To see the sea; United Divers are at home in the ocean.

• Position: NEWS

Byline: Matt Kane

When you think of scuba diving, you might envision the warm, crystal blue waters of the Caribbean. Does January off Cape Ann, Massachusetts, come to mind? It does if you are Jeff Goodreau, who straps on his regulator and air tank and heads out to the decidedly untropical waters of New England all months of the year.

"It's addictive," says the 30-year-old Fitchburg resident. Goodreau feeds his addiction by leading members of United Divers of Central Massachusetts on excursions to his favorite dive spots in New England. He is one of more than 70 members of the Fitchburg-based club, a diverse group of divers with ages ranging from teen to 60-something. Members come from various walks of life - social work, medicine, military service, carpentry, plumbing, truck driving and machine work - but they all share a passion for scuba diving.

Club membership coordinator Cecelia Pringle, 51, discovered her underwater interest about two years ago.

"It is never too late to dive," she says. "It is so much fun and so interesting to see the sea life."

In addition to Goodreau's "dive-a-month," the United Divers' schedule is filled year-round with meetings, guest speakers, group dives, social events and conferences.

The pumpkin-carving contest in October is one of activities director Karen Livesay's favorite events. During the competition, held at Whalom Pond in Lunenburg, members try to carve the most impressive jack-o-lantern, but with one added challenge - the task must be accomplished underwater.

"They come out looking pretty funny," says Livesay, attributing the trickiness to cumbersome dive gloves.

The Scuba Chicks' Day of Diving is another one of Livesay's favorites. At the event, held last July at Stage Fort Park in Gloucester, husbands, boyfriends and any other available males carry the ladies' gear and escort them into the water.

"Basically they wait on us hand and foot," Livesay says.

On a more serious note, club members collect data on marine fish populations as part of the Great Annual Fish Count, a day of semi-organized dives throughout the Atlantic, Pacific and Caribbean. Twenty-one United Divers, lead by club member Al Boyarsky, counted fish in Gloucester last summer. The project is organized by the Reef Environmental Education Foundation. "Their goal is to make divers - actually the public - more aware of ecological diversity in the ocean," Boyarsky says, "which basically falls into what our club is all about."

The club dives along Cape Ann, including Lanes Cove in Gloucester and Norman's Woe in Manchester-by-the-Sea. Divers also venture to...