SuPrBuGmAn
Contributor
DogHouseDiver picked me up at 8:20AM in the morning, so a relatively late start, and it was great! We loaded up the trailer he tows behind his little hybrid and we headed off to Pensacola to pick up Paul, one of DHD's regular dive buddies. Once all loaded up, we headed East looking for some cool, and hopefully clear water.
Cypress Springs
We stopped by Vortex to get some fills and along the way decided to rent a canoe to hit up Cypress, which DogHouseDiver and Paul had never dived before. After the tanks were filled and we finished scarfing down some subway sandwiches, we headed off to Vernon. I had never used the canoe rental place just down the road from the boat launch, Canoes 4-U, since I usually just bring my own boat. We didn't originally plan to dive Cypress though, so figured we'd give them a try. The people running the place were very accomodating and even drove the canoe over to the launch for us. I'd recommend them to anyone looking to rent a canoe for Cypress or anywhere else in the area.
The boat launch was as packed as I'd ever seen it, with trucks and trailers lining just about any available parking area and even filing down the road a bit. We packed the canoe with three sets of gear, six tanks, and three people. This caused the canoe to be VERY overloaded as I was the lightest of the bunch(scary). :shocked2: The diving god's smiled on us though and we never swamped the boat despite only having an inch or two of freeboard. The Fish and Wildlife people were out and we were even checked for the correct number of lifejackets. I had heard they come out there, but this is the first time I've seen them around.
Cypress was quite populated yesterday. The outskirts and beaches were fairly filled with boats filled with people cooling off in the water and escaping the harsh temperatures. Aside from a couple people swimming in the basin, the water we'd be diving was pretty much empty. Most everyone stayed in the waist deep water and shallower. We geared up and after a few checks, hit the water. We were the only divers onsite and headed into the cavern, which is always an adventure fighting the flow. Visibility was endless, as usual, and we enjoyed the eels and rockbass in the cavern area. I zipped down to the bottom, removed a tank, and squeezed through the restriction and continued to the end of the line. That gave me a max depth of 63' and we enjoyed the fossils in the walls a little more before exitting into OW. We explored the rest of the vents and other nooks and crannies, did the swim thru and watched the bream, bass, pike, lizardfish, and crawfish in the basin. We ended up exitting after about 44 minutes. We enjoyed watching the local shinanigans for a bit then decided we'd do our second dive at Morrison(since we have daylight until like 8PM, we had plenty of time). Paul wanted to look for fossils and artifacts on the way back, so DHD passed him his longhose and he swam along the side of the boat for the entire trip back to the boatlaunch. He did find a cool fossilized tooth of some sorts, but no arrowheads on this trip. Despite being busy, everyone seemed to have a great dive. Everyone still had a ton of gas left, so we headed straight to our next destination.
Morrison Springs
We made it over to Morrison around 5PM, and even got a parking spot next to the pavillion. It seems as though it had probably been VERY busy earlier in the day, but people were trickling out and allowed for some close parking. We geared up quickly and headed to the water, using the "Scuba Platform". The platform was overrun with swimmers jumping from the platform as well as the railings on the side.
We entered the water, nearly 3 hours after exitting our last dive. Paul and I looked on from deeper water as DHD narrowly escaped being cannonballed by three very large swimmers - LOL. The visibility was around 30' and a bit greenish until you hit the depression where the water cleared to blue and visibility stretched out much farther. It seemed as though the cavern has been cleaned up quite a bit, which was a nice change from all the trinkets that had accumulated within it over the years. We looked around for quite a bit and it still seems as though break down is being place over the vents. Down near the lower vent, I found an eel that had a large gash behind its head. It was bleeding and obviously dying, so I found a sharp rock and tried putting it out of its misery. I was having some issues, so Paul took out his dive katana and finished it off. Shortly afterwards, I see the head of another eel. After the dive, Paul said he had seen a third head. SOMEONE WAS IN THE CAVERN DECAPITATING EELS!!! There's NO good reason for this, and if anyone sees diver's doing this, they need to be approached and lectured on being more responsible! I mean what the hell??? We eventually headed into OW and goofed around in the basin for a bit before exitting. I had a max depth of 90' for 38 minutes. We exitted via the beach, which is a hellovalot easier to use for entering and exitting anyway.
After gearing down and heading out, we decided to head over to Sally's as tradition dictates. Then DogHouseDiver suggested mexican and we agreed that'd be great. So we headed off to El Rumba in Defuniak Springs. None of us had been there so we didn't know what to expect. The place was great though, salsa was awesome, the beans were good, and it was definately worth driving a little further for
I know, it was sacriligous for us to skip Sally's, but such as life. The ride back was spent talking about diving and mainly trying to keep awake. Can't wait for next weekends dives Word on the street is that GlenFWB might have a new card coming soon :shocked2:
Cypress Springs
We stopped by Vortex to get some fills and along the way decided to rent a canoe to hit up Cypress, which DogHouseDiver and Paul had never dived before. After the tanks were filled and we finished scarfing down some subway sandwiches, we headed off to Vernon. I had never used the canoe rental place just down the road from the boat launch, Canoes 4-U, since I usually just bring my own boat. We didn't originally plan to dive Cypress though, so figured we'd give them a try. The people running the place were very accomodating and even drove the canoe over to the launch for us. I'd recommend them to anyone looking to rent a canoe for Cypress or anywhere else in the area.
The boat launch was as packed as I'd ever seen it, with trucks and trailers lining just about any available parking area and even filing down the road a bit. We packed the canoe with three sets of gear, six tanks, and three people. This caused the canoe to be VERY overloaded as I was the lightest of the bunch(scary). :shocked2: The diving god's smiled on us though and we never swamped the boat despite only having an inch or two of freeboard. The Fish and Wildlife people were out and we were even checked for the correct number of lifejackets. I had heard they come out there, but this is the first time I've seen them around.
Cypress was quite populated yesterday. The outskirts and beaches were fairly filled with boats filled with people cooling off in the water and escaping the harsh temperatures. Aside from a couple people swimming in the basin, the water we'd be diving was pretty much empty. Most everyone stayed in the waist deep water and shallower. We geared up and after a few checks, hit the water. We were the only divers onsite and headed into the cavern, which is always an adventure fighting the flow. Visibility was endless, as usual, and we enjoyed the eels and rockbass in the cavern area. I zipped down to the bottom, removed a tank, and squeezed through the restriction and continued to the end of the line. That gave me a max depth of 63' and we enjoyed the fossils in the walls a little more before exitting into OW. We explored the rest of the vents and other nooks and crannies, did the swim thru and watched the bream, bass, pike, lizardfish, and crawfish in the basin. We ended up exitting after about 44 minutes. We enjoyed watching the local shinanigans for a bit then decided we'd do our second dive at Morrison(since we have daylight until like 8PM, we had plenty of time). Paul wanted to look for fossils and artifacts on the way back, so DHD passed him his longhose and he swam along the side of the boat for the entire trip back to the boatlaunch. He did find a cool fossilized tooth of some sorts, but no arrowheads on this trip. Despite being busy, everyone seemed to have a great dive. Everyone still had a ton of gas left, so we headed straight to our next destination.
Morrison Springs
We made it over to Morrison around 5PM, and even got a parking spot next to the pavillion. It seems as though it had probably been VERY busy earlier in the day, but people were trickling out and allowed for some close parking. We geared up quickly and headed to the water, using the "Scuba Platform". The platform was overrun with swimmers jumping from the platform as well as the railings on the side.
We entered the water, nearly 3 hours after exitting our last dive. Paul and I looked on from deeper water as DHD narrowly escaped being cannonballed by three very large swimmers - LOL. The visibility was around 30' and a bit greenish until you hit the depression where the water cleared to blue and visibility stretched out much farther. It seemed as though the cavern has been cleaned up quite a bit, which was a nice change from all the trinkets that had accumulated within it over the years. We looked around for quite a bit and it still seems as though break down is being place over the vents. Down near the lower vent, I found an eel that had a large gash behind its head. It was bleeding and obviously dying, so I found a sharp rock and tried putting it out of its misery. I was having some issues, so Paul took out his dive katana and finished it off. Shortly afterwards, I see the head of another eel. After the dive, Paul said he had seen a third head. SOMEONE WAS IN THE CAVERN DECAPITATING EELS!!! There's NO good reason for this, and if anyone sees diver's doing this, they need to be approached and lectured on being more responsible! I mean what the hell??? We eventually headed into OW and goofed around in the basin for a bit before exitting. I had a max depth of 90' for 38 minutes. We exitted via the beach, which is a hellovalot easier to use for entering and exitting anyway.
After gearing down and heading out, we decided to head over to Sally's as tradition dictates. Then DogHouseDiver suggested mexican and we agreed that'd be great. So we headed off to El Rumba in Defuniak Springs. None of us had been there so we didn't know what to expect. The place was great though, salsa was awesome, the beans were good, and it was definately worth driving a little further for
I know, it was sacriligous for us to skip Sally's, but such as life. The ride back was spent talking about diving and mainly trying to keep awake. Can't wait for next weekends dives Word on the street is that GlenFWB might have a new card coming soon :shocked2:
