Saturday, the Tallahassee Scubaclub met up with Jeandiver at Blue Grotto in Williston, FL. After driving through several rainstorms during the 2.5hr drive, we counted ourselves lucky as it turned out to be an ok day, and this kept some divers away. We arrived at 8:30 in order to get good conditions as this site gets quite cloudy after the OW classes come through. Blue Grotto is a sinkhole with no flow, but usually 100ft viz before anyone stirs its up. With OW, cavern and some cave, it has multiple levels of diving.
After getting checked in, we suited up and jumped in. This is when Murhpy took over. I broke a fin strap right away, and had to make do with a spare mask strap. Another in my group had a bad LPI and had to abort. Then during an S drill, Jeans hose completely seperated from her 2nd stage. That was fixed easily, but finally after everything seemed ok, and we headed down, a 4th one in our group pulled his dump completely off his BC, resulting in an inability to hold air. A rarity luckily, but a great demonstration as to why to have drop weights and be weighted properly and have a buddy nearby.
Finally after everyone was back int he water, we headed in and toured the cavern down to 50ft, where it turns into a bt of a cave. Viz was great at 100ft, and we had a blast. WHile under it started to pour and this made for some great views of the surface. After a SI and the greatest BBQ sandwiches ever from the Blue Grotto BBQ guy, we headed back into a not as impressive dive, now that viz was reduced to 30ft. Still, we had a lot of fun.
On the way home we stopped by Manatee to check conditions, and saw the river was up, but not affecting the basins, though it was quite full of swimmers. Here are some pics of the dives, and a link to the rest.
http://northfloridadiver.net/media/pics/grotto705.htm
After getting checked in, we suited up and jumped in. This is when Murhpy took over. I broke a fin strap right away, and had to make do with a spare mask strap. Another in my group had a bad LPI and had to abort. Then during an S drill, Jeans hose completely seperated from her 2nd stage. That was fixed easily, but finally after everything seemed ok, and we headed down, a 4th one in our group pulled his dump completely off his BC, resulting in an inability to hold air. A rarity luckily, but a great demonstration as to why to have drop weights and be weighted properly and have a buddy nearby.
Finally after everyone was back int he water, we headed in and toured the cavern down to 50ft, where it turns into a bt of a cave. Viz was great at 100ft, and we had a blast. WHile under it started to pour and this made for some great views of the surface. After a SI and the greatest BBQ sandwiches ever from the Blue Grotto BBQ guy, we headed back into a not as impressive dive, now that viz was reduced to 30ft. Still, we had a lot of fun.
On the way home we stopped by Manatee to check conditions, and saw the river was up, but not affecting the basins, though it was quite full of swimmers. Here are some pics of the dives, and a link to the rest.
http://northfloridadiver.net/media/pics/grotto705.htm
