Ok I just drank a bunch of coffee to see if I can get this written while it’s fresh. Cat isn’t here to proofread either so they maybe there are some errors.
Went out the past couple days with a bunch of people way west of Key West. The diving was pretty awesome but only part of the time.
I went with Stoner, Steel, Jared, Rob and Nico so we had a pretty packed boat. Our bad luck started when at 5 in the morning we could not get the boat off the lift at Andy’s. We had to pull all the ice back off the boat, along with a bunch of other stuff and mess with it for almost 2 hours until we got it to go down. So we hit the water almost 2 hours behind schedule.
After driving for hours we hit the first spot in 100 feet. It was a scuba spot and Jay, Nico and Steel did the first drops. Nico came up first screaming his head off like a Justin Bieber fan. I drove the boat to him and picked him up. He had a nice black that looked just under 30# and was breathlessly screaming out a story about sharks eating his stringer off his BC. Next Came up Stoner with some big ass hogs. Then came steel with more big hogs but also the story of a 60# black that he shot, but still had on the line. Steel Brought down a reel gun with him and shot the big black and then he was out of air. He surfaced with the gun with line and shaft still in the black.
Then Steel, Stoner and Nico all went back down in that spot where the big black was holed up and all 3 of them working together could not get it out of the cave, so basically three tanks burned with nothing to show for it. Extremely frustrating.
Then we ran to some spots in 50-60 feet where we shot a ton of fish when we were out there last year, and not one of them produced fish. Like 5 or 6 good numbers and they all were duds. So then we spent the rest of the day looking for new spots and only found one in around 70 feet of water. We got a couple grouper off it but the water was dirty. At one point I shot a mutton and this shark ran straight at my chest. He got so close that I brought my knee to my chest and kicked him with the fin heel in the nose. He took off like a rocket after that.
We moved shallower after a bit but could not find anything really. Everyone shot muttons here and there but it wasn’t anything good. The water was like like 20-40 feet of vis which was doable but not great.
We camped over night and that was mostly uneventful. There was some kids on trip there along with some camp counselors and some turtle counting people.
The next day we headed out and and everyone was kind of low spirits due to the day before sucking so bad. We headed out and the water looked pretty crappy then suddenly it turned dark blue and there was probably 80 feet of vis maybe a bit more.
The first spot everyone jumped in and it started going off. Blacks, Reds, 10# hogs it was awesome. Everyone was shooting nice fish. Then came the sharks, and big jewfish trying to take everything we shot. You had to dive as a team, one person shooting and then another person poking whatever was trying to eat the fish. It was fun.
After we hit that area for while we went searching for new spots. We rolled out to 80 feet of water and I could see a dark patch from the boat. I jumped in and could see the rocks and small fish from the surface. Then I saw a big red grouper come out on the sand and look up at me. I dove on him and stoned him. On the way up I could see muttons running around on the sand looking at him. He was probably pushing 16-17# and he had a baby red grouper in his stomach.
As I pulled him up Jared dove and and shot a black off the same rock but his mono got stuck and he couldn’t pull the fish up. Like 3 sharks rolled in and started tearing it up. I dove on it but couldn’t get it. The commotion of the sharks brought everything in. Rob dove and shot a nice black on the sand in 80 feet, and a shark followed it to the surface from the bottom and Niko had to bash it in the head to stop it. There were big ceros zooming around watching the action, Muttons started rolling in on the bottom to where the sharks were eating the grouper. I dove down to shoot another big red that had showed up and at the last second switched and shot a nice mutton that swam right up to me. Then Steel came down with a tank and mopped up the area, getting the big red I passed on, a hog pushing 10# and a couple muttons.
Then we hit another bump out in 75 feet and it went off for a minute too. I got a black rocked up in 75 feet and had to go down and actually move big rocks out of cave to get him out. Nico shot a nice mutton at 66 feet a personal best for him. Jared and Rob both shot red groupers.
Then we drove back east to dive in the dirty summer water on the reef and it was ok but we didn’t see anything noteworthy except Nico got a nice dog snapper and Rob shot some extra large mangroves.
I really should have got in the water and taken some photos for real but we took a few photos so at least I got something to go with this report. Steel Rocket uploaded a bunch of video clips he took from the trip to his facebook account and Stoner also took a bunch of photos so I may have some more photos to go with this post eventually. I hate social media, now I guess everyone is on instagram or some thing. So instead of just updating this website I have to upload crap everywhere or I will look like an old man.
