Truth Aquatics, Santa Barbara, Southern California
This review is a review of the Truth Aquatics dive boat operating out of Santa Barbara, CA.
We chartered a boat to San Miguel Island (Part of the Channel Islands) in April of 2013. Truth Aquatics had us board the boat around 10pm the night prior to departure and we were able to sleep in really comfortable and clean berths while the boat was still docked. Around 3am, they started the engines and began the 5 hour ride towards San Miguel. For those of your unfamiliar with the Northern Channel Islands, San Miguel is a wonderful dive destination but it is also the most difficult one to reach because of the distance and lack of protection from northern winds and swells. When we arrived, we were greeted by the calmest seas the dive boat has seen in many months.
Our first dive site was Wilson's Rock, which was an underwater pinnacle that sat at 50ft. The descent was somewhat uncomfortable due to the fact that visibility of low (10ft) and you appear to be descending into the abyss. However they were spot on with the anchor and once at the pinnacle, it was absolutely amazing the amount of life there. There were barely any bare rocks as most of it was covered with sea stars (blue knobby, bat stars and okra), metridium and anemones. The fish life there was very abundant as well, very large sheephead, lingcod and many species of rockfish lived there. While there was a current, the pinnacle itself is not too large so you can always circle back to find the anchor and ascent when ready.
During our surface interval, they served hot drinks and a really delicious lunch. The next dive site was March Rock, this site was part of the island and was a really beautiful dive as well. There was a medium sized trench that you can go through and there it lived lots of large sheepheads, black and yellow rock fish, nudibranches and tons of anemones. This dive was a little surgy but it was nothing too bad.
Our last dive site was a cove right next to the March Rock, I would presume the site name is March Cove but I may be incorrect. The visibility here was phenomenal, the only thing that blocked the viz at times were the abundance of krill in the water column. Here, the sea floor was covered with shells of barnacles, mussels and other arthropods. Sunflowers stars roam around looking for food as well as California sea hares. This was a relatively shallow dive, maxed at 40ft.
Post dive, we motored back to Santa Barbara and many of us were fast asleep in the comfortable beds. We awoke to a pod of Doll's Porpoises riding our bow, which is quite rare as they are usually very shy animals. We arrived back in Santa Barbara early evening.
Overall, this was a fantastic trip granted that we had perfect ocean conditions which is really rare for this location. However, with that being said, it was said to me that 1 in 5 boats attempting to get to San Miguel makes it successfully (rest must turn back half way and dive one of the other islands). Most of the time the dive conditions are meant for advanced divers as it gets choppy, surgy and most of the dives are relatively deep. If however, you get lucky, it is hands down one of the best places to dive in Southern California. I would also highly recommend Truth Aquatics as your method of getting there because they have a very professional crew and very comfortable boats. The shop provides steel 95s tanks so that is another plus about the shop.
