Key Largo dive sites, picks for new divers

[bradlw]

I'm trying to plan a dive for my family of soon-to-be certified divers, planning to go to the Key Largo area
and as of now I've been trying and trying to get in touch with Rainbow Reef. They so far haven't answered the phone, except one time when she kept complaining about the phone connection, so I didn't get all my questions answered. (maybe I was in a bad cell area)

Their website stinks and when I try to message them through it it identifies me as a spammer. I promise I'm not...I'm just a guy trying to book and PAY for FIVE divers to take a couple trips out!

So the primary question that I'm trying to answer...which dive trips should I pick?

I'm experienced and certified and would love to drop down on the Duane or the Speigel again....but the rest of my family will be doing their OW checkout dives next month...so shallow and easy is good
and I know all the dive sites will be good there
but as best as I can tell...and to the best of my memory, some of the dives in that area are very shallow.

I'd like to get them down at least on one dive to at least maybe 30-35 feet...but I suppose the higher priority is just good and fun dives for their first experience!

timeframe will be early August

my picks are these on the days we'll be there:
day 1 PM:

1. Christ Statue/City of Washington
2. Sand Island/Molasses Reef
3. North Start/Nine Channel
4. Five Caves/Sand Bottom Cave
5. Benwood Wreck/Christmas Tree Cave

day 2:
I'd prefer morning:

1. French Twist/Hourglass
2. Benwood Wreck/French Reef
3. Spanish Anchor/Nine Channel
4. Hole in the wall/Aquarium

but day 2 I could do afternoon instead of morning:​

1. JJ's Cave/Coral Canyons
2. Christ Statue/Double North
3. Pickles Reef/Permit Ledges
4. Undersea Highway/City of Washington
5. Hard Bottom Cave/Turtle Ledges

@Rae HalfTheHill...I saw in another post you said you captain for Rainbow...so I'll bet you could help me choose!

thanks in advance!

 

[fred32176]

Just have them do a couple of reefs. Let them see a nurse shark, eels, tile fish and whatever else is around. You are pretty close to High Springs, Williston and many springs. All great for beginners and different than a reef.

You're not so far away that you can't drive to West Palm when they get good enough and do the wreck trek, cable crossing... Key Largo is less than a day's drive, let them enjoy and want to go trips to the keys. When you live in Florida you don't need to be in a rush to do the best dives as you can experience them all.

 

[bradlw]

Yeah, I realize that any of these would be fun enough.

It's been a really long time since I've dove...that area especially
but I remember a few dives in the keys that were so shallow that they weren't so fun...fighting surge from waves overhead, etc..... and besides, if it's casual snorkel depth then it just seems silly to SCUBA

If a couple of the dives are like that fine. It'll still be fun with interesting things to see... but I'd like to get them a taste of experience down to say 1ATM/33ft just to pick an arbitrary number.

They had really great bouyancy control in the 12ft deep pool for the class. I'm really looking forward to seeing how they do in the springs for their checkout dives!

 

[atxdiver]

@bradlw Congratulations on the new family of divers. All good locations for Key Largo. Since they're new, I'd skip Spiegel, but I like your list. One possible addition would be to try the Benwood on a night dive. Turtle city! You'd have to check around to see who goes out on what night. I've not dived with Rainbow, so I can't speak to that, but I've had great luck with Amoray, Pirate's Cove, and Horizon. The first two are IMO a better fit for first time divers, although the shallow dives Horizon provides are the same. As an alternative, check out Conch Republic in Tavernier. They will run great dives for first-timers and it's a little different from what you'll get in KL.