OysterBoot74
Guest
Headed to Pensacola pulling the boat and with a backseat full of camping gear on Saturday morning. After checking the radar over coffee we decided to give it a shot despite the forecasts we had been seeing. Worst case we are in Pensacola Beach for the day forced to eat and be merry prior to heading to Vortoberfest right? lol. I had never launched in Pensacola before and ended up putting in at the State Park on the Intercoastal on the State line. We made quick work of the launch and was headed past Ft. Pickens by around 11am. Seas were a little choppy going out of the pass but settled nicely about a mile out. The couple who went with us (my dive instructor and his wife) wanted to dive something they hadn't been on before. So, not knowing if it was worth heading too far offshore, we settled on the Tug Sylvia for our first dive. While there was structure there, there wasn't a whole lot that still resembled a tug. I really enjoyed it though due to the big schools of extremely curious amberjack, southern stingray, grey snapper, one lonely barracuda, an octopus that we harassed with our dive lights, a couple of nice flounder, and all the other usual grunts and toadfish. There was one small crevice of the structure near the bottom that we noticed was packed with decent sized gray snapper and small red grouper too when we dropped our heads to the sand and peered underneath. The octopus sent jets of water to jettison the objects we were placing at the front of his hole. The other couple said they gave it one of their backup flashlights and it unceremoniously threw it back out at them. lol. They also found what they said was an expensive aluminum flashlight while circling out around the structure. When we all joined up again topside the wind had laid down even more and we couldn't resist the urge to head further south. Even thought they had been on this site before, they were excited to show it to us. We headed toward the YDT-14 Navy Ship. This was an impressive dive. Having not been on many ship reefs, this one was intact and felt large. There was life encrusting and milling about nearly every inch of it. I got to see my first Spanish Hogfish and a few other tropicals. There had to have been nearly 100 nice sized barracuda hanging about and countless blue runners, bluefish, and vermillion snapper. I also swear I saw an Almaco Jack but didn't get a picture. There were some nice outcroppings of coral growing on the ship and an urchin on nearly every square foot of the structure. The highlight though was a ~7 foot nurse shark that appeared out of nowhere and laid on the deck for the remainder of our dive. I managed a couple of pictures but had trouble concentrating due to the screaming Brandy was doing through her regulator in telling me not to get too close and writing ugly words on her slate about me not being careful. :shocked2: The other couple was able to see it on their dive as well and also reported a nice Bull Shark cruising the perimeter of the ship.
We motored in on slick seas and a warm breeze. I'm not sure we could have gotten any luckier with the weather. Once back incell range, however, my phone lit up with updates to the Auburn game.
That, combined with news that we would need to drive to Montgomery and miss out on Vortoberfest slowed us a little but not enough. We trailered the boat and had a liesurely supper at The Oyster Bar on the canal. Was a fantastic day but hate we missed seeing everyone at Vortex. I don't take the greatest pics but here are a few....
