Our latest Third Age Expeditions column for LuxeBeat Magazine has been awarded “editor’s pick.” The editor commented… “Perfect article for October.” Kathryn and I were not thinking about Halloween when the finishing touches to the piece were added, so incorporating the word “Graveyard” into the article’s title was kismet.
It is my distinct pleasure that I can now formally announce who the speakers will be for “Explorers Talk” on November 5th, at the Vancouver Aquarium Theatre. In no particular order, they are:
Jude is Founder and Editor in Chief of Hakai Magazine, a magazine focused on science and society in coastal ecosystems. As a freelancer, she writes about science and the environment for readers young and old. Her book, “Salmon: A Scientific Memoir” (2014), explores the human relationship with Pacific salmon and chronicles her discoveries and thoughts collected over a four-year period in the field with scientists who study British Columbia’s coastal ecosystem.
Award-winning environmental writer and conservation photographer, Isabelle Groc shares her passion for everything wild, big and small, on land, in water, on the move. Her work focuses on environmental science, wildlife natural history and conservation, endangered species, marine mammals and ecosystems, and the changing relationships between people and the natural world. She aims to create engaging stories that increase our understanding and awareness of conservation issues and inspire change.
A recipient of the Order of Canada and Order of British Columbia, internationally recognized pioneer in the diving industry, Phil Nuytten has spent 40 years creating deep-water dive products that have opened the ocean’s depths to exploration and industry. Among his many pursuits Phil is an inventor; scientist; Sub-sea engineer; commercial diver; deep-sea explorer; author; carver and native advocate; entrepreneur; designer of the Newtsuit and the Exosuit; publisher of DIVER Magazine, the longest-established scuba magazine in North America; President of Nuytco Research; opened his first dive store in 1957; founded Can-Dive Service in 1966; co-founder of Oceaneering International in 1969; took part in the first saturation dive under polar ice; took part in the first mixed-gas dives under polar ice; given the name Tlaxwsam (Red Snapper) by the Kwakwaka’wakw tribe. Yes, we’re willing to take a chance on this multi-talented local kid who announced back in September 2018 that he was designing, and planned to build, an underwater human settlement off of the coast of Vancouver, Canada in the Pacific Ocean.
It is with immense gratitude that I extend our deepest thanks to all three of these Explorers Club Fellows for generously agreeing to participate in the Explorers Club, Canadian Chapter, BC / Yukon Region’s first Explorers Talk event. Many thanks also to all who put their name forward.
Jett Britnell FI’16, FRCGS, FRGS
Regional Director BC/Yukon
Canadian Chapter
The Explorers Club
“Raptures of the Deep: Beneath British Columbia’s Emerald Sea”, our latest Third Age Expeditions column for Luxe Beat Magazine, has just been published.
Queen Charlotte Strait lies between the “top end” of Vancouver Island and British Columbia’s mainland. It is an immense waterway with narrow, constricted passages, fjord-like inlets, large islands and a tangled maze of scrawnier weather-beaten islets. Seasonal upwellings combined with extreme tidal water movement produces an enriched planktonic soup that supports a lush profusion of exotic marine life and more than 400 species of marine fish. These waters also support a healthy population of marine mammals and are deemed to be one of the best places on earth to observe seals, sea lions, dolphins, porpoise, Minke whales, grey whales, humpback whales and a resident pod of more than 100 killer whales.
Link to story here
As the Explorer Club’s Regional Director, BC/Yukon, Canadian Chapter, it is with great pleasure I can now confirm “Explorers Talk” in Vancouver is all systems go!
Tickets available here: Explorers Talk Tickets
The Vancouver Aquarium Theatre is booked for the evening of November 5th!
A call for three presenters from the Explorer Club’s BC / Yukon Chapter is in progress. Soon after August 1st, we will announce the speakers.
$20.00 general admission tickets will be offered exclusively to BC/Yukon Explorers Club membership for two weeks. After that, all remaining tickets will be made available for sale to the public. We will post when this happens.
So… take your protein pills and put your helmet on as the countdown has commenced for “Explorers Talk” in Vancouver.
Until then, dare to Explore… Dream… Discover.
Jett Britnell FI’16, FRCGS, FRGS
Regional Director BC/Yukon
Canadian Chapter
The Explorers Club
Our latest Third Age Expeditions column about “Fish Photography: The Ultimate Undersea Skill” was published today by Luxe Beat Magazine. It was also selected as an Editors Pick Feature.
Use whatever cover the reef terrain provides and keep the sun behind you. As you slowly creep forward, use as little extra movement as possible and decide how you will frame your subject. If the fish appears nervous, stop and play the waiting game. Every fish has a minimum approach distance. If you violate this limit, the fish will likely swim away. If the fish seem really skittish, simply leave the area and return later in the dive to try again. By then, they will have forgotten about you and resumed their normal routine.
Link to the full story: Here
Happy to receive a note from Nikon Canada today advising that we are among an elite international group of special Nikon photographers and that we are now a Nikon Professional Services Member.
Luxe Beat Magazine has published our most recent Third Age Expeditions column about octopus called, “Realm of the Giant Pacific Octopus.”
Giant Pacific octopus are about 90 percent soft-bodied muscle except for two small plates anchoring their heads, together with a beak used to grasp and bite prey They possess three hearts and nine brains. Two smaller hearts pump their blue blood to the gills, while a larger third heart circulates blood to the rest of the body. One central brain controls their nervous system and there is a large ganglion of nerve cells at the base of each of their eight arms, which act like independent brains that work both independently and together to coordinate movement. Their blue blood contains a copper-rich protein called hemocyanin which is more efficient than hemoglobin in cold ocean environments and improves oxygen flow.
Here is a link to the story: here
Join us for a “Polar Cruising Adventure” aboard PolarQuest’s, M/S Quest, August 14 – 24, 2019. Kathryn and are special guests for a once-in-a-lifetime adventure to one of the world’s most remote, northerly, wilderness realms! With ten nights on board the small expedition ship M/S Quest there will be ample time for grand shore-based nature excursions and wildlife encounters. In August the polar ice is slowly starting to loosen its frozen grip, which offers good opportunities to explore the seldom visited eastern parts of Norway’s Svalbard archipelago, which geographically, is closer to the North Pole than to Norway its nearest neighbour 1,000 km away. I am also aboard as a Special Lecturer during this polar voyage.
Not so much fear and loathing of sharks, but more of a love story about an apex predator that I have both admired and studied for the past 55 years. Yes, I was the kid who chose sharks as the topic for my interest talk to my fellow grade 5 classmates in Ottawa, many years before the movie JAWS scared the living bejesus out of people. So, you could say that I was an early adopter when it came to shark appreciation. This is a story Kathryn and I wrote for Shearwater Research Inc (manufacturers of rugged dive computers for technical divers). Kathryn learned to overcome her fear of sharks after diving into my deep blue sea over the past decade.
Here is link to the story: Here
Luxe Beat Magazine has published our latest column, “The President and the Lady: World’s Greatest Diveable Intact Shipwreck?” You can read it: Here
Bathed in a shroud of dim pale blue light the silent steel hulk looms up from the shadowy depths. An enormous ship at 654 feet the SS President Coolidge, an American luxury ocean liner when she was launched in built in 1931, is equivalent in length to two- and one-half football fields when placed end to end. Like every shipwreck, the Coolidge has a glorious story to tell about a time long ago, in a place far, far away. The tale of how this metal hulk sank into a watery grave was written during the tides of war more than a half century ago.
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