Spring Break 2013 - And we're off

[JesperS]

On a Spring Break diving road trip w/ my kid. As always, I completely overpacked. Our poor Jetta is loaded to the gills.

Day 0: Checked into the High Springs Country Inn. Perfectly passable for the price, plenty of room to spread out. Free internet was a plus.

Day 1: Had to completely up-end my plans for day one, as it consisted of Orange Grove and Troy Springs, both of which are closed to flooding. So we switched things up, did Devil's Den and drifted Rainbow River. To further prove that maybe this wasn't meant to be, the very first dive flooded and killed my GP2. Don't know what happened. Latch and o-ring both looked fine. Did the dive housing leak?



Not a great start to things. Fortunately, my kid is awesome, and as a way-to-go present for a good mid-term, myself, baby mamma, and his grandparents chipped in to get him a SeaLife Reefmaster for the trip, so at least it will be photo documented.

Devil's Den was a fun dive for us noobs, and a good primer for our gear in freshwater (thought I was conservative, but I was still overweighted).



After we got done with our dive and packed into the car, I called up Rainbow River Water Taxi and told 'em we were on the way. Took us about a half hour or so to get to KP hole park, and the taxi was there to pick us up just before we finished getting ready. $10 per rider, bring a flag (maybe they have 'em, didn't ask since we brought our own). They captain and mate were great, pointing out waypoints and springs.



Immediate equipment failure: My son is using my mask from when I was his age (one of the few not brand-new pieces of kit we have). It had side windows, and one is now missing. No worries, the water taxi boys hook us up with a spare mask, and tell us to drop it off at the concession. Sweet!

The drift dive was nice (but boy do I hate carrying the flag), saw lots of neat life and such.

I <3 sand boils



Oh, and another catastrophic equipment failure! This time it was me! Exhale, inhale a mouthful and lungful of water with the mouthpiece still in my mouth! I've read about this, but had hoped NOT to have it happen! Fortunately, I wear a bungied backup reg, popped it in and coughed the water out, and completed the drift on the backup. Didn't have the wherewithal to NOT lose the mouthpiece, but still pretty proud of myself and pleased with my training and equipment setup.



Back to High Springs, hang our stuff up and ate @ Great Outdoors, good prime-rib and my kid killed the Suwanee Cheeseburger. Good stuff.

Visited Cave Country Dive Shop for fills and some other stuff, including a new mask for kiddo . Good people and super nice shop!

Day 2: Got the car packed back up and headed to Ginnie Springs. Got there early since we knew it would be busy, and for our first visit, opted to only do the ballroom and stay out of the way of the cave divers. Unfortunately, during the gearing up phase, I kinked my back REAL good, and as of this writing, I'm on heat and it's still pretty bad. We opted to leave the camera on land and just enjoy the dive, and it was enjoyable, once the weight of the gear was off my back (though it still hurt).

Once we left there, we had an hour drive to kiddo's grandmas house (on baby mamma's side) and we visited with her, uncle, and aunt for lunch and a few hours. Then we drove through Ocala forest over to Orange City near Orlando, where we are crashing tonight.

We should be at Blue Springs State Park around the time of gate open tomorrow for our last fresh water dive.

After that, we shoot down to Key Largo for Mon-Thu. Hopefully my back recovers, and the weather isn't as bad as the report is starting to look, though I am a Floridian, and know how sporadic those scattered thunderstorms can be. Night dive with Elena Wednesday, and Lionfish dinner Tuesday! Woohoo!

We will be diving with Rainbow Reef Tuesday PM, Wednesday AM, and Tuesday PM, weather and back permitting, so let us know if you are going to be onboard so we can say hi!
Sorry if this is longwinded and bloggish.

And don't mind the GoPro attachment below, can't seem to get rid of it.

 

[JesperS]

And a big HAHA at myself, this trip has quite a few guffaws...just double checked the Blue Springs website, and I must have had an incorrect date stuck in my head for some time now, because water activity, including scuba diving, is closed until March 15th, and tomorrow is only the 11th.

We may substitute Wekiva Springs or Kelly Park @ Rock Springs for snorkeling or tubing, or we may just sleep in and head down to KL directly. We've been up EARLY every morning so far, so this is sounding like a LOVELY plan.

 

[JamesK]

Sounds like you are making the best out of it with the weather and flooding issues. Great!

The Great Outdoors is my favorite place to eat in High Springs. For breakfast check out Alice's. Great food. Inexpensive and will fill you up! The Diner across the street from you is good too.

Have fun!!!!

---------- Post added March 10th, 2013 at 10:25 PM ----------

Sounds like you are making the best out of it with the weather and flooding issues. Great!

The Great Outdoors is my favorite place to eat in High Springs. For breakfast check out Alice's. Great food. Inexpensive and will fill you up! The Diner across the street from you is good too.

Have fun!!!!

Well disregard that. I just reread it and saw you already left High Springs! Lol. Oops.

Well, continue to have fun!

 

[Katch]

That's an early start for Spring Break 2014


Mrs. Macs and Lazy Days both had Lionfish on their menus last week.

 

[deeper thoughts]

Enjoy your trip. The seas are a bit "up" right now

 

[JesperS]

And a big HAHA at myself, this trip has quite a few guffaws...just double checked the Blue Springs website, and I must have had an incorrect date stuck in my head for some time now, because water activity, including scuba diving, is closed until March 15th, and tomorrow is only the 11th.

We may substitute Wekiva Springs or Kelly Park @ Rock Springs for snorkeling or tubing, or we may just sleep in and head down to KL directly. We've been up EARLY every morning so far, so this is sounding like a LOVELY plan.

Day 3: So we got to sleep in, which was nice, and decided to go to Blue Springs to check it out, we're nearly there and it's six bucks, so cram the car full again (hooray for hotel cart things, these things are the bomb! I wish they would fold up mini style, I would totally steal one. As it is, we've got one currently parked in our room full of all our dive gear, ahahaha, don't tell!). Seriously, they are the ultimate dive cart.



I hauled 4x AL80s on that bad boy too, could probably take it all at one time without a sweat. Just waiting for someone to yell at me for using it

Anyways, back to Blue Spring State Park. I asked the ranger when I saw the "scuba diving = $16" sign up, and she said well, yes, you CAN dive, but there are manatees in the run, so it's limited. We decided to give our bodies (mostly my back) a break and skip it, but check out the park anyways. Nice layout, with lots of boardwalk on the spring run and headspring. The parking area is at a swimming area / normal scuba departure spot, but this was closed. There were roughly 30 manatees in the spring run, due to a recent cold snap. I think I had my dates right, but they got changed when the tees returned.



We will definitely come back here, going to see how far ahead you have to reserve a cabin (my guess is close to a year, seems to be the norm for good parks these days ) Normally, you park, gear up at your car, walk a boardwalk for 1400 feet, then get in the water, swim upstream to the headspring, and OW can drop to the reaper sign, and are not allowed to carry lights. Looks neat as heck, oh and then you drift down the run to the parking area! So exiting is much easier then entering, I like it. St Johns river is at the end of the run, and there are river tours and kayaking excursions.

Sounds like you are making the best out of it with the weather and flooding issues. Great!

The Great Outdoors is my favorite place to eat in High Springs. For breakfast check out Alice's. Great food. Inexpensive and will fill you up! The Diner across the street from you is good too.

Have fun!!!!

---------- Post added March 10th, 2013 at 10:25 PM ----------


Well disregard that. I just reread it and saw you already left High Springs! Lol. Oops.

Well, continue to have fun!

Thanks James! Great Outdoors was indeed great, awesome ambiance, good food, good service, and I thought the cost was perfectly reasonable. Saw Alice's, and saw the Diner, and rued that we didn't get more dining opportunities. Fortunately, we now have an excuse to return when Orange Grove and Troy are good to go, we will be back, and try both places out. Both look right up our alley.

Enjoy your trip. The seas are a bit "up" right now

Day 3 continued: Left Blue Springs Monday before noon I think, told Garmin to take us to Scuba Outlet in North Key Largo (needed a couple of fills). As we are driving on the turnpike, and not very far into the trip, I saw a billboard or three for Gatorland and made an impulse stop Figured boyo would enjoy it. It was surprisingly large, and a good value @ 10$/p FL resident!

Also a a bit of a bird sanctuary, saw several photog hounds with mega setups taking pictures of birds. Lots of different gators and crocodilians, and a really nice, long boardwalk through a swamp.

Sure beats driving.




Continued southward from there, another 4 hours or so to Key Largo. We get very far, with VERY light traffic on the turnpike. I start seeing not so cryptic "all lanes closed past commercial ave, seek alternate route" signs, but I figure if the other cars and truckers seem unconcerned, why should I be a daredevil.....weeeeeelll...

We get to Commercial, and suddenly there's a full stop. Creeping bumper to bumper traffic. Phone up my dad to check the FHP site, and there had been a major accident south of there. I figure it must be clearing now, and it must be between this exit and the next, and besides, I'm in the middle lane, I ain't going nowhere. Sure enough, we end up crawling for maybe 45 minutes, then get through.

Make it to KL, decide to save the fills for the morning (dive isn't scheduled until PM, so I have time in the morning to take care of stuff).

Check into Courtyard, grab our first bag of stuff out of my poor overloaded car, get it into the room, aaaaaand.....piercing fire alarm. GROAN! Ok, grab our keys and my wallet and such, and out the door we go, down the stairs. As I hit floor two, there is a distinct burning electrical smell. Let the front desk know, and we go stand outside for a few. Obviously, this is going to take a while (fire truck on it's way), and it's coming up on 6, let's do an early dinner.

Remembered seeing fantastic reviews for Key Largo Fisheries Backyard, and it's not even 5 minutes away, let's do it!

To be continued....

 

[JesperS]

Key Largo Fisheries Backyard

We get there, and it kinda looks closed, but we ask, and they take care of us. My son pointed out to me that they close at 6 when we sit down and eat, and it was 6:20 at that point. Another customer arrived shortly after us. Money is good, right?

I had the Lobster BLT. UNF! UNF UNF UNF! Decadent and delicious. Lobster and Bacon, who knew!?!



Back to the hotel, and the situation is under control Finish getting our crap to the room and settled in.

Day 4: Took off this morning to get some things done: Fills, spare parts, pay for Wednesday night dive and take care of that paperwork. All done, and back to the hotel, get our gear ready, and down to the dock for the 12:30 departure.

They warned that it would be "bumpy, to say the least", but hey, whatcha gonna do.

Went out with just us, one other diver, an instructor, captain, and mate. Nice having a large boat like that practically to yourself. The ride out was fairly uneventful, but it certainly started pitching pretty good at the end. When we came to a stop and they tie off is when things got really rough, and I knew it was going to be interesting.

We made it in the water (glad we brought our 5mm's, brr!) and drop down. But even going to the bottom, the surge is pretty bad, the vis is way down, and everything is hard work, and really not fun at all. Though I kept track of the boat, but can't locate it, so pop up for a boat check, frak, it's a good distance off, and now that I'm at the top burp daddy don't feel so good at all. DOWN PERISCOPE!

We work our way back towards the boat, but between our badly fogging goggles (shoulda used our own seadrops) and the nasty arse surge which is now making my seasickness worse underwater to the point I thought for sure I would throw up, I have to do one more boat check, which makes me even sicker. We get back to the boat at the same time as the other diver and trainer, and we manage to make it back on board. I get out of my BP ASAP and go to the rail, certain I'm going to blow. Somehow, someway, don't ask me how, but it stays down (thank you ginseng pills? certainly thank you improved overall diet). We all decide that enough is enough, and head back in. Interestingly enough, there were are TON of other boats there, AND a group of waverunners (wtf?)

We make it back to the dock without further incident (and no vomit, YAY!) We unload and clean all our gear, which is always so much fun.

Lesson learned: It's really not worth it to bring your own tanks to the keys. Note that we only had them with us due to the cave trip, and I figured we might as well use 'em. But I'm going to try to use the one tank on tomorrows night dive (if it happens) for each of us that we have left, just to use up most of the gas before we head home to lighten the load a little.

So we're back on solid land, equipment all hung up on the mack daddy hotel cart . We take showers and a nap (which was VERY difficult to get back up from), then go to meet MsElaneous and NetDoc at Fish House Encore. My main reason for wanting to go there was the Lion Fish appetizer, which looks awesome as hell, and I want to try lion fish.



We meet Elena and Pete and they are just the nicest people you'd ever want to meet, and even my shy reclusive deaf arse am able to hold a lively conversation with them Elena is going to be our guide on our hopeful night dive tomorrow. Hopeful, in that hopefully the weather won't be crap

SADLY, there is no lionfish on the menu!!! MEGA SAD FACE! Apparently, they are mostly caught in lobster pots (?) and since season is over....bummer.

I settle for the Mahi Encore style, which is awesome, and everyone else really liked their food as well.

We split a dessert that was beyond awesome.



We said our farewells and we look forward to seeing both of them soon, starting with Elena tomorrow!

And that's where we are at now. Plans going forward are:

Tomorrow: AM dive, have to be at the dock @ 8:30 I think. HOPEFULLY the weather is calmer. My lesson is learned, when the weather is "sporty" or "pretty bumpy" or "pretty bad" or whatever down here....we stay at the dock! After that, back to the hotel, and I think to Category Three for lunch, cause those stuffed burgers sound farking awesome. Then, HOPEFULLY, the weather will be good for a night dive with Elena (after a healthy nap, of course!)

Thursday: Final day. Currently have a PM dive trip scheduled, but I think we're both pretty ready to call it a day, and we are tentatively planning to cancel the dive, and go to the Dive History Museeum instead, then head home. Though I did see a sign for Monkey Jungle north of the keys, how can that place not be fun?!?

 

[JesperS]

That's an early start for Spring Break 2014


Mrs. Macs and Lazy Days both had Lionfish on their menus last week.

/facepalm

LOL, yeah, I'm gonna have to get a modmin to fix that I think. Lazy Days was recommended to me and we might hit that up if we go with the Dive Museeum plan on Thursday, since we will be down there anyways. If not, we'll try Mrs. Mac's, maybe on the way out of town. If we don't, I think that will be the FIRST time I come to the keys and don't eat there.

Have you eaten at their new location in between the traffic lanes. Is it as good as the original spot?

 

[Katch]

Have you eaten at their new location in between the traffic lanes. Is it as good as the original spot?

I heard their original spot was better, but that may only be because the new one doesn't have a bar

I only went to the original because it was next door to my hotel (Pelican).

The view from the deck at Lazy Days is just as good as the Lionfish-n-chips. I took a picture about 7 years ago that's still my Windows desktop background.

 

[JesperS]

I'm thinking what the waiter said last night is true, because I don't see Lionfish on the Lazy Days menu either.

Woke up and took a look outside, flags were horizontal, small craft advisory...cancelled the dive trip. We're going to the History of Diving Museeum instead Oh, and Category Three for stuffed burgers for lunch! Would do Windley Key, but it's closed on Wednesdays.