jplvr
06-14-2004, 10:00 AM
One of my friends in Mobile was able to convince his buddies with a boat to let 2 absolutely green divers on his boat for the weekend for a little spearfishing. 23' boat with 5 divers gets pretty darn crowded, so I considered myself lucky to even be invited to go. My friend and I leave out of B'ham around 1 pm Friday afternoon and hit traffic caused by a wreck ahead at Evergreen, Al along I-65. I make the call to Mobile to let him know we may be delayed.
This is when I learn that his friend with the boat has had an allergic reaction to something and is headed to the hospital. Just one of those freak things that couldn't be avoided I guess. I pretty much knew right then that we were shut down for the weekend, but headed to Mobile anyway just in case.
He couldn't go, but we were able to get on a charter captained by my friend's scuba instructor. We head over to Pensacola around 10 am or so. After a couple of stops, we get across the bay and pick up some food at Wendy's. At this point, my B'ham buddy learns that his wallet is missing which he declares "the worst disaster ever." :rolleyes: He didn't even have any cash in there or his license... just credit cards and his diver's card (temp card at that).
Anyway, we get to Pensacola and load the boat eventually. The captain starts the engine and gets bogged down in the mud. No problem, he just guns the motor... still stuck. We get it underway eventually, but the damage was already done: bent prop. We still limp out to get in a couple of dives.
First dive was at 45 feet. Captain tells us that we're in the middle of the reef and it's all around us so we drop off the back of the boat.....sand, as far as you can see. We start swimming along the bottom single file, looking for structure and fish. I'd say about a minute later, my B'ham friend who was behind me was missing. We surface to find that his BC (older one he bought from me that I told him to get serviced) has malfunctioned and filled with air sending him directly to the top from 45' down. Needless to say we were lucky that he was not injured. We drop back down the anchor line, but can't find any legal fish.
Next stop was at 90'. No legal fish there either. We head back in.
Highlights of the day were a school of baracuda at the first stop, one of them close enough to me to touch, and a nice sized octopus on the 90' wreck. In hindsight we were lucky that all the events that caused us to be on the 45' deep wreck happened since the first dive of our original plan would've put us in at least 90' of water. Since my friend had not handled the BC problem correctly in 45', I'm not confident he would've been able to do it in 90'.
From what I understand, the guy that had the allergic reaction is doing well. I gathered that if it wasn't for a synus infection also incurred that he would've been going out on Sunday.
I guess I have to chalk this one up to a learning experience. Hopefully, I'll have another shot at my first fish in a week or two.
This is when I learn that his friend with the boat has had an allergic reaction to something and is headed to the hospital. Just one of those freak things that couldn't be avoided I guess. I pretty much knew right then that we were shut down for the weekend, but headed to Mobile anyway just in case.
He couldn't go, but we were able to get on a charter captained by my friend's scuba instructor. We head over to Pensacola around 10 am or so. After a couple of stops, we get across the bay and pick up some food at Wendy's. At this point, my B'ham buddy learns that his wallet is missing which he declares "the worst disaster ever." :rolleyes: He didn't even have any cash in there or his license... just credit cards and his diver's card (temp card at that).
Anyway, we get to Pensacola and load the boat eventually. The captain starts the engine and gets bogged down in the mud. No problem, he just guns the motor... still stuck. We get it underway eventually, but the damage was already done: bent prop. We still limp out to get in a couple of dives.
First dive was at 45 feet. Captain tells us that we're in the middle of the reef and it's all around us so we drop off the back of the boat.....sand, as far as you can see. We start swimming along the bottom single file, looking for structure and fish. I'd say about a minute later, my B'ham friend who was behind me was missing. We surface to find that his BC (older one he bought from me that I told him to get serviced) has malfunctioned and filled with air sending him directly to the top from 45' down. Needless to say we were lucky that he was not injured. We drop back down the anchor line, but can't find any legal fish.
Next stop was at 90'. No legal fish there either. We head back in.
Highlights of the day were a school of baracuda at the first stop, one of them close enough to me to touch, and a nice sized octopus on the 90' wreck. In hindsight we were lucky that all the events that caused us to be on the 45' deep wreck happened since the first dive of our original plan would've put us in at least 90' of water. Since my friend had not handled the BC problem correctly in 45', I'm not confident he would've been able to do it in 90'.
From what I understand, the guy that had the allergic reaction is doing well. I gathered that if it wasn't for a synus infection also incurred that he would've been going out on Sunday.
I guess I have to chalk this one up to a learning experience. Hopefully, I'll have another shot at my first fish in a week or two.