Tessunderwater
Contributor
I decided to do a mid morning dive at Pickens yesterday since high tide was scheduled for 11:50am. The surf on the gulf side was petty rough, 3 to 4 foot breakers on the beach, and so about 100 yards of the road past the guard shack was flooded. Nothing my little 4 door couldn't handle though. I geared up and got into the water right at slack tide and found 20 feet of visibility during the first 10 feet and visibility dropped to 15 for the remainder of the dive. I hit the usual structure spots and found the usual resident critters. An octopus in the rocket launcher, he is a pretty decent size. Also, a resident snapper that has been around since about spring in the pipe. He is about 10 to 15 pounds and a few smaller ones hanging around. I managed to see a large stingray, 4 to 5 feet across. I was just trolling around after my safety stop and was playing with a school of spadefish at 17 feet and went west toward some rocks to look around. I was about 6 feet from the rocks when a sea turtle popped up and turned to head west. I chased after him of course to no avail, since they are surprisingly fast. This was my first turtle sighting and I was surprised to see it at Ft. Pickens. Had a geat dive!
