can be made in 2:45 hrs, so it's more like 5hrs.  definitly going to get there sometime when I'm up at leech.

I'm still lovin my honda fit... 80mph, 35-36mpg out on the hwy. and it'll turn 10,000 miles soon. whoah, it's been a busy (meaning, go to the lakes diving) summer and I sure can't complain about not getting into the water often.

[Maka]

Usually it's 41 at depth.

[LKunze]

We dove St. James Pit today.  Viz was 30 to 40 feet.

[LKunze]

Dan G and I did three dives at St. James yesterday.  Viz was a consistent 40 feet from the surface on down, no hazy layers at all!  Water temp was 59F down to 33 feet at the first thermocline.