SuPrBuGmAn
Contributor
Springs on 3-27-10
Several gaggles of parade floats staging at different locations, 10k runners, and road blocks tried desperately to delay us from our meet time at BGillespie's house for 8AM. We even stopped at Chick Filet for a quick breakfast in route and TheAwesomeFish and I still made it on time. Cwick and Twick were already there and we all loaded up quickly and headed out with a quick gas station stop(gas and redbull). BGillespie hopped in with the Wickmans and our two truck caravan made way to Fort White. Our first stop was at Amigo's to fill up some tanks. Wayne was elsewhere, but he allows you to fill your own tanks(24 hours a day), just pay up afterwards. It was a short ride from there to our first divesite within Ichetucknee State Park.
The volunteer working the booth didn't understand that our state park passes worked for diving and ended up charging us a dive fee per car. Later on, we met up a park ranger who fixed the situation for us and refunded our money. Ya can't dive the main Ichetucknee Spring, but it sure looked great.
Instead, we'd be using a cart thats in place at the trailhead to carry gear down to Jug Hole Spring. The cart was originally donated by the NFSA and recently replaced by Wayne(I think) as the original cart wasn't doing so well. Its locked up and the code is readily available for divers. The trail is a good 1/3rd mile, so its well appreciated. Jug looked great too!
The trail...
The spring...
After a few trips we managed to get all our gear down to the steps into the water. Ms Awesome and I would be doing a cavern dive and the Wickmans with BGillespie would be doing a cave dive. We all started at the same time, our team lead the way and I ran a primary down to the mainline for both teams to use. Once tied in, we let the cave team through and we started poking around the Blue Room, which is the second room in Jug, still within the cavern zone. Visibility was pretty much limitless and the flow was strongly positive, as typical when the aquiffer isn't suffering too badly(which it was LAST february). There are lots of nooks and crannies in the blue room to poke around in and look and see. Turtle fossils can be found amongst the bottom along with other bones. There were a few skittish catfish here and there. Eventually we made our way to the main cavern area and played around in the shaft of sunlight in the center. We observed the flow take some dislodged debri and twist it around and up like a tornado. It swirled slowly throughout the rest of the day. We explored the overhangs on the outside of the cavern and looked at a few clay banks. Eventually, we decided to head back into the Blue Room for a few more minutes before reaching turn pressure. We did a safety stop around the cavern mouth, getting kicked around by the flow, left the line in for a second dive, and then exitted the cave with a max depth of 55' for a dive lasting 40 minutes.
We had a short SI, only about 8 minutes before I paired off with BGillespie to hop into the cave itself for a quick dive with my tanks still at better than rated pressure. Twick joined us for as long as he could in BM'd doubles, then turned. BGillespie and I headed back past the bedding plane and Diamond Sands restriction and another 100'p or so before B's mask leak had annoyed him enough to call the dive. We turned and headed out, looking at a promising little lead along the way. The cave at Jug is beautiful, its primarily a dark cave, but has some very interesting orange/blue/grey clay banks, coarse dark sand that sparkles in your light, and azuer blue water. While the main passage is short(just shy of 600'p), its one of my favorite caves. I had a max depth of 88' for a dive lasting just 32 minutes. We saw a couple brown water snakes along the water's edge as we were waiting on the cart to get back. Everyone always thinks they're moccasins.
By the time we were packed up, everyone was famished, so food was in order. We stopped in Branford at a sub shop next to the Hardees, it was pretty good. We ate at the park next to the Suwannee River and Branford Spring. Branford Spring was crazy flooded. After a bit of food, we headed out to check on another spring I had visited once before, this one has some supposedly great sidemount cave. It was flooded the first time I was there, but it was VERY flooded this time...
That railing is for a stairway down to a shoreline where we stood last time to take a picture of the flooded spring
Its completely inundated now. The trip back went by quickly, had a great set of dives with some of my favorite buddies.
Sinks on 3-28-10
Didn't dive on Sunday, but TheAwesomeFish and I did check on conditions on a few sinks in Leon County.
Here's one...
We checked out another afterwards, it was very blue, but I didn't get a picture.
Here's another one we visited on the way home.
I need to learn to start taking my entire kit out with me, I missed out on some great wildlife pictures because I only had a wide angle lense on the camera(had macro and zoom lenses in the car). Saw a big fox squirrel, a fairly decently sized moccasin with great coloring(especially for its size), and several other creatures worthy of pictures. Dunno what I was thinkin?
Anyway, another great trip, looking forward to some more bottom time in the near future!
Several gaggles of parade floats staging at different locations, 10k runners, and road blocks tried desperately to delay us from our meet time at BGillespie's house for 8AM. We even stopped at Chick Filet for a quick breakfast in route and TheAwesomeFish and I still made it on time. Cwick and Twick were already there and we all loaded up quickly and headed out with a quick gas station stop(gas and redbull). BGillespie hopped in with the Wickmans and our two truck caravan made way to Fort White. Our first stop was at Amigo's to fill up some tanks. Wayne was elsewhere, but he allows you to fill your own tanks(24 hours a day), just pay up afterwards. It was a short ride from there to our first divesite within Ichetucknee State Park.
The volunteer working the booth didn't understand that our state park passes worked for diving and ended up charging us a dive fee per car. Later on, we met up a park ranger who fixed the situation for us and refunded our money. Ya can't dive the main Ichetucknee Spring, but it sure looked great.
Instead, we'd be using a cart thats in place at the trailhead to carry gear down to Jug Hole Spring. The cart was originally donated by the NFSA and recently replaced by Wayne(I think) as the original cart wasn't doing so well. Its locked up and the code is readily available for divers. The trail is a good 1/3rd mile, so its well appreciated. Jug looked great too!
The trail...
The spring...
After a few trips we managed to get all our gear down to the steps into the water. Ms Awesome and I would be doing a cavern dive and the Wickmans with BGillespie would be doing a cave dive. We all started at the same time, our team lead the way and I ran a primary down to the mainline for both teams to use. Once tied in, we let the cave team through and we started poking around the Blue Room, which is the second room in Jug, still within the cavern zone. Visibility was pretty much limitless and the flow was strongly positive, as typical when the aquiffer isn't suffering too badly(which it was LAST february). There are lots of nooks and crannies in the blue room to poke around in and look and see. Turtle fossils can be found amongst the bottom along with other bones. There were a few skittish catfish here and there. Eventually we made our way to the main cavern area and played around in the shaft of sunlight in the center. We observed the flow take some dislodged debri and twist it around and up like a tornado. It swirled slowly throughout the rest of the day. We explored the overhangs on the outside of the cavern and looked at a few clay banks. Eventually, we decided to head back into the Blue Room for a few more minutes before reaching turn pressure. We did a safety stop around the cavern mouth, getting kicked around by the flow, left the line in for a second dive, and then exitted the cave with a max depth of 55' for a dive lasting 40 minutes.
We had a short SI, only about 8 minutes before I paired off with BGillespie to hop into the cave itself for a quick dive with my tanks still at better than rated pressure. Twick joined us for as long as he could in BM'd doubles, then turned. BGillespie and I headed back past the bedding plane and Diamond Sands restriction and another 100'p or so before B's mask leak had annoyed him enough to call the dive. We turned and headed out, looking at a promising little lead along the way. The cave at Jug is beautiful, its primarily a dark cave, but has some very interesting orange/blue/grey clay banks, coarse dark sand that sparkles in your light, and azuer blue water. While the main passage is short(just shy of 600'p), its one of my favorite caves. I had a max depth of 88' for a dive lasting just 32 minutes. We saw a couple brown water snakes along the water's edge as we were waiting on the cart to get back. Everyone always thinks they're moccasins.
By the time we were packed up, everyone was famished, so food was in order. We stopped in Branford at a sub shop next to the Hardees, it was pretty good. We ate at the park next to the Suwannee River and Branford Spring. Branford Spring was crazy flooded. After a bit of food, we headed out to check on another spring I had visited once before, this one has some supposedly great sidemount cave. It was flooded the first time I was there, but it was VERY flooded this time...
That railing is for a stairway down to a shoreline where we stood last time to take a picture of the flooded spring
Its completely inundated now. The trip back went by quickly, had a great set of dives with some of my favorite buddies. Sinks on 3-28-10
Didn't dive on Sunday, but TheAwesomeFish and I did check on conditions on a few sinks in Leon County.
Here's one...
We checked out another afterwards, it was very blue, but I didn't get a picture.
Here's another one we visited on the way home.
I need to learn to start taking my entire kit out with me, I missed out on some great wildlife pictures because I only had a wide angle lense on the camera(had macro and zoom lenses in the car). Saw a big fox squirrel, a fairly decently sized moccasin with great coloring(especially for its size), and several other creatures worthy of pictures. Dunno what I was thinkin?
Anyway, another great trip, looking forward to some more bottom time in the near future!
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