paulwall
Contributor
I made plans to meet up with BamaScubaKat, but completely screwed up the times, and denied myself 2 hours of sleep.
I left new Orleans at 6am to head over to Gulf Shores to hopefully dive the Whiskey wreck. For some reason, I thought the meet time was 9:30am, but reviewing BSK's thread today, I see it was actually 11am. Anyhow, I arrived in Gulf shores at 9am to find the triathlon had the Hwy 59/Hwy 180 intersection blocked. I headed west one block up and got to the parking area to find it nearly deserted. Since I had time, and only a 1/2 tank of air, I decided to snorkel out and tie in the dive flag to save an underwater hunt later.
The first thing I noticed is that the water was a greenish-brown, and that the waves were breaking about 100ft off the beach. 1-2ft rollers were coming in infrequently, and the sandbar was immediately adjacent to the beach. DownUnder had reported good vis earlier in the week, but I now dispute that claim. I could barely see 3ft down from the surface.
Anyway, I spent 30 minutes looking for this thing in limited vis. I could hear the clicks of a nearby dolphin pod and was rewarded by a tail slap after surfacing once. The mammals were only a few yards away, but I didn't know until I surfaced. As 9:30 rolled around, I exited the water to check on BSK's status. She was still in Robertsdale, so I told her the situation and we decided it was still worth a try. I headed back out in snorkel gear to try to tie in again.
On the second trip, I noticed some still spots on the water's surface behind the biggest rollers. This was an indication of upwelling from the water passing over the wreck and causing something like a boil on the surface. I lined up the largest of these with some markings on the beach and headed back in.
This time, I found the wreck pretty quickly. There was a slight offshore and west push, that moved me from my surface dive spot. I found a pair of pipes poking up from the sand at least 3'. It seemed I was diving deeper than I had in August, too. After tying off and making a couple of more exploration plunges, I headed back to the beach. (Side note, someone was watching me from the beach, but didn't see my final surfacing and freaked out that I was lying on the bottom).
BSK showed up, and we geared up and discussed the conditions, experience, and equipment before heading back to the beach. I had tied in S of the main part of the wreck, and told her about the offshore and westward push. We swam out on the surface and regrouped near the flag. I dived down to let a little more line out, as the tide had risen a bit, and the flag was a little restricted.
We got together and descended, and I headed N to the wreck. And lost BSK almost immediately. Resurfaced, regrouped and descended again. She stayed with me as we approached the wreck from the S, swam West on the N side to the break, and returned on the S Side of the wreck exploring in 1-2' vis how much was exposed. I lost her again, shortly after showing her a snail shell as big as my palm. I actually swam under a deck beam and backed out, as I didn't want her to follow me under any structure. When I couldn't find her after a minute, I resurfaced and we regrouped and decided to abort the rest of the dive.
The surge was strong, once sweeping me over the wreck from S to N and bouncing the two of us together quite often. Vis was 1-2 ft, and it was gloomy under water. I was sans wetsuit, and saw 0 jellyfish. Max depth was 19ft! (Yes nearly 20') for a dive lasting about 20 minutes. We swam back to the beach, and debriefed in the parking lot.
Might want to hit this again in a couple of weeks if the visibility improves. I doubt the rudder is exposed, but there is lots of new debris to see S of the wreck. The S side is still pretty silted in, but the N side is undercut, and that's where I think I found the 19'. Scared one flounder, saw a school of juvenile spadefish, lots of blennies. I did find one circular piece of Iron or concrete while snorkling but 20' is at the limit of my abilities and I couldn't find any place to tie in the flag.
Headed to the condo to take a shower and get some lunch. Keep the vis reports posted for the next couple of weeks, and let's hit this again.
I left new Orleans at 6am to head over to Gulf Shores to hopefully dive the Whiskey wreck. For some reason, I thought the meet time was 9:30am, but reviewing BSK's thread today, I see it was actually 11am. Anyhow, I arrived in Gulf shores at 9am to find the triathlon had the Hwy 59/Hwy 180 intersection blocked. I headed west one block up and got to the parking area to find it nearly deserted. Since I had time, and only a 1/2 tank of air, I decided to snorkel out and tie in the dive flag to save an underwater hunt later.
The first thing I noticed is that the water was a greenish-brown, and that the waves were breaking about 100ft off the beach. 1-2ft rollers were coming in infrequently, and the sandbar was immediately adjacent to the beach. DownUnder had reported good vis earlier in the week, but I now dispute that claim. I could barely see 3ft down from the surface.
Anyway, I spent 30 minutes looking for this thing in limited vis. I could hear the clicks of a nearby dolphin pod and was rewarded by a tail slap after surfacing once. The mammals were only a few yards away, but I didn't know until I surfaced. As 9:30 rolled around, I exited the water to check on BSK's status. She was still in Robertsdale, so I told her the situation and we decided it was still worth a try. I headed back out in snorkel gear to try to tie in again.
On the second trip, I noticed some still spots on the water's surface behind the biggest rollers. This was an indication of upwelling from the water passing over the wreck and causing something like a boil on the surface. I lined up the largest of these with some markings on the beach and headed back in.
This time, I found the wreck pretty quickly. There was a slight offshore and west push, that moved me from my surface dive spot. I found a pair of pipes poking up from the sand at least 3'. It seemed I was diving deeper than I had in August, too. After tying off and making a couple of more exploration plunges, I headed back to the beach. (Side note, someone was watching me from the beach, but didn't see my final surfacing and freaked out that I was lying on the bottom).
BSK showed up, and we geared up and discussed the conditions, experience, and equipment before heading back to the beach. I had tied in S of the main part of the wreck, and told her about the offshore and westward push. We swam out on the surface and regrouped near the flag. I dived down to let a little more line out, as the tide had risen a bit, and the flag was a little restricted.
We got together and descended, and I headed N to the wreck. And lost BSK almost immediately. Resurfaced, regrouped and descended again. She stayed with me as we approached the wreck from the S, swam West on the N side to the break, and returned on the S Side of the wreck exploring in 1-2' vis how much was exposed. I lost her again, shortly after showing her a snail shell as big as my palm. I actually swam under a deck beam and backed out, as I didn't want her to follow me under any structure. When I couldn't find her after a minute, I resurfaced and we regrouped and decided to abort the rest of the dive.
The surge was strong, once sweeping me over the wreck from S to N and bouncing the two of us together quite often. Vis was 1-2 ft, and it was gloomy under water. I was sans wetsuit, and saw 0 jellyfish. Max depth was 19ft! (Yes nearly 20') for a dive lasting about 20 minutes. We swam back to the beach, and debriefed in the parking lot.
Might want to hit this again in a couple of weeks if the visibility improves. I doubt the rudder is exposed, but there is lots of new debris to see S of the wreck. The S side is still pretty silted in, but the N side is undercut, and that's where I think I found the 19'. Scared one flounder, saw a school of juvenile spadefish, lots of blennies. I did find one circular piece of Iron or concrete while snorkling but 20' is at the limit of my abilities and I couldn't find any place to tie in the flag.
Headed to the condo to take a shower and get some lunch. Keep the vis reports posted for the next couple of weeks, and let's hit this again.
