Ft. Pickens Thursday Aug. 27

[kmenees]

Bamaskubacat - you can always head over there with us and lay out on the beach, then go eat with us after the dives. It will still be fun and we can talk about dive stuff!

 

[mrmccoy]

You want to be in the water about an hour before high tide. As chris said the gulf water will be pushed into the bay during high tide. While the tide changes from the peak of high to the start of low tide is called slack tide which is when you want to dive. The current should not be as bad and the vis should be best at this time

http://freetidetables.com/sid/2650148b/tf/tgi this is a decent website for tides and the little waves help to understand whats going on. this shows that high tide is at 11:39(different websites have different times but are all within a half hour of each other.....usually)if you were to plan a single dive for tomorrow you would want to be in the water about 10:30.

On a side note you always want to wear gloves when diving the jetties. If there is a storm in the gulf it can throw the tides off and gloves will help if you have to do the jetty crawl

Thanks for all the info. I moved here from Kansas (no tides to worry about there). So, I'm just trying to learn what the different tidal stages are, how it effects diving - currents, visibility, etc. and how to determine when the best/safest times are to dive. I'm sure I'm overly cautious, but better that then doing something stupid cause I didn't ask questions.

Thanks again!
Tina

 

[chris_b]

Chris_b, Come on out! I think we're getting there about 9, but two tanks are on the plan- - - so you could always join us for the second.

We'll need to get our tanks topped off beforehand so if we can't get our butts in gear and get to a dive shop earlyish we may join you for the second dive instead. It's been several years since she's been in the ocean so we may just play around near the typical float tie-off point. I'm just stoked that she's finally agreed to go diving again!