hammet
Contributor
why?I did Ft. Lauderdale/west palm a couple winters ago. Very unimpressed with the drift dives....all of them.
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why?I did Ft. Lauderdale/west palm a couple winters ago. Very unimpressed with the drift dives....all of them.
In 2006, I had a couple of lousy drops in WPB so I bought a 30’ center console Century with twin 250’s. I did that for 10 years, and it was ok but it was not a gentle tow at 6gph with my F-150.
Hi @Tom Winters
Where are you doing your local diving now? I dive solo, rarely see another diver. What is lousy water, viz?
Viz has varied from good to spectacular so far this summer. It's so easy to find knowledgeable boaters and divers to join us. I would sooner give up diving than get rid of my boat and resort to cattle boats. So it's not cheap to own a boat but there are endless advantages. Silly to be towing a 30' boat around (your F-150 was way over matched) when you could just keep it at an indoor storage place and have it sitting in the water ready to go with a phone call.
When you know the territory, you can nearly always find the reef. Yesterday, I volunteered to take 2 first time visitors to Boynton Beach with me. We were dropped on the west facing reef. One of the divers had a lot of trouble descending. We spent a fair amount of time drifting. Finally, I went my own way and the two of them were to sort through the problems and get redropped. I found myself in 65 feet of featureless sand. I swam quite a distance east, found the reef, and enjoyed the rest of the dive. A compass is very useful, the current can be tricky, it was quite strong west, northwest on this day.Well, the way I look at it. It is what it is.
If you are a guest with a limited time, every dive counts. You want to maximize that potential experience of your vacation. I understand that.
However, if you are a local. Well, you can well manage to have a so-so dive. Next weekend you can have another experience.
So, yes, being a tourist it can suck. I remember I came to Ft. Ltd and with another insta-buddy got off course and spent 80% of the drift dive over sand. Not me or him knew which way is the reef.
Now I wouldn't mind it. Dive is a dive.
Hi @Tom Winters
Where are you doing your local diving now? I dive solo, rarely see another diver. What is lousy water, viz? Where do you fly to do most of your diving?