Florida Panhandle Help!!!

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

Reef

Contributor
Messages
965
Reaction score
19
Location
Tampa, FL and Washington, NC
# of dives
1000 - 2499
The wife and I are sitting next to the kiddie pool at St.Andrews Park. It's blown out. I think I could surf the waves in the kiddie pool.:(

Long story short. We are packing up and heading towards Destin, and Navarre. Bug mentioned Gulf Shores. I realize the conditions will likely be the same, but we have to try something. We have no desire to dive Vortex which is the only Spring locally we know of.

We want to get wet today. Last night we made the 6 1/2 hour trek down in the middle of the night, and conditions evidently drastically changed since yesterday.

Any help will be rewarded with alcohol (if of age) when we all meet!:D

Thanks!!!
 
The wife and I are sitting next to the kiddie pool at St.Andrews Park. It's blown out. I think I could surf the waves in the kiddie pool.:(

Long story short. We are packing up and heading towards Destin, and Navarre. Bug mentioned Gulf Shores. I realize the conditions will likely be the same, but we have to try something. We have no desire to dive Vortex which is the only Spring locally we know of.

We want to get wet today. Last night we made the 6 1/2 hour trek down in the middle of the night, and conditions evidently drastically changed since yesterday.

Any help will be rewarded with alcohol (if of age) when we all meet!:D

Thanks!!!

I got the impression yesterday that things were already getting canceled in the Gulf for this weekend. Some may still go out. You can check with the dive ops on an individual basis, but just because the dive op decides to go out, doesn't necessarily mean that they should. (i.e. green monsters and "ralph" tend to appear).

Some of us in the panhandle area are heading to JB and Vortex this weekend for the DR Demo days. I was planning on doing the Oriskany on Sunday, but, after hearing about the forecast for seas yesterday, changed my mind.

Nature is a fickle beast. Good luck finding a dive for you and the fam.
 
There's a lot in the panhandle if you're willing to work for it. You can always access Morrison Springs from the river. You can rent a canoe and head over to Cypress. If you don't mind shallow, you can dive Merritt's Mill Pond. Head east a couple of hours and dive Troy.
 
Hope you guys had fun.

Surf is rough in Gulf Shores right now, putting all but the dive sites in the pass, out of reach. Vis in the pass likely isn't that good.

Destin would be your best bet as the surf will be blocked by the jetties and the pass itself.

Find Shane(at Vortex) and talk to him about Cypress and rent a canoe from him to go dive it :) Its worth the trip.
 
I second what Mat said....if you can make it to Cypress, it is worth the trip.

Hope you guys had fun.

Surf is rough in Gulf Shores right now, putting all but the dive sites in the pass, out of reach. Vis in the pass likely isn't that good.

Destin would be your best bet as the surf will be blocked by the jetties and the pass itself.

Find Shane(at Vortex) and talk to him about Cypress and rent a canoe from him to go dive it :) Its worth the trip.
 
We are at Vortex now. Thanks for the advice.

When we got in nobody else was in the water and viz was GREAT.:D

I stopped by Vortex this afternoon on the way to Marianna. I am going to try to dive the cave with Eduardo on Sunday if everything goes as expected.

Glad to hear things worked out.
 
Thanks for the information.

4 days later we managed to get wet 3 times.:(

Vortex on Friday after the original post. We headed to Destin/Ft.Walton on Saturday and conditions stunk.

Sunday we dove for 30 minutes at St.Andrews Park. Viz was horrible, and our tide charts must have been off. We along with 10-15 others had a tough time getting back across into the kiddie pool.

If anyone needs a dive buddy next weekend let me know. The wife is out of town, and I still need my fix!
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/teric/
https://xf2.scubaboard.com/community/forums/cave-diving.45/

Back
Top Bottom