Mini wall at turtle farm

[sdwho]

We love diving turtle reef. Not only is it a fantastic night dive (as other posts describe), but it is place to spend the afternoon. You can swim out to the miniwall, or if you choose, stay up in the shallows. The route out to the mini wall is a little channel that is filled with juveniles: we've seen spotted drum smaller than my fingernail, juvie queen and french angel fish, juvie puffers, juvie triggers, etc. On the flats we usually see rays (sting and yellow), flounder, and an occasional turtle.

If you stay in the shallows, you can make the dive last a long time. Our longest was 1 hour 45 minutes.

One other thought: I don't think there is a requirement that you use any particular tanks, at least not on night dives.

 

[ianr33]

One other thought: I don't think there is a requirement that you use any particular tanks, at least not on night dives.

If you wanted to dive your own tank during the day you would have to sneak it in,possible but bad form. Air tanks are only $10 .

At night you can use anything you want. Pay for a tank in advance (or run a tab) and Divetech will leave tanks just outside the shop with your name on them.Doesn't get any easier than that.

The Big Wall at the Turtle Farm is also a great dive but a considerably larger undertaking.I have never done it on a single tank but it could be done with a short bottom time.

This is a report on my last trip,hopefully some of the info is useful
http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=153825

 

[billinwilliamston]

Taken Oct 20, 2006.

In October we did the sand flats and coral heads rather than the mini or maxi(?) wall. Not as scenic as the walls, but we did see lots of critters. There were several conch about (I think conch is the plural for conch, but I'm sure I'll be corrected if it's not ), a number of large (foot long or so) furry worm looking things, a couple of sting rays, turtles (of course), a few flounder (plural?) and lots of little fishies.

A return trip is definitely in the plans for next week.

 

[tsreimer]

I did a night dive and 2 afternoon dives to the mini wall over the holidays. We had some bad luck on the night dive, although we still saw lots of stingrays... but during the day.... oh my did we see a variety of cool sea life! Big green moray eel, small spotted eels, yellow rays, tarpon, beautiful coral.... all at fairly shallow depths.

Divetech folks are really helpful there, so esp. during the day, just pay for the air fills and ask for a dive briefing before you head out to get your money's worth

Here's just one of the many pics I took there of a little spotted eel. Viz could have been better on this day, but he still turned out ok

Wish I could go back there tomorrow!

 

[carlislere]

Outstanding beach dives at Turtle Reef. Make one dive left on the mini-wall, then one dive right, but make the night dive to the left.

 

[luvturtle]

Thank you all so much for your input on the turtle farm reef!We cant wait to dive there.

 

[billinwilliamston]

Just got back from Grand Cayman Saturday. Did the mini-wall last Thursday. Very nice dive, although the vis was not the greatest. Watch the current this time of year. We started out going against the current (turned right) like good little doobees, but underestimated it and turned back with the current way too early in our dive. Even though all we did was drift with the current on the last 1/2 of the dive we still left ourselves a bit of a swim back to the ladder. Oh well, it was worth it.

 

[diversteve]

Divetech also rents Apollo scooters there to go out to the Big Wall. But they warn you that you might not make it back with them. They told us if we used them up just to drop them in the sand flat so they could pick them up easier. We had just as much fun buzzing up and down the mini-wall. There's usually a big bunch of Tarpon to the south underneath an overhang. Also we saw a group(swarm?pack?) of Eagle Rays go streaking overhead.