I just got back from a weekend bus trip to Florida. Me and thirty other divers from Scuba Commander in Chesapeake. VA. Thirty divers, tanks, gear, and other assorted cargo made for one long uncomfortable ride. I spent most of the night trying to sleep on the aisle floor. Our first stop was breakfast at Cracker Barrel in Gainesville, FL. There, we ran into another bunch of divers from Lynnhaven Scuba in Virginia Beach. They were trekking to Devil’s Den that morning. We were on our way to Blue Grotto, an underwater cavern in Williston, about 30 miles west of Gainesville.
The Blue Grotto is an underwater cavern. (www.divebluegrotto.com) Personally, I’ve always hated caves since a bad experience as a kid. They’re bad enough in the open air but this one is underwater. I figured it would be a difficult attempt for me but I geared up to try it. I started with two buddies, both just open-water certified. I’m a divemaster, soon to be an instructor. First off, the water was frigid, around 71 degrees. And that’s cold water for diving when you’re only wearing a three mm wetsuit. Five mm would be the minimum for that temperature. I got my light ready and we started down the line. Just as I was entering the overhang of the mouth of the cavern, the water was really silty and I got disoriented. Needless to say, I bailed on the dive right away. I know my limitations and caves are one of them. My two buddies ended up going down to Peace Rock with another divemaster. I got out and called it a day. We left Blue Grotto after lunch and headed to Plantation on Crystal River. A poolside bucket of rum, a nice sit in the hot tub, dinner and I was ready to crash.
Sunday was an up early day. A cool foggy morning to swim with the manatees. The water temperature in King’s Bay wasn’t much better that in the springs. I had what I thought was my trusty GoPro camera. Well the camera is trusty but the battery was shot. I know I had charged it before leaving home. I turned it on for a few minutes on Saturday. But Sunday morning, it was dead. And my I didn’t bring the spare battery on the boat. So no video. Even long after sunrise though, the fog persisted. Even so, you could see the manatees waking up and moving around in the bay. They are curious animals and several approached the groups of people scattered around. Some are outright hams wanting the humans attention. I floated up beside one. It caught my arm with its fin and squeezed it with both fins. So, I got a manatee hug. Several of them swam through our group with stopping. Guess they had better places to be than hang around a bunch of tourists. All in all, it was one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.
From Crystal River, it was over to Devil’s Den. Another kinda, sorta cave dive. I skipped it. I was already cleaned up from the manatee swim for the long ride home. I ended up cooking and wagon-mastering the bus packing. It was a long ride back to Virginia, arriving around 630 am. The temperature sure was a lot nicer in Florida.
The Red Fins 