Johnoly
Contributor
- Messages
- 4,460
- Reaction score
- 6,356
- # of dives
- 2500 - 4999
Out of town friends came to dive the warm waters of the Florida Keys and I drove down to join them for a couple of days. 100% relaxed vacation. Just a Giant stride, a wet smile, and practice once-a-year picture shooting. Mark at Quiescence was fantastic and let us pick the dives.
First tank we drove the Spiegel Grove looking around at the different levels to 100 ft deep and watch the bull sharks cruise around. Second tank was Benwood Deep which is not the shallow wreck. What you do is head directly off the Benwood bow jump over the reef ridge and head down off the side sand chute to the sloping wall as it drops off to 95 ft deep. Very different & cool to do. Pulling up to the Grove and alot of parked boats, we talked to our sister boats captains on Ch11 & 88 who let us slide in after they released the #6 top deck preferred mooring line. My camera housings f-stop adjustment wasn't working correctly so I had to set it once and deal with some kruddy darker pictures. But I got a couple keeper shots.
BIG 3 foot long black grouper
Goliath Just parked his fat belly on the deck floor and didn't move an inch as we got close for pictures
A slow weather front is sliding down Florida and turned our 2 - 4 foot seas into 3 -5's which cancelled our dives for the next two days to go deep.
I know room rates change on a day-by-day basis but I lucked out at Waterside Suites right next to the Rainbow Reef shop at $115 a night. These are two-story all newly updated suites with a two bathrooms, kitchen & pans, full fridge, balcony and covered parking. If you are 3 days before your arrival,, definitely check out their rates and you might be very surprised by switching to them.
Lastly there's a hidden small red taco food truck trailer right next to the ice cream shop at mile 100 called Tacos Jalisco at 100470 overseas hwy. They have some of the best tacos and burritos you have ever had after a hungry dive day. It's so good there's always a line of 3 to 6 people but the food comes out fast. Here's a street view photo of the location but it's well worth a stop
First tank we drove the Spiegel Grove looking around at the different levels to 100 ft deep and watch the bull sharks cruise around. Second tank was Benwood Deep which is not the shallow wreck. What you do is head directly off the Benwood bow jump over the reef ridge and head down off the side sand chute to the sloping wall as it drops off to 95 ft deep. Very different & cool to do. Pulling up to the Grove and alot of parked boats, we talked to our sister boats captains on Ch11 & 88 who let us slide in after they released the #6 top deck preferred mooring line. My camera housings f-stop adjustment wasn't working correctly so I had to set it once and deal with some kruddy darker pictures. But I got a couple keeper shots.
BIG 3 foot long black grouper
Goliath Just parked his fat belly on the deck floor and didn't move an inch as we got close for pictures
A slow weather front is sliding down Florida and turned our 2 - 4 foot seas into 3 -5's which cancelled our dives for the next two days to go deep.
I know room rates change on a day-by-day basis but I lucked out at Waterside Suites right next to the Rainbow Reef shop at $115 a night. These are two-story all newly updated suites with a two bathrooms, kitchen & pans, full fridge, balcony and covered parking. If you are 3 days before your arrival,, definitely check out their rates and you might be very surprised by switching to them.
Lastly there's a hidden small red taco food truck trailer right next to the ice cream shop at mile 100 called Tacos Jalisco at 100470 overseas hwy. They have some of the best tacos and burritos you have ever had after a hungry dive day. It's so good there's always a line of 3 to 6 people but the food comes out fast. Here's a street view photo of the location but it's well worth a stop
