paulwall
Contributor
Picked up a co-worker and headed over to Bayou Chico marina to dive with Capt. Tim and Viking diving for a 3-tank offshore trip
Day promised to be hot and the promised afternoon thunderstorms never materialized. The forecast called for 1-2's, and fortunately, that proved true.
After a short discussion, a little before 8am, four of us headed out to the Chevron site, an old oil rig that has been sunk in two sections in 135' of water. I've never dived this site, and was keen to see what was happening out there.
We splashed a little before 10am to find, below the 84o murky water glorious 40-50' of visibility on the site. My buddy and I set a 100' floor to our dive, so we weren't planning on hitting the bottom. We swam amongst schooling amberjack, baitfish, small snapper (beeliner?), angels, butterflyfish and blennies aplenty. We had tied into the leg structure, and went the wrong way, so we were all the way around this piece before we saw the second piece immediately adjacent until midway through the dive. We searched the platform section and were able to pull out two shovelnose from the structure. After 40 mins, I ascended from the 74o bottom temps into the bathtub warm water on the safety stop.
Second dive was the Pete Tide. Always a favorite, the wreck was covered in baitfish, and small amberjack. Still looking for lobster, we circled and lightly entered the wreck. The wreck is very entertaining, and housed big angelfish who were oblivious to us, banded butterflyfish, barracuda, and spadefish. temps were about the same, but the vis (away from the clouds of fish) was only 20-25' and murky.
Finally, we splashed on the Heron/LCM. Another new site for me, this was extremely entertaining. We tied into the Heron, which is sitting stern-deep in the sand. The bridge and bow are out of the sand, completely. A great tugboat that is very deteriorated. Bottom time was limited for my air-breathing buddy, but we did make it over to the LCM, which is mostly covered in sand, but very cool, nontheless. Lots of fish were about, mostly tropicals,
A very pleasant, though hot day on the water. The 1-2's were more like 0-1's by the time we hit the third site. We all had a great time, but I had to drive back to New Orleans after dropping my buddy off at his family's condo.
Day promised to be hot and the promised afternoon thunderstorms never materialized. The forecast called for 1-2's, and fortunately, that proved true.
After a short discussion, a little before 8am, four of us headed out to the Chevron site, an old oil rig that has been sunk in two sections in 135' of water. I've never dived this site, and was keen to see what was happening out there.
We splashed a little before 10am to find, below the 84o murky water glorious 40-50' of visibility on the site. My buddy and I set a 100' floor to our dive, so we weren't planning on hitting the bottom. We swam amongst schooling amberjack, baitfish, small snapper (beeliner?), angels, butterflyfish and blennies aplenty. We had tied into the leg structure, and went the wrong way, so we were all the way around this piece before we saw the second piece immediately adjacent until midway through the dive. We searched the platform section and were able to pull out two shovelnose from the structure. After 40 mins, I ascended from the 74o bottom temps into the bathtub warm water on the safety stop.
Second dive was the Pete Tide. Always a favorite, the wreck was covered in baitfish, and small amberjack. Still looking for lobster, we circled and lightly entered the wreck. The wreck is very entertaining, and housed big angelfish who were oblivious to us, banded butterflyfish, barracuda, and spadefish. temps were about the same, but the vis (away from the clouds of fish) was only 20-25' and murky.
Finally, we splashed on the Heron/LCM. Another new site for me, this was extremely entertaining. We tied into the Heron, which is sitting stern-deep in the sand. The bridge and bow are out of the sand, completely. A great tugboat that is very deteriorated. Bottom time was limited for my air-breathing buddy, but we did make it over to the LCM, which is mostly covered in sand, but very cool, nontheless. Lots of fish were about, mostly tropicals,
A very pleasant, though hot day on the water. The 1-2's were more like 0-1's by the time we hit the third site. We all had a great time, but I had to drive back to New Orleans after dropping my buddy off at his family's condo.
