Newly minted OW Diver - Florida Panhandle Trip Review

[Jmneal107]

Just returned from my open water check out dives weekend and it was about as good as it gets.

We spent Saturday at Vortex Spring in Ponce De Leon, FL. While it was a little crowded at times, the weather was perfect and we got three dives in the log book. My biggest takeaway from the first day was how important buoyancy control and trim are. This affected the vis as other divers were silting the place up to heck and back with their fin work. I plan to work a lot on buoyance in the coming months, both at the pool and local dive spot in Birmingham.

We then drove to Panama City Beach to dive the St. Andrews State Park Jetties. High tide on Sunday was at 9:20am so we were there and ready to go around 9am. It has not rained in the panhandle in weeks and that lead to some of the best visibility I have seen in the area in a while. I felt like I was diving in the Bahamas. 50-60ft vis at high tide. We did two dives before the outgoing tide started to affect current and vis. The jetties is a phenomenal dive spot , whether you are a beginner or experienced, particularly when the conditions are great.

I now have the itch to dive more and learn more! I plan to take the nitrox course and some other courses to work toward the AOW cert. as well as get on some shallower gulf wreck trips this summer. If there are any local Birmingham divers, I'd love to connect and maybe dive Blue Water park come this summer. Cheers!

 

[Cthippo]

Congratulations on getting your cert!

I can't imagine 60 foot vis, though I hope to experience it some day!

 

[BoundForElsewhere]

Congratulations and welcome to SB.

You will no longer have any disposable income and your children will have to pay for their own college but you will see wonderful things, meet amazing people, and travel to freaking awesome places.

this is the way of scuba.

 

[TMHeimer]

I took some courses at Vortex. Bought my first wetsuit there-- rented it first then decided to buy it, and I got no credit for the rental fee... Anyway, St. Andrews is a great dive, maybe best shore diving on the N. Gulf Coast. You can even tool around in the Kiddie Pool. I only had one day out of my 3 day trips there with good viz. If you're in Destin, check out the "Thumb Jetty" dive and ask about how best to do the bridge dive. I always dealt with Emerald Coast Scuba there.

 

[Belzelbub]

Just returned from my open water check out dives weekend and it was about as good as it gets.

That's a good sign. It's great when all the variables cooperate to allow for good conditions.

I now have the itch to dive more and learn more! I plan to take the nitrox course and some other courses to work toward the AOW cert. as well as get on some shallower gulf wreck trips this summer.

Good idea. Nitrox course is a good idea. You don't need to rush into the other training right away. Nitrox doesn't add any dive skills, so you can do that immediately. Then, do some diving. Work on what you learned and identify what else you need to work on. Too many seem to rush right into training and more training. Doing some diving in between that will really help.

 

[Billg68bg]

Congrats and welcome aboard!

 

[Divin'Papaw]

Congratulations! Eventually you'll want to work your way further south to hit some of the fantastic diving in Southeast FL. Palm Beach and Broward counties along with Key Largo offer a great deal of variety and some pretty incredible diving. Palm Beach County especially is a great place for drift diving. You will see all of the tropical species found in the Caribbean along with sharks, rays, eels, turtles and goliath group. All of that is within a day's drive from Birmingham. Around 11-12 hours I'd guess.

 

[edwants2dive]

Congratulations! Eventually you'll want to work your way further south to hit some of the fantastic diving in Southeast FL. Palm Beach and Broward counties along with Key Largo offer a great deal of variety and some pretty incredible diving. Palm Beach County especially is a great place for drift diving. You will see all of the tropical species found in the Caribbean along with sharks, rays, eels, turtles and goliath group. All of that is within a day's drive from Birmingham. Around 11-12 hours I'd guess.

What he said!! But he left out the bugs.

 

[Waterwulf]

Do they still allow you to dive the spring cave in Vortex Springs?

 

[Grantt]

Do they still allow you to dive the spring cave in Vortex Springs?

I was in the back of the cave Sunday. There is a locked gate, so you have to show your cave card to get the key.