Swimming at Dusk with Sea Lions

I got back from Utah late Wednesday night and so I was aching to get back in the water. Dave Galli was looking to do a 2 hour training swim at Corona Del Mar (CDM) at 5pm on Thursday night, so I told him I was in. CDM is a nice protected cove with a low sandy beach and even some buoys that rope off the swimming area from the boats and kelp. After a week of staying up late to watch Discovery Channel's Shark Week, I probably would have opted out of any other beach at dusk.

When I arrived at the beach, Jim Fitzpatrick and Dave were at the life guard stand shedding their outer layers and spitting on their googles. I quickly did the same and we headed to the beach. Since we were going out unaccompanied by kayakers, we tucked our water bottles in the back of our suits. Jim noted these were real "crack bottles". Instead of swimming laps around the bay, he suggested we just swim south for an hour and then turn around. I know the area from previous swims and I'm not a huge fan. Even on clear days, the large off-shore reef along Crystal Cove and the kelp beds just south of CDM provide lots of habitat for marine life, which I like when I'm snorkeling, but not when I'm swimming. The water was a murky 5 feet visibility and had the standard afternoon chop with some big swells. I didn't protest and so we started swimming.

After a mile, I looked down to see a spotted gray sea lion staring up at me. He swam along underneath me and Dave for 20-30 feet and the swam off. Soon he came around for a second pass. When he came zooming up from the depths on a 3rd pass, I'll admit for a split-second I was thinking shark ambush. After another 1/2 mile of swimming I saw both Dave's white cap and Jim's yellow cap on my left so I was confused when I saw a black cap to my right. I pulled my head up and saw a big black seal head bobbing on the surface checking us out. I put my head back in the water, only to see a sea lion underneath looking up again. Man, I was thinking, lots of shark food. After seeing another seal, I wondered what was so interesting about us...then I remembered I was wearing mirrored goggles. I had just read that shiny things attract the interest of sea predators- they look like fish scales. I swam on, but the swim wasn't feeling as fun as a minute earlier.

After another few hundred yards and another sea lion encounter, I tapped Dave on the shoulder and suggested we return to the cove and finish our 2 hour swim there. Jim noted we were 9 minutes shy of an hour, but agreed. So at quarter of a mile past the first Crystal Cove parking lot, we turned around. We swam back (without sea lions), did a loop around the cove, and swam into the beach after 2 hours of swimming. My right shoulder was a little sore for the relatively short swim and I scratched all of the scabs from last Saturday's chaffing off, but it was great to be back in the Ocean. I'll be back Saturday- but I'll be staying in the cove after 5pm.