Hmm... I suppose I like diving this time of year just as much as I like diving any other time, but the thing that sets it apart for me is the fact that so few people around here do it.
I drove over to a Florida spring last weekend, and when I got there at 7am, the air temperature was apparently in the low 20s. There was not a diver to be seen. I took my time gearing up, as it didn't look like I'd have any Shermans* mucking up the vis, and once I was ready, I calmly walked into the serene depths of the spring. As someone who has always enjoyed long backwoods hikes, I appreciated the ability to disappear from the world for a while.
I suppose the winter diving around here is similar to being at Six Flags when a huge thunderstorm comes through and drives everyone off, and then somehow the skies suddenly clear up. There you are, in the same place you'd been that morning, but now all the hassles and all the crowds and all the lines are gone, and you have the park almost to yourself to explore and enjoy as you see fit...
...and then there are the stories you can tell. I can't help but be happy when I'm talking to people, divers or surface-dwellers, about the latest winter diving. To the topsiders, they're stories about fascinating and intriguing places they've never been, and to the divers on their extended winter surface intervals, they're stories about places they've been and things they know, but in an elegantly foreign way. If a buddy or two of mine ends up in the drysuit crowd by *next* winter, I might even get to give winter buddy diving a try.
Hehe, I suppose a little of the fun is the "guilty pleasure" of knowing you're out diving while everyone else is sitting at home on scubaboard, pining away while silently reading the "Exposure Suits" forum. (Incidentally... *seals*?!? I *so* want to dive with seals someday.)
*"Shermans?" you ask? Yeah, "Shermans march through the sea."