Pulali Point + Brinnon PInnacle

5 of us tried out Pulali Point over in Hood Canal last Saturday. None of us had been there before. Not bad although the wall petered out below about 145ft. Brian, Jeanna, and myself scootered down to 190ft to check it out. Lots and lots of squat lobsters and shrimp but not much else down there. Brian found a red bortula though, that was really cool. Huge octo in a cave shallower too. One cloud sponge was found around 140ft. Average depth ended up being 150ft-ish so we only had 30mins of deco. We scootered the wall portions on deco, it was fun looking down and imagining an abyss below but knowing it only went to 140ft lol.

Doug and Kirk aimed a bit shallower (160ft-ish max I think). Not really a great tech diving wall, better for 25/25 profiles if that.

We monkey dove the Brinnon Pinnacle afterwards which was wicked cool. Max depth 75ft, 45mins, lots of blue and vermillion rockfish, some lemon peel nudis, and 2 wolf eels.

Other notes:
Left Seattle at 7AM (ugh)
Picked up Kirk in Fed Way at 8
Drove over the Narrows Bridge
The WDFW boat ramp at "Misery Point" was miserable! Talk about hassles loading and unloading all the gear on the beach.
2 dives
Jeanna's great chicken pasta salad for lunch
More boat ramp loading and unloading, doubles, deco bottles, stages to monkey with and scooters (4 Xs and a standard Gavin)
Rinse the boat
Home at 9pm (ugh)

I need to work on the videos at some point.

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Permalink Reply by Douglas Steding on June 29, 2009 at 9:58am

Our report:

We dropped in in front of the green day marker--close to a green buoy that marks the wall. Kirk and I scootered down to 150-160 and headed north for 10 minutes. We went past one dramatic wall at 150 and ran into a fair number of good sized cloud sponges. We scootered off of the wall in search of more structure, and turned on time (still over mud/gravel bottom). We came back at about 110, and found the good wall. Ended up deco'ing up that wall.

Highlights were turning over at 150 ish on the good wall and seeing a ton of black (blue?) rockfish schooling about. Also lots of vermillions. We swam deco back up to the shallows and then scootered west in 20 fsw, popping back up next to the boat.

Agreed re Brinnon Pinnacle--that was an excellent second dive. The monkey approach worked really well on a hot day--easy peasy to get in and out of the water, minimal gear hassles, and fun to scooter the pinnacle (which literally comes to a sharp point at the top in about 20 fsw). I'd say the best structure of the pinnacle is in the western side, a dramatic wall going from 40 fsw down to around 80 or so.

Kirk ran into a lion's mane, but shook it off bravely (I looked over to see him rubbing face with reg out of mouth right after narrowly missing it).

Agreed re boat loading/unloading, that ramp seriously sucks. Next time, I'm monkey diving both dives from that ramp.

Permalink Reply by Brian Wiederspan on June 29, 2009 at 10:47am

Like Richard said, Pulali is pretty boring below 140 - 150'. We saw way more on deco than on the dive. I haven't seen a red brotula in a long time. That was really cool. Literally, aside from the cloud sponge and the red brotula, all the cool stuff was above 100-120'. At 140ish, it turns into a barren gradual slope. Don't waste money on an 18/45 fill. Like Richard said, 25/25, or even just 32% is plenty for this site.

The pinnacle is an awesome dive, and a great monkey dive site. The topography is really cool, tons of rockfish and the vis was pretty good too. I really want to go back there.

The water was like glass on the way out and between dives. The wind really kicked up during the second dive, however, and made for bit of a rough ride home, as well loading the boats.

The ramp was so flat, and tide was so far out, we had to lug all the doubles, deco bottles, stages and scooters down to the water line, launch the boats, float the gear out to the boats and load. Tide was out even further when we returned, so we had to repeat the entire process in reverse, only with waves.

All in all, an awesome day!

Permalink Reply by Kirk Hamblen on June 29, 2009 at 1:27pm

Funny how things turn out; the recreational "monkey dive" at Brinnon pinnacle was the best dive all day!
Pulali Point does have its strong points though, the topside scenery is awesome: The rugged shore line is covered in Doug firs and Madrona trees, it’s a very pretty piece of land, and watching the Eagles flying about is fun too. The one wall Doug and I found is very interesting too. I would like to take some pictures of it someday. I saw it as a dark sheer wall that’s barren except for a dozen or so pale yellow sponge clusters. The small shallow fingers to the south would be fun to dive, if you had excellent visibility, and a new diver. We did see a small Puget Sound King Crab hiding in a crack during our deco swim about. But by far the star dive site of the day was Brinnon point. Brinnon point has the largest abundance of fish stock outside Edmond Underwater Park I've ever experienced. For someone who loves to watch schools of Rockfish; me, and has a new found fascination to see just how fast a full sized Lingcod can swim...it was like visiting the Seattle Aquarium, except when the stinging jellyfish tentacles were sucked into my scooter prop and thrown into my face; that was not fun.
If it wasn’t for the lousy boat ramp I'd do the pinnacle dive again soon.

P.S. Brian, tell Jenna thanks again for the wonderful pasta salad.

Permalink Reply by Richard on June 30, 2009 at 11:29pm