Eagles Nest Ballroom Questions
- Thread starter bradymsu
- Start date
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
Jack Hammer
Contributor
Jack Hammer
Contributor
@bradymsu
It has been about 5 years since I last dove there. Eagles Nest Ballroom is a great dive for those qualified. There truly is no cavern there, just a small tube that opens into quite a massive room. Once inside the way out is back via a tiny hole on top of a ~400'/122m wide room. Visibility varies and Its wide enough you can easily lose the sight of any wall. It can be ddisorientingat times and on top of that there is a lot of silt in some parts. It's really best to go there your first time with someone familiar with the place as it can be a tad deceptive. Finding people to dive with shouldn't be that difficult if you have proper training and experience.
It has been about 5 years since I last dove there. Eagles Nest Ballroom is a great dive for those qualified. There truly is no cavern there, just a small tube that opens into quite a massive room. Once inside the way out is back via a tiny hole on top of a ~400'/122m wide room. Visibility varies and Its wide enough you can easily lose the sight of any wall. It can be ddisorientingat times and on top of that there is a lot of silt in some parts. It's really best to go there your first time with someone familiar with the place as it can be a tad deceptive. Finding people to dive with shouldn't be that difficult if you have proper training and experience.
He's full cave and trimix. If he goes with someone who has experience, he should be just fine. The ballroom isn't a big deal for anyone cave certified. My understanding is his skills are a little rusty from not doing it for a while, but with a guide or a local who knows it he's perfectly safe. Don't pust the limits and don't push depth.
PfcAJ
Contributor
Guys seriously swimming around the ballroom for a full cave/ trimix diver isn’t some outrageous feat.
its big, beautiful, and if the conditions are good the ballroom is a fantastic dive. Stay shallow, pay attention, and enjoy it.
going below the debris cone and into the cave proper? That takes some more consideration. But that’s not what’s being described here.
caveat: if the vis isn’t good, it’s a stupid dive because you can’t see the walls unless you keep a reel in your hand the whole time connected to the vertical line. It’s not a good experience.
its big, beautiful, and if the conditions are good the ballroom is a fantastic dive. Stay shallow, pay attention, and enjoy it.
going below the debris cone and into the cave proper? That takes some more consideration. But that’s not what’s being described here.
caveat: if the vis isn’t good, it’s a stupid dive because you can’t see the walls unless you keep a reel in your hand the whole time connected to the vertical line. It’s not a good experience.
OP
Thanks guys for the information. My intent now is to focus on Buford instead of Eagle's Nest for my early March trip. My interest is in diving these west Florida caves for the speleology more than for the technical aspect. From what I'm learning, both Eagle's Nest Ballroom and Buford are very similar. When I do Eagle's Nest ballroom in the future, it will be with a cave diver already familiar with that dive.
The people giving me a hard time isn't surprising given the history of Eagle's Nest and the unqualified divers that have died there or the qualified divers who have treated it as a pinnacle dive and died. My diving style is rather conservative and I'm not going to push boundaries at Eagle's Nest. My purpose for posting the same question here and on Reddit was for information gathering. I knew in advance that along with solid information from people who have dove Eagle's Nest, this post was likely to attract the internet scuba police, as well as the internet bullies/trolls. In the case of the latter, I've had four people message me letting me know about her bad reputation on this forum and her real world diving history. No harm. ScubaBoard has an ignore feature.
The people giving me a hard time isn't surprising given the history of Eagle's Nest and the unqualified divers that have died there or the qualified divers who have treated it as a pinnacle dive and died. My diving style is rather conservative and I'm not going to push boundaries at Eagle's Nest. My purpose for posting the same question here and on Reddit was for information gathering. I knew in advance that along with solid information from people who have dove Eagle's Nest, this post was likely to attract the internet scuba police, as well as the internet bullies/trolls. In the case of the latter, I've had four people message me letting me know about her bad reputation on this forum and her real world diving history. No harm. ScubaBoard has an ignore feature.
OP
Thanks Manatee! If you're around I'd love to meet up with you for Buford that Monday in early March. My intent is to do a one day cave refresher the week prior at Peacock. Also planning on doing a similar course in the Yucatan in June to learn their cave navigation system which I understand to be much different from Florida's.
J-Vo
Contributor
Given everything I had heard in the past I was surprised and excited to get to dive EN during my full cave cert back in July. My instructor had paired me with a diver that was also doing AN/DP with cave, so it was required to do a couple "deep" dives. As someone that has done most of my trimix diving in deep dark holes, I didn't finding it nearly as sketchy as some have said. I would love to go back with some mix and check out the deeper areas if not the "real cave". I could see it being daunting if all your mix diving was in places with plenty of sunlight at 300'.
Similar threads
