Venice isnt Paradise, but nor is Alexander - weekend of alternates

[simbrooks]

Well this weekend was a fun set of trips!!

Saturday as arranged I arrived at Venice (2.25 hours, 150 miles from Orlando) to find some reasonably rough weather. Due to traffic I had missed Reefguy by nearly no time, waited a little time before Walter came along and surveyed the area - trust me it wasn’t pretty!!

So as an alternate we decided to go up to Paradise Springs (which I hadn’t done before) and after another 2 hours on the road we go there to see 6 divers leaving. Had a pretty good time on my deepest dive to date (97ft - although my stupid rental w/max depth indicator didn’t show it that deep, the needle did, but the thin max depth thing didn’t!! Thank goodness I looked at it, it hovered near 100ft for a little time). We then slowly ascended back up to the main cavern for a look-see at some fossils, offgas a little for some time. It was a nice sight to see that little hole in the pitch black (when we turned the lights out). We floated around in there for the remainder of our bottom time and then ascended to the cone at 15-20ft for at least 6 minutes of safety stop. I saw some nice fossils, the big ‘whale’ bone under the log, but I didn’t really notice any sand dollars – mostly as I didn’t know what they looked like and wasn’t looking for them. Each dive I have done so far is a new experience with new stuff to see and to be told that I still missed something else down there!! I really enjoyed that dive, it was a little different than my other overhead dives so far due to it being one large but sloping hole with a permanent guideline.

Sunday my GF and I were planning to dive PS, her first time, this would be my second. We left Orlando around 12 after church kicked out and arrived there a little after 1.30 to see at least 12 autos of some description in the lot and at least 15 bodies out the water in various states of gearing up/down or on SI – this wasn’t a good sign for viz and the thought of entering a silted up cavern with my GF was not what I had hoped for – would like her to see it in a more virgin sense. I had managed to arrange the loan of two Ranger BC’s for the trip to try out and also was loaned a Maximus reg – which I didn’t like all that much, we weren’t going to use those here though. So we decided to call that one for another day (like early one Saturday morning!). Our alternate yesterday was then either one of the Williston couple or Alexander Springs. We had a good idea that the Williston pair would be similar to PS, so Alexander it was. We headed up to Ocala to find major roadworks and after a 30 minute detour finally were on our way to the forest. Arrived there around 3.30 for a chance of diving for one tank before the 6pm kick out. After rigging up we headed down to a reasonable sized head spring, got in and found the boil. There were two other divers in the water til about 4pm, but they were in the weeds snorkeling on gas. We tried out best to hang and watch the fish, but after 25 minutes of watching the fish and looking into the various parts of the boil got a little bored. We then spent the remainder of the hour drifting along the banks. Which was interesting although more snorkeling on air (we didn’t bring the snorkels as we thought we were going into a cavern!) than diving. I cant believe how shallow it was though, barely 3 ft in most places – I could touch the bottom with ease if I wanted to. Got to practice my frog like kicks – still not sure I am doing it right (hard to break it when you were a breaststroke swimmer before diving), but I was moving along pretty well without silting. We still ended up with a little in our hair, I think mostly from the boil. Viz was great in all the spring (no different from many other springs), but I did find it a little boring after a time. I have dove a river drift dive that had many boils/springs (Rainbow) to check out and it was nice to get a variety of topography there, but I found it a little less than a tank’s dive even to watch the fish.

So all in all, my car had a 300 mile round trip via Venice to get only 80 miles from Orlando and then another 120(?) round trip to get only 70 miles! But at least we got some U/W time in for the weekend!!

Next up is an arranged weekend down in Jupiter, doing 4 dives there, two on wrecks (non-pen) and two on the reefs, hopefully find the lemons this time! That is in two weeks, then Ginnie Springs another 3 weeks after that. Might hit PS some time in between if we have time on a weekend.

 

[The Chairman]

I must have missed you by mere minutes. Those two snorkeling the weedline at Alexander Springs were none other than MB and his wife, Joanne. We almost did Paradise after the Grotto (see my musical trip report) but were just too durn cold.

The boil is very very stong... I think it is the third or fourth largest in Florida (Blue SPring is the largest), and it can cause all types of "popcorn" to be blown up if you are merely in the vicinity. It had nothing to do with your style of kicking.

 

[simbrooks]

Well part of the reason we didnt get cold at PS is that i took my 5mm - what i would have used at Venice, then i packed for a cavern dive on sunday only to find myself needing my snorkel that same afternoon in the alternate venue! Talk about unprepared!

So did you come along to PS after the Grotto? We left around 3 i think. There were two divers leaving as we got there (about 1.30), both on nitrox and what looked like a pair of couples who knew each other also leaving (possibly family?). As for Alexander, we hung out in the boil, swam into the flow a little and watched fish, not sure i would go there for a little while again though, not quite the action i was hoping for.

As for kick styles, any fluttering (more than a few inches) seemed to throw up a cloud in the run, i felt like i only just had enough room to drop my knees to keep my fins in the water for a shallow frog like kick - when the flow wasnt helping me or i was going against it to come back.

 

[The Chairman]

We -ALMOST- went to PS but did not.

I use a scull kick in the shallows... there are a ton of different fish specie to see. It's my favorite spot to teach in.

 

[SmokeAire]

I arrived at PS at about 3:15 so I must have just missed both of yall. There were about 6- 7 divers there. I still haven't done PS. It's so close yet I seem to want to spend ,ore time in my car than in the water..sheesh.
Last weekend at Alexander Springs I must have spent about and hour and a half in the springs. There is a lot to see if you know what to look for. Plus I saw about 7 large amored catfish that I hadn't seen there before. They were rather large. One swam up and settled right next to me like it wanted me to pet it. I just laid there and we just looked at each other.
And yes a head covering is mandatory unless you want to wash a pound or two of "popcorn" (good term Doc) out of your hair.

Anyway sorry I missed you guys.

Chuck

 

[MB]

There were two other divers in the water til about 4pm, but they were in the weeds snorkeling on gas.

Hey sim - when we left the ranger station, she said there were two other divers in the park. Sorry we missed ya, but I was doing my NetDoc/manatee imitation (nose in the grass, fins up). I enjoyed Alexander - the warmest water we had all weekend!. VERY beautiful area. I agree, the diving there is limited, but the wildlife was awesome, and the whole experince was pretty nice.

See you next time we're up you way.

 

[Walter]

Simon is hard to miss.

 

[simbrooks]

I dont know if you dived PS SmokeAire at that time, but by the number of divers i saw there, it didnt look as inviting as on saturday with Walter (thanks again for that trip, shame we couldnt have spent more time! Also what do you mean its hard to miss me? I hope for my size rather than uncoordinated diving style .

We seriously tried to explore every inch of that boil and the weeds that we could, my GF found it a little cold after just over an hour, it was also getting late, so we headed out. It was pretty, but i do like a change in scenery or variety of scenery as i dive.

We also saw those "catfish", they definately had the whiskers, but they were almost purple - couldnt find a good description of them in the freshwater book we have, the blue catfish arent "supposed" to be in this area according to the maps in this book. They also had almost shark like looking tails, rather than a what the rest of the pics in the book looked like - what were they? We saw a few types of turtle and i couldnt count/ID the fish there were so many.

Sorry we missed so many people at some many places this weekend, Reefguy & Divingvenice at Venice, Netdoc and MB at PS (even though you didnt go there, but were thinking of) and SmokeAire at PS on sunday and MB again at Alexander - its a small world!

 

[SmokeAire]

Armored catfish at Alxndr Sprng.
Here is a portion of an Em I received about Armored Catfish which, apprarently, is not indigenous to Florida and springs.

With over 50 species of armored catfish, almost all live in the streams of South America. These are small fish with the largest less than one foot long and they are members of the mailed catfish family known as Callichthyidae. The armored catfish are remarkable for two reasons. One is their bony armor and the other is their method of fertilization which is used in most of the species. Armored catfish have often been known to travel over land for considerable distances, pulling themselves along with the strong spines on the breast or pectoral fins and using intestinal respiration. They have a supplementary breathing system in which air is swallowed and the oxygen from that air is taken up by a network of fine capillary blood vessels in the wall of the intestines. One species is know to aquarians as the talking catfish due to the grunting sounds it makes both in and out of the water. These sounds are caused by movement of the spines in the pectoral fins, amplified by the gas filled swim bladder that acts as a resonator. Have you observed any of the exotic catfish hanging around the spring and spring run (see photo)? The numbers here at Blue Spring have been increasing exponentially. At this point I’m just casually asking around to see how far north these critters have become established.

I hope this helps.
Chuck

 

[Walter]

You're a big guy = hard to miss.