Article Author:

Suzette
Advanced Open Water

Today was so awesome that I wanted to just re-wind it and have it all over again!

It was a small but enthusiastic crowd today on the boat.  I had a special request for Divemaster/Instructor Brad: Show me  a turtle!  I haven’t seen a turtle in ages.  It seems that every dive I come up and someone says “Did you see the turtle?” and I’ve missed it again.  So today I said “Brad.  No more goofing around.  TURTLE.  Show me!”

Well, the aquatic critters do so love Brad.  He gets in the water and he’s like Aquaman; he starts putting out the calls and the best stuff shows up.  Sure enough, what do you think we saw on dive #1?  A turtle.  Gorgeous and he swam around for a while letting me get some good photos.  We also saw a shark for a moment, a scorpion fish, some barracuda and a plethora of other underwater life.  Can you beat having a dive guide that takes requests? I think not!

Dive #2 was amazing, and I really didn’t think we could top #1.  We drifted Molasses reef, and guess who showed up and drifted it with us? How about 3 beautiful spotted eagle rays?  Yes indeed.  They drifted along, so graceful and lovely and they stayed to our outside for much of the dive, occasionally re-appearing to show off their grace and beauty to us.  We were on an incredible portion of the reef; very unspoiled and pristine.  There were numerous large french angel fish, the aforementioned rays, tons of bright corals and even some lobster.

Enjoy the pictures, but above all, come out and enjoy some diving.  The weather is perfect, the diving is great and the staff will even conjure up the critter of your choice.  OK, that last part may not be true, but it seems to work out that way for me.  Happy diving!

Article Author:

Suzette
Advanced Open Water

Why yes, yes I did! What a spectacular week it has been in Key Largo for diving. Really; if you are sitting at home wondering if you should get out and dive, the only answer is YES. Do it.

Yesterday I did the afternoon dive and it was simply gorgeous. Great weather, reasonably calm seas and an enthusiastic group on the boat. Jeff was our guide in the water and showed us some great stuff, most notably a HUGE green eel that was just laying under a ledge for the world to see. Usually you just see them sticking their heads out of a hole in the coral, but he was just on display and so beautiful.

The second dive was even better, as if that’s possible. I saw and photographed what I *think* is a little blue shrimp of some kind. Very different from the usual large fish I like to take pictures of. Sometimes you have to remember to slow down and look at the small stuff as well as enjoy the big stuff.

Gotta run for now, it’s a lovely day and I may just…you guessed it…go diving!

Article Author:

Suzette
Advanced Open Water

Well, it was an awesome week of diving with Rainbow Reef this week. The days blended together some, but I’ll do my best to recap what really stood out for me on each day.

First, on Wednesday we had an incredible Discover Scuba dive with Megan and her student, Kat. I don’t know if Kat will ever bother going out again, since on her first dive (which you never would have known, she was such a natural) she/we saw a shark, a huge ray, about a million fish, jellyfish- you name it! It was simply a spectacular day on Snapper Ledge. Megan must have used all of her critter calling talents to put on a show like that.
That same day we did a drift dive on Molasses with Jeff leading the way and it was a relaxing, fun dive. There is nothing quite like playing “follow the flag” to make for a fantastic day of diving. On that dive, we saw a big scorpion fish (they really do blend, wow!), a giant ugly sea cucumber, and a slew of gorgeous corals.

Article Author:

Captain D.J.
Master Instructor

Hi gang,

So my old friend Paolo from Miami Beach called me up the other day and wanted to take his girlfriend Katarzyna diving. Growing up in Poland, where they aren’t exactly known for great diving, she has never been diving, so naturally we got her in our PADI Discover Scuba Class happening on Thursday. What a great student! She did great in the pool, and then we took her out to the reef after lunch. She had a blast! She got to see stingrays, sharks and more fish than she could count. We think she might still be smiling.. It was also a nice day for my good friend Paolo.. He runs a famous modeling agency in Miami Beach and it’s a pretty high stress environment, and he works too much! So both Katarzyna and I were thrilled we could get him out diving on a rare day off. To make it a true day off, she even hid Paolo’s blackberry!

It was great to catch up with Paolo, and it was also very nice to meet Katarzyna. I can tell Paolo is very happy around her, and for good reason, she is a sweetheart who is always smiling. Hope everything works out for them! We wouldn’t be surprised to see Katarzyna back to get certified soon, she was a natural underwater!

We stopped at Snapper Ledge and then we did a drift dive on the shallow end of Molasses Reef. Probably about 100 feet of visibility and a light current. The water was 86 degrees and we could only measure the waves in inches! The weather forecast is AWESOME for this Labor Day Weekend.. Hope you will be joining us for the last big holiday of the summer and our season..

CLICK HERE TO WATCH Katarzyna Discover Scuba Diving!