Dive Trip Report to:
Florida's Beaches!
Purpose:
To
Beach Dive Florida
for old wrecks, cannon, ships, bugs etc!
Dive #:
Sunday, 23-July, Morning Dive. My Dive #317
A. Dive Boat / Location:
Beach Dive - Humiston Park, Vero Beach
B. Conditions:
Visibility:
Don't even ask! Less than 3 ft at the 3rd and 4th reef!
Seas:
FLAT (Winds out of the West)
Water Temp:
78 deg! Still used a full Farmer John! Tried to just swim later with no wet suit - 78 Deg is COLD!
Skies:
Typical Florida Sunny Clear Blue Skies
Air Temp:
80's
C. Dive Information:
Depth & Time:
Me: Genesis Nitrox Dive Computer -
11 ft for 2 min!
Air consumption:
Me: 3500 - 3400 lb (120 cu ft). We do use air on the Beach Entry and Exit!
Current:
Mild to the north! After swimming out, you could notice the current carrying ya north!
Description:
Well, as typical Florida Morning Beach Dive, your up at 5:30 am, leave the house by 7:00 am to arrive at the dive location just before 8:00 am. Previous weather checks said winds out of the West all week - that's good for beach diving, it knocks down the waves. But, calls to the lifeguard stations said there was only 3 ft of vis on the 2nd reef. It looked better further out! We arrived at 8, in the water by 8:15. It took 30 minutes to swim on our backs out to the 3rd and 4th reef areas. Down we went, still heading east! Vis was zero to 3 ft! I almost ran into a reef ledge several times. Well, after a few minutes, I headed back up to see where everybody else was. They also were back on the surface. Snorkeler "Caribbean Crazy" was out with us just blasting all around us! It's easy to swim without 100 lbs of dive gear on! She also took a few dives to the bottom - almost hit it with the face mask before she saw it! ScubaGirl took a few dives down and by general vote we decided to call it a day! Again, it was a 30 minute swim back. Beach Diving does contain hard exercise!! The current had carried us north quite a ways and we had a walk back to the cars. The group decided to have lunch, have a Bacardi Limon R&C and shoot the bull! We discussed our bottom time and if we could really call this a dive. The vote was, we had to get up early, an hour drive, a half hour swim out and back each way - yea - it's a dive
Discussions with the life guards concluded that this would probably be the Conditions for Mini Season this Wed and Thursday. So, beach divers for Bug Mini Season - don't count on seeing the bugs before you hit them. It takes several days for the vis to improve!!