Isle of Shoals

Just north of Boston off the Maine/New Hampshire coastline, sits a small group of nine rocky islands called the Isle of Shoals. The complete line-up is Seavey, White, Lunging, Star, Cedar, Smuttynose, Malaga, Duck and Appledore Islands. The opening picture is Appledore. First discovered in 1603 by Martin Pring (English descent), the islands have been occupied off and on by fishermen. The discovery of the islands was erronoeously credited to Captain John Smith (no relation) so he named the islands Smith Isles. The name was change to the Isle of Shoals because the isles were teeming with schools, or "shoals" of fish.

In the late 1840's, summer resorts began to spring up. This lasted until the early 1900's when larger, more luxurious resorts were built on the mainland. In 1973, Dr. John M. Kingsbury started the Shoals Marine Laboratory The lab is there today run by the University of New Hampshire and Cornell University.

My trip was arranged through Cape Ann Divers. Even though the trip out of Gloucester was rather long (over 2 hours), it gave me a chance to relax, take in the scenery, and chat with the other divers on the boat. It was a really foggy and overcast day. The closer we got to the isles, the better the visibility got. We were able to see minke whales, a Navy sub, and the isles themselves.

The captain anchored the boat just off Appledore Isle. Just off the stern bobbed a yellow float marking the spot over The Chute. This is a small canyon about 45 feet down. I swam over to the float and pulled the dump valve. I had a real problem descending due to air being trapped in my suit. Once that was vented, I was on the bottom. I saw many starfish, urchins, lots of colorful algea. I didn't see alot of big fish; just some juveniles darting in amoungst the rocks. Once I had reached the end of the canyon, I swam over the side down to sandy area (60fsw). Just some broken shells, some star fish and more sand. Since the air supply was going down, I made another pass back through the canyon and then headed for the boat.

After a lunch/surface interval, the captain manuevered the boat over to a group of rocks where some seals were sunning themselves. I took a compass bearing on the island and dropped over the side of the boat. It was only 25 fsw deep under the boat so I swam towards the seals until my depth gauge showed 15fsw; and waited; and waited; and waited. No seals. They decided not to come my way. I started getting board and cold so I swam back to the boat and do some exploring in that area before my air supply told me to head on up.

The ride back was nice. Just as we were entering the Annisquam river, we saw a sunfish cruising the surface. What an awsome sight! Heading back into Gloucester, we got the only rain for the whole day.

A great day of diving but I had wished I had seen some seals. Maybe another day!

Images from the Isle of Shoals, using an Aquashot II camera housing with Fuji Film: