Just back from the Dry Tortugas

[Warhammer]

We had an excellent weekend aboard the Ultimate Getaway in the Dry Tortugas. Friday was a little ruff with the 4ft + seas, but both Saturday and Sunday offered relatively calm seas and blue skies, which made for great diving. We only managed to get in 12 dives due to the conditions on Friday and some of the group wanting to tour Ft Jefferson on Saturday, but I had a great time. While I didn't catch any bugs, the rest of the group managed to catch a few. Visibility was so so on Friday, better on Saturday (around 70/80ft on a few dives), and around 30ft on Sunday on the Baja California and radio tower. Since the group I was with was mainly interested in catching bugs, we spent the majority of the dives over ugly lobster bottoms. But we did make 2 dives on the Ultimate Ledge. That site was beautiful and literally covered in all different types of coral and fish. Due to the bad vis on the California, I didn't really get an opportunity to appreciate the wreck and it's massive size. Maybe next time conditions will be better for that one. Both it and the tower did offer some absolutely awesome Barracuda scenery, however. There were 100s of them suspended around them both. And man those Jew Fish on the California are huge and plentiful! I've never seen such big fish. The crew was excellent and keep us well feed and our tanks full. They'll soon be adding a membrane system, which should speed things up even more.

Walter, sorry I missed you for dinner Sunday, but as I expected my traveling companion was itching to start the long 14 hour journey home when we hit the dock. Maybe next time. I plan on coming back in either August or September and making a week out of it. Hopefully we can get together for a few dives and/or dinner then.

 

[Walter]

I'm glad you had a great trip. The Ultimate Ledge compares favorably with any reef I've ever seen.

DSSW,

WWW™

 

[NAUTICAL NOBLE]

Thats sounds like a cool dive ,me and my wife were thinking about going in feb. How many people were on board?( Not including crew) I am looking foward to going ...thanks for the update......here is the web site for anyone wanting to see it... http://www.ultimategetaway.net/

 

[Warhammer]

Yeah, I was really pleasantly surprised with the Ultimate Ledge after all the lobster bottoms. I would have loved to have spent the rest of the day on that site, but the group voted to move on to some rather large pinnacles for the afternoon and night dives. Those were pretty good as well.

We had 17 passengers/divers and 4 crew members. The boat holds 20 divers, and I here it's usually full. It was a tad crowded when gearing up with 17, but manageable. On drift dives the captain requires that all divers are ready to enter the water at the same time, so that complicates the crowding a little. But I usually grabbed my gear and donned it while standing, then had a seat on a cooler, out of the way, for those. On the rest of dives there is no hurry, so you can either donn your gear first or allow some of the others to enter the water and get out of the way. What I really liked was the freedom aforded to the divers. There are no DMs and everyone is encouraged/free to go their own way and do their own thing. On alot of the dives, my buddy and I never saw another diver after we moved away from the boat, making it pleasant even with 17 divers in the water. One thing that I would suggest to you is to take a good safety sausage (the longer the better). I used mine on more than one occasion after surfacing a ways from the boat. One of the Diver Alerts might come in handy as well. Oh yeah, be sure to take an extra blanket along with your sleeping bag. The captain keeps the cabins pretty cold. As far as Feburary goes, I almost positive that one of the crew members told me that they shut the boat down before New Years and it doesn't start going out again until March. Also March is highly subject to cancellation due to the weather. Have fun!

 

[ONESPEED]

Thanks for the report Warhammer, sounds like an awesome trip.