Well, it's been a long wait, sorry folks but here we have it, a nice diary of my dives in the Keys this year. Went back to Key Largo again for two days this year and my uncle and I had a blast 
. I'm going to update this a little at a time since there are SO MANY pictures. We'll start with Day One which was French Reef, dive site is called Woody's Ledge. One of the somewhat deeper reefs off of Largo with some larger reef formations and shelfs. The sand was down about 45-50ft and the flats up around 25-30ft. We went out with dive guides, something' I'd never done before and it was great. They helped show us a lot of really cool things I'd never have seen without them. Conditions were OK this day, vis was around 30ft prolly and somewhat troublesome for photography but fine for seeing things visually. Surface was really choppy (~6' seas). Anyways, on with the pics (photoshopped to pull out the blue)
After gettin in the water and realizing I was about a pound short on weight (forgot I added thick boots instead of my usual thin ones) I began my descent. First few fish I saw were a gorgeous Atlantic Blue Tang
And while still getting my bearings I decided to take a few shots of some more common members of the Carribean/Keys. A Yellowtail snapper,
Once we were all down and OK, we headed off and I snapped a few more pics, a hogfish and a smaller nassau grouper
Now, our diveguide ran through all these weird hand-signals for livestock I've never heard of before. About the only two I understood were "shark" (hand pointing up on your forehead), and "ray" (flapping his arms at the side). He'd always follow the signal with a point so although I wasn't sure what I was gonna see I got to catch it anyways
. First up, he gave the signal for a ray as we were passing over a reef shelf. And there at the bottom was a nice big Southern Stingray. Might have seen him on my own...
Moving away from the shelf, we came across a small outcropping in the middle of this BIG hole in the reef. And underneath this outcropping, a whole bunch of reef lobster. Prolly 5 or six in total. Funny that the lobsters got redeye
And here's a shot of my uncle on the sand tryin to get the Lobster, and me swimmin around the hole
So we headed back towards the reef and our guide gave us another sign, this time for shark. And there ahead of us was a 7' nurse shark. Scared her away with the 4 of us tryin to get close enough for a pic
Figured I'd take a break to take a couple shots of some corals (brains) and fish
Moving on, another sign from our guide I didn't get, this one turned out to be a Cowfish, big one too about 10"
Swimmin around, caught a doctorfish and a few black margates
Next up, the dive guides showed us what they told us on the boat to be one of the larger brain corals in the keys. Shoulda taken pics with us in the foreground to get an idea of scale. This thing was MASSIVE, taller than me!
Gettin closer to the end of our dive I snapped a few more blue tangs, and the first barracuda of the day (surprisingly weren't many of them on any of the dives)
And just before we ran out of time and had to surface, got another sign from the guide. This one I would have NEVER seen without him, turned out to be a Toadfish. Amazing camo!
Well, hope you guys enjoyed this first installment. Was a great warmup dive. The next installment is gonna be even better, watch this space
. I'm going to update this a little at a time since there are SO MANY pictures. We'll start with Day One which was French Reef, dive site is called Woody's Ledge. One of the somewhat deeper reefs off of Largo with some larger reef formations and shelfs. The sand was down about 45-50ft and the flats up around 25-30ft. We went out with dive guides, something' I'd never done before and it was great. They helped show us a lot of really cool things I'd never have seen without them. Conditions were OK this day, vis was around 30ft prolly and somewhat troublesome for photography but fine for seeing things visually. Surface was really choppy (~6' seas). Anyways, on with the pics (photoshopped to pull out the blue)After gettin in the water and realizing I was about a pound short on weight (forgot I added thick boots instead of my usual thin ones) I began my descent. First few fish I saw were a gorgeous Atlantic Blue Tang
And while still getting my bearings I decided to take a few shots of some more common members of the Carribean/Keys. A Yellowtail snapper,
Once we were all down and OK, we headed off and I snapped a few more pics, a hogfish and a smaller nassau grouper
Now, our diveguide ran through all these weird hand-signals for livestock I've never heard of before. About the only two I understood were "shark" (hand pointing up on your forehead), and "ray" (flapping his arms at the side). He'd always follow the signal with a point so although I wasn't sure what I was gonna see I got to catch it anyways
. First up, he gave the signal for a ray as we were passing over a reef shelf. And there at the bottom was a nice big Southern Stingray. Might have seen him on my own...
Moving away from the shelf, we came across a small outcropping in the middle of this BIG hole in the reef. And underneath this outcropping, a whole bunch of reef lobster. Prolly 5 or six in total. Funny that the lobsters got redeye
And here's a shot of my uncle on the sand tryin to get the Lobster, and me swimmin around the hole
So we headed back towards the reef and our guide gave us another sign, this time for shark. And there ahead of us was a 7' nurse shark. Scared her away with the 4 of us tryin to get close enough for a pic
Figured I'd take a break to take a couple shots of some corals (brains) and fish
Moving on, another sign from our guide I didn't get, this one turned out to be a Cowfish, big one too about 10"
Swimmin around, caught a doctorfish and a few black margates
Next up, the dive guides showed us what they told us on the boat to be one of the larger brain corals in the keys. Shoulda taken pics with us in the foreground to get an idea of scale. This thing was MASSIVE, taller than me!
Gettin closer to the end of our dive I snapped a few more blue tangs, and the first barracuda of the day (surprisingly weren't many of them on any of the dives)
And just before we ran out of time and had to surface, got another sign from the guide. This one I would have NEVER seen without him, turned out to be a Toadfish. Amazing camo!
Well, hope you guys enjoyed this first installment. Was a great warmup dive. The next installment is gonna be even better, watch this space
