SCUBA Diving in the Keys

Gina and I are back from a short vacation in the Florida Keys. We flew into Ft. Lauderdale Thursday morning and then drove down to Summerland Key to stay with my brother, Marc. Gina finally got to meet Marc's dog Dallas.

Friday morning Marc, Gina, one of Marc's friends and I did two dives on Looe Key. This is a fairly shallow reef that gave us a maximum depth of about 25 feet. The reef here is in pretty good shape and we saw lots of interesting sea life. Here are a few pictures:

French Angel Fish

Sting RayI have to look this one upBarracuda

Looe Key was nice, but the highlight of the trip was getting to dive on the USNS Vandenberg. The Vandenberg was sunk on 5/27/09 to create an artificial reef. It opened for diving on 5/30/09. We went out to dive the Vandenberg on 6/7/09 so we were some of the first divers to get to see the wreck.

The Vandenberg is about 7 miles from Key West and was sunk in 140' of water. The deck is at about 95' and the super structure starts at around 50'. Gina, Marc, and I did 2 dives. The boat was tied into the middle of the ship between two large radar dishes.

Our first dive we went to the stern of the ship and had a maximum depth of 89'. The dive lasted about 34 minutes. Our second dive we explored the bow of the ship and even did a quick swim through on the bridge. Our maximum depth on the second dive was 97' for 37 minutes. Here are a few pictures:

One of the radar dishesGina and I near the center of the ship

On the bowGina on the bridge
Near one of the radar dishes

Marc took most of the pictures using my camera. They turned out pretty well.

The trip ended way too soon and we flew back to DC on Monday. Gina and I had a blast and can't wait for more diving on the honeymoon. We are going to have to head back to the Keys sometime soon too.

Less than 2 months until the wedding!