I haven't been to Repulse Rock in almost 8 years. I heard that the cloud sponges that used to be here a long time ago died or were destroyed over 10 years ago. That's why I couldn't find them last time. I still wanted to have another look even without cloud sponges so I came here on Aug. 18, 2011. I tied up my boat to the rocks at Elbow Point and swam across on the surface to the marker at Repulse Rock. I didn't want to scare the seals basking on the rock so I didn't swim all the way to the marker, but descended a bit before it. The bottom was 30 feet deep here and I saw a seal swimming along the reefs below me. I saw the edge of the wall and followed it down. Visibility was about 50 feet. At 125 feet deep there was a small, slightly-overhanging section of wall with several broken-off stumps of cloud sponges. Maybe this was where the semi-mythical " Valley of the Sponges" used to be. The stumps were still white and I wonder if they were starting to grow back. There were also a few living boot sponges and a tiger rockfish here. I ascended back up the drop-off and I saw more broken stumps of cloud sponges on a flat rubble slope about 115 feet deep. Near the top of the slope there was a boulder area with a school of yellowtail rockfish, quillback/copper/black rockfish and a vermilion rockfish. Many of the rocks were covered with orange cup corals. I saw another small wall about 50-60 feet deep that was also covered with cup corals.
