Question Spring Diving Late March 2025 (Suggestions?)

[oldschool45]

Hit Catfish Hotel twice today....make sure you clean the duck weed out of your regs! My wife didn't and when I setup her 2nd tank and took a few quick breaths the duck weed almost made it to my lungs.

 

[oldschool45]

We did get to see the Manatee day 2 at Fanning. There was a Manatee with a very young calf( 2~3 days old) at Manatee Spring today and what they thought was a mommy about to birth. ( second hand story my mother visited that park today). We went to devil's Den for 2 dives today...I was born in Florida but I'm a Kentucky boy now. My thoughts on Devil's Den is "Mammoth Caves under water on Crack". Sumptin not right with you cave divers;-P
After DD I'm really wondering if I want to do Ginnie before heading home. Northern springs are still browned out.
Tomorrow is going to be Rainbow River in the afternoon. Are freedive fins over kill for that?

 

[Rilelen]

Ah so cool you got to see the manatees!

A lot of my freediver friends like to bring their freedive fins when snorkel drifting Rainbow - it’s VERY shallow in most of the river (3-5’) but does drop down to 20-25’ at several spring vents.

And yep, Troy and Royal are still brown. Orange Grove is okay (in Peacock Springs State Park), and open to OW divers.

Personally, I enjoy Ginnie as an OW dive too - poke around in the spring run at Devil’s Run and check out the Crack, the Eye and the Ear. OW divers are allowed to poke in within the limits of natural daylight (no lights!), just be courteous to any exiting or entering cave divers. You can drift or float down the Sante Fe, and then swim up the spring run to Ginnie Ballroom (which is a fun little OW-friendly cavern dive).

 

[oldschool45]

Hit Rainbow River today guided with American Pro Dive Center. Neat dive and one spot with a wall of garfish was cool.
Hitting Ginnie tomorrow. Question for the herd. This will be my wife's first experience using Nitrox. Should I have her run plain air first tank then Nitrox ( 32%) so she has a side by side comparison or just run both tanks Nitrox?

 

[Rilelen]

Love the gar there! Ginnie isn’t deep enough to notice a big difference in NDLs on nitrox, so if you want to go nitrox, I’d probably just do that.

 

[oldschool45]

Got to Ginne on Thursday and skipped the Nitrox. The Devil's Springs were fun. Saw some cave divers exiting Devil's Ear. We skipped doing the Santa Fe river and hit the Ballroom. I'm making a list of places we missed when we get back down here; Blue Grotto, Orange, Royal and Troy maybe Bufford next time. Non-scuba Ichetucknee & Sliver Glen Springs.
We had a great time. Now to start planning Palm Beach in July.