General meeting: The February general meeting will be on Monday, February 2 2004 in the Garden Room at the Orinda Public Library. Entertainment will consist of either a presentation on the Blurb editors jewelry of choice even if she can’t afford it (Black Pearls), or a Catalina video, or both (not to mention the T-Shirt Vote)….

If you missed the January general meeting you missed a GREAT slide presentation by Tracy Grogan, from a trip to the Solomon islands and of humpback whales in Tonga…..He took a photo class on the Solomons trip, and it really paid off with some excellent work. Thanks Tracy!

General meetings are generally held the first Monday of every month from 8-10 PM at:

Garden Room

Orinda Library

24 Orinda Way

Orinda, CA 94563

Executive board meeting: Executive board meetings are usually held on the third Monday of the month at 8 p.m. and are usually preceded by a potluck at 6:30 pm.

Because of the President’s Day holiday in February, the February E Board location is still up in the air, although we anticipate that it will PROBABLY be held on Tuesday February 17^th, since Alacostans will be celebrating President’s Day with a dive on February 16th. An update will be provided at the General Meeting. All Alacosta members are welcome to attend EBoard meetings.

Old Dives: The New Year’s day dive, a long cherished Alacosta tradition, fell victim to King Neptune’s bad mood. This year, even a hike at Lobos wasn’t an option in the midst of a rather bad storm. Hopefully, next month’s Blurb will be filled with diving adventures!

Speaking of next month’s Blurb, submissions are, as always, welcome, but please submit your articles, dive reports, letters to the editor, or whatever, no later than February 17^th; as the Blurb editor will be leaving for a BIG milestone birthday blowout in Paris shortly thereafter, meaning the March Blurb will be published in a week earlier than usual…note that this early deadline will still give all participants a chance to report on the big President’s day dive…

President’s Day Dive, February 16, 2004: Chris Fryer is chairing a President’s Day dive. The dive will be a two or three tank dive depending on the majority’s interests. If you want to go on this great dive, email Chris at cfryer@hansonbridgett.com to sign-up, first come, first served.

Van Damme Ab dive: John Beland will be leading a spring camping trip/dive to celebrate the newly opened abalone season, at Van Damme State Park in Mendocino, April 9 – 11, 2004. As is usually the case with Alacosta dives, there will without a doubt be tank diving, free diving for abs aided by the club inflatables, and a terrific potluck on Saturday night featuring some of the ‘spoils’ of the ‘hunt’! And yes, this is Easter weekend, so maybe there will even be an egg hunt in the campground Sunday morning (or at least a good omelette or two).

If you want to go, you are responsible for making your own camping reservations (unless of course you are inclined to find a nice B and B in town). Campsites can be reserved at Van Damme at http://www.reserveamerica.com/jsp/commonpage.jsp?goto=/usa/ca/vand/newindex.html

For more information, you can email John at jwbeland@att.net, or call him at 510-482-2934.

Cozumel, April 2004: Simon Kisch is leading a trip to Coz, departing April 25, returning May 2. The trip hotel will be the Barracuda: cost with 5 days of two tank dives will be $499 p/p double, and $685 single; airfare on SunTrips from Oakland will be antoehr $485 including tax. If you want to join this great trip, call Simon at 510-663-6400 (work), 510-841-5900 (home), or on his cell at 510-459-0256.

Catalina 2004: The dates for the annual trip to Catalina will be September 11 -18, 2004. Mark your calendars now and plan to attend; details to follow soon! Catalina trip Co-Chairs will be Rocky Rockafellow and Susan Carter.

Australia: Susan Carter plans to lead a dive to Oz in November of 2005. She is starting the preliminary planning and hopes to have an initial proposal at the March meeting . If you are interested in going, email Susan at Susan.Carter@ucop.edu or still15320@aol.com or keep an eye out for an email from Susan with more information in February or March.

Susan’s tentative plans, if there is enough interest, is to lead a nine day trip in the Coral Sea. She is researching both Mike Ball and the Undersea Explorer and is currently leaning towards the exploratory expedition to the Far Northern Reefs of the Coral Sea and GBR on the later. General info on that trip is available at http://www.undersea.com.au/ so check it out, or be on the lookout for an email from Susan in February or March. Cost for a group of eleven or twelve would be approximately $2800 p/p not including airfare to Oz, but including air transportation from Cairns or Port Douglas out to the departure site. This figure is in US dollars at the current unfavorable exchange rate, and the trip would be booked in Aussie dollars, so it will be cheaper if the Presidential election outcome or other fortuitous events leads to a strengthened US dollar. Susan has dove Mike Ball with Alacosta, but hasn’t dove the Undersea Explorer, so if there are any club members out there with experiences on that boat, Susan would be particularly interested in hearing from them with their assessment of the operation, whether or not you want to join the trip.

Alacosta T Shirts Proposal: After much discussion, the Alacosta EBoard voted at its January meeting to recommend approval of the following TShirt proposal to the general membership of the club. If you have any comments or an opinion on the proposal, be sure to attend the February general meeting on February 2^nd.

Tee Shirts

Color: Ash Description: Large club logo printed on back (see below). Single color small logo (see below) printed on front, left breast, in navy blue.

Cost: Set up fee: $200; Per shirt: $6.70 (Add $1.50 for XXL), minimum quantity of 72.

Propose an initial purchase of 100 shirts to be sold to members for $12.00 ($14.00 for XXL). Treasurer to maintain a stock of shirts for sale to members.

Golf Shirts

Color: Preferred--navy blue with silver embroidery, but since these will be individually ordered, color is optional. (Shirt and embroidery combinations should be fixed, i.e. if a navy blue shirt is ordered, it will come with silver embroidery, white shirts with navy blue, etc.)

Description: Small logo embroidered on front, left breast.

Cost: Set up fee: $100; Per shirt: $16.00, minimum quantity of 48.

Propose individual orders for this shirt, no stock maintained. Price to members $20.00.

Large logo: This will be a large version of the club patch, with the club’s web site—www.alacosta.org—below in navy blue.

Small logo: This will be a circular design, approximately 2 ½ inches in diameter, with “ALACOSTA DIVERS” as the top half of the circle, and “established 1957” as the lower half of the circle. Inside the circle will be a scuba diver (similar to the one from the club patch).

Alacosta Calendar

February 2, 2004, Monday, February General Meeting

February 16, 2004, Monday, President Day’s Dive, Cypress Sea

February 17, 2004, Tuesday, February EBoard, location TBD

April 9 – 11, 2004 Ab dive and camping trip, Van Damme State Park

April 25-May 2, 2004 Cozumel

September 11 – 18, 2004; Catalina Trip, Emerald Bay

November 2005 Australia

Alacosta Divers Officers and Executive Board Members:

Officers: Mike Daily, President; Kevin Dalley, Vice President; John Beland, Treasurer; James ‘Rocky’ Rockafellow, Secretary and Immediate Past President;

Chris Fryer, Membership Coordinator; Susan Carter, Blurb Editor

Executive Board Members: Mike Elliott, Simon Kisch, Bill McDowell, John Purnell, Gary Schleimer, Rob Vermuelen

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The Blurb

Alacosta Divers, Inc.

Editor: Susan Carter/still15320@aol.com/415-647-9036

101 Appleton Ave

San Francisco, CA 94110