East West
Contributor
My good friend and only dive buddy has invited me and the family many times to stay at his house in the Florida Keys . He is one hell of nice guy and have had many years of wonderful times together . He grew up in Florida and has been diving for forty years . I have been fortunate to own a boat for many years since I like to dive when I want and where I want . He likes to dive and owns three boats . The house in the keys has a dock for his boat and a short ride through the canal to open water . We both live on the west coast which he has a house with a dock and two boats . You should have a dive buddy like mine. We flew into Fort Lauderdale rented a car and drove to his house . Being a family vacation there is a fine line to spend time with them , go diving a marine sanctuary , sight seeings and Ed and I to go spearfishing . We finally launched the boat on the gulf side to spearfish because of the huge amount of wrecks . It is unbelievable how many there are looking on the charts and most never get dove . The plan was to have a list of wreck locations and spend no more than ten minutes to meter it . The third one gave a meter reading in seventy feet of water . I put on and my fins and mask to check it out and saw bait fish that were circling the wreck . A amber jack swam by and I was excited to shoot some big game . He went down on scuba to spear grouper and hog snapper . He finished the dive with some fish and it was now my turn . Big fish you need to free dive to spear them . I made a back roll into the water and turned to immediately see a shark swimming toward me fifteen feet away . I pushed him on the nose with the gun and he left . The current picked up so I had to work off the anchor line . There was a big barracuda hanging around the boat But I was waiting for amber jack or other game . Ed said don't shoot that barracuda but I thought it was okay for target practice . I made a good shot and the shaft and fish screamed away from me . I grabbed the float line to fight and land the fish when I saw the same shark coming in , o **** . The shark was going toward the fish when things got worse . I was near the boat but still holding the line so not to lose the shaft and float . The barracuda screamed over to the boat and me to run from the shark . It was trying to hide next to me and the boat . Now the shark is in front of me and the barracuda is behind me . It does not help to panic so you deal with the situation the best you can . There was plenty of blood in the water next to me and I only had the gun to defend myself . An eight foot bull shark can do some damage to you and me being a novice with sharks . He came in and I just pushed the gun near him a few times and he swam away . He must of not been hungry or something so I climbed back on the boat and brought the fish and gear aboard . It was getting late in the afternoon and we called it a day . The lesson learned was listen to your dive buddy , don't spear that barracuda !
