Is it worth a drive from NY to FL?

[del_mo]

And you might consider Rainbow River and a swim with the manatees in Crystal River.

 

[Potapko]

Not trying to hijack but I am also thinking about coming down with the family the first week of April. Is there good diving in North FLA? Which side is best? Atlantic or Gulf? Is the few extra hours worth going to Central? Again, East or WEst? Ideas?

There are 6 of us so price is also important.
Thanks

 

[gerardnealon]

I completely get you, as for a drive, my GF comes from NJ and i think she suggested it was 16 hours from there, which makes me think it might not be much quicker from Long Island She doesnt drive particularly slowly either. North FL would be about an hour at most two closer to you than Orlando. Boat dives run around $50 per 2 tank trip, the commercial springs are around $30 for the day, air or nitrox is somewhere between $3-10 a fill or by the cuft in the right places.

The ballroom is a nice cavern, you can see most of it in one dive, a couple more might max you out. You can do a night dive there, not technically cavern, which might give you an idea about cave diving - its pretty safe, just remember where the exit is. There is a thick line running out of that cavern and other commerical springs, state parks are about $10 for the day but have no permenant line and enforce the no lights rule.

Wow, boats dives around you are a lot cheaper then on LI. Prices here range anywhere between 70-85. The price for fills you mentioned seemed very reasonable also. Air fills here are around 8 bucks, and depending on the percent of Nitrox could be 12-15. What is the closest state park to Ginnie Springs? Thanks again for the great advice.

 

[simbrooks]

Not trying to hijack but I am also thinking about coming down with the family the first week of April. Is there good diving in North FLA? Which side is best? Atlantic or Gulf? Is the few extra hours worth going to Central? Again, East or WEst? Ideas?

There are 6 of us so price is also important.
Thanks

Oh a hijack - we dont look highly on those Atlantic generally has greater viz, more colourful tropical fish and gets deeper quicker, like 80ft 1 mile out rather than 5-10 miles out on the Gulf side. There is good diving in NFL, see above discussions, but i think you could get sick of rocks after a few days if you werent cave diving - most people do.

Wow, boats dives around you are a lot cheaper then on LI. Prices here range anywhere between 70-85. The price for fills you mentioned seemed very reasonable also. Air fills here are around 8 bucks, and depending on the percent of Nitrox could be 12-15. What is the closest state park to Ginnie Springs? Thanks again for the great advice.

Thats the regular price, even in the Keys it doesnt get over $60. Fills are $3-5 for air and 8-10 for nitrox most places. State parks in the Ginnie area - Royal, Troy and Manatee that are open to OW divers and others that are fun but some you cant dive as they dont allow scuba there or only for cavern/cave divers in the water.

 

[darcy]

Might I suggest my beautiful home town of Panama City Beach, FL. Located right in the Panhandle of North Florida. there is some great diving here. You can get the best of both worlds. You can go offshore to some kick *** wrecks with Diver's Den for $60, you could dive the Jetties at St. Andrews State Park, which is free. Then you could scoot on up to the Cypress, Morrison, or Vortex Springs. All are about an hour from Panama City Beach. Morrison is free if the water level stays down it's a good dive. Cypress you'll have to rent a canoe to get there for $50, but it's worth every penny. Then you could do Vortex which is $25 and gin clear, but overrun with OW classes and fish poop, so try to get in early.

This way you can get some Florida diving in without having to drive all the way through the state. Don't get me wrong central florida springs are great, south florida shore and offshore diving is incredible, but they are a long drive even for me and I live in Florida!

 

[gerardnealon]

Might I suggest my beautiful home town of Panama City Beach, FL. Located right in the Panhandle of North Florida. there is some great diving here. You can get the best of both worlds. You can go offshore to some kick *** wrecks with Diver's Den for $60, you could dive the Jetties at St. Andrews State Park, which is free. Then you could scoot on up to the Cypress, Morrison, or Vortex Springs. All are about an hour from Panama City Beach. Morrison is free if the water level stays down it's a good dive. Cypress you'll have to rent a canoe to get there for $50, but it's worth every penny. Then you could do Vortex which is $25 and gin clear, but overrun with OW classes and fish poop, so try to get in early.

This way you can get some Florida diving in without having to drive all the way through the state. Don't get me wrong central florida springs are great, south florida shore and offshore diving is incredible, but they are a long drive even for me and I live in Florida!

Thank you for your advice. That is something I am definetly going to look into. What is the ocean vis like near you? If its better than 2 feet, you beat me

 

[darcy]

I have some friends that went offshore yesterday and said they had 50-60' vis. Which sounds ok to me. We did a night dive 2 weeks ago around the PCB Jetties and the vis was 5-10', of course we were off the tides by about 2 hours so that might have had something to do with it. I'm going on another night dive at the jetties tomorrow night and I'll let you know how everything looks out there.

 

[Big Mike]

I just drove 1300 miles one-way last week to dive in Key Largo (From Indianapolis). Well worth the extra miles to the Keys IMHO. Took me 21 hours going & 18.5 coming back. (Traffic is almost always worse SB around Nashville TN & Atlanta. DEFINITELY plan on hitting Atlanta at a NON-RUSH drive time or you are SCREWED!)

Mike

 

[adder70]

Concerning the drive time from NY, if you know the time to get to Richmond (people there said about 4 hrs, IIRC), I can tell you the time from Richmond to Gainesville, which is very close to Ginnie. In fact, the time to Ginnie is probably exactly the same as to G'ville. The beauty of I-95 is little traffic at all between Richmond and Savannah, and not much there or in Jax, so the 675 mile trip usually took me around 10.5 hours, including brief stops for drive thru's and restrooms. Be VERY careful if you take US301 from Jax to Gainesville, the small towns there are the only AAA speed traps in the US.

I would stop for a day or two at Ginnie and continue on down to the West Palm/Ft Lauderdale area for a couple more days, and then drive back up, or do it in the reverse, if I took the time and gas money for the drive down.

I would recommend Itchetucknee springs to see pristine Florida, though it's only snorkeling/tubing there. However, it's very controlled there (no homes or businesses in the area) and you really see wilderness and lots more of all types of animals.

 

[darcy]

A girlfriend of mine's parents drove from Northern New York to Panama City Beach, FL last Friday said it took them 21 hours straight through. They said next time they'll stop over a night. I might not argue!

We tried to do a night jetty dive last night, but the lighting storm kept us a bay. So I don't have any conditions today for you except for the fact that the water is this color. A bunch of semi-local folks from the Scubaboard are getting together this weekend at St. Andrews State Park, you can look for the trip reports in the Florida Conch Divers forum. Good times should be had by all.

Sounds like any way you look at it, you'll be diving in Florida, not too shabby.