September Sessions
- September 5, 2007
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- By Story/Photos By Matt Badolato
Fishing sessions that is, no big wave riding to speak of as of now. A couple nice days a couple weeks ago, but that hasn't bothered many people too much. If you've been living under water lately instead of under a rock, you would know that our little section of the Atlantic has been gin clear the past couple weeks. With lobster season kicking off last month and the Keys-like visibility we've been blessed with, this past weekend was great for diving, snorkeling, and fishing to boot.
If you were to drive over the inlet bridge this past week you may have been initially shocked to see that the water in Sebastian Inlet was gone!! Just rocks and sand lining the channel! AHH!! Whats happening? Well, those boats weren't just floating on air, but the water was actually so clear that you could make out every little dynamite blasted pebble on the bottom of the inlet, from the reef extending off the south jetty to the bottom of the fenders in the middle of the channel. Standing on top of the A1A bridge one could make out schools of snook and jacks homing in on fleeing mullet, blasting them up against the rocks. On our way out the inlet en route to a day of diving it felt like we were cruising through the Bahamas.
I had heard from a buddy that it was top to bottom visibility on the 45' reefs, so we headed out there first thing in the morning. My buddies and I strapped on masks and fins to check it out. Lo and behold the tip I'd received was true, and one could make out sea bass 50' below. We thought, if it is this clean out here, imagine what it would look like out deep...
Thirty minutes later we were donning wet suits, tanks, and BC's and were anchored up in a spot in 88', about 20 miles out of the inlet. We made our way down the bouy line we had dropped and it was right on a ledge, a huge one. You could actually stand up inside the ledge that went about 8 feet into the rock. Would have made a nice shelter for a cave man, but we weren't looking for neanderthals. The visibility was some of the best I've ever seen out of Sebastian, I could see my John and Jamie from over thirty feet away! We saw some nice red snapper, mangrove snapper, grouper, a few lobster with eggs, mega schools of sardines and cigar minnows, a forty pound snook cruisin' the ledge, and about a 250 pound jewfish patrolling his den. This was our first time diving this spot and area, and I was a tad disappointed with the number of fish. Maybe since the waters were crowded that day the fish had spooked off or had been over fished. Nonetheless, it was a killer dive and always fun with friends. We caught a kingfish trolling a ribbonfish on our way back west.
One thing that really got my blood boiling was when we were making our ascent to the surface. We were doing a 3-minute safety stop at 15' to rid our bodies of whatever nitrogen may be left in our blood. We could see the surface easily and we could see the anchor line coming from the bow of my boat. We were looking up and about to hit the surface when all of a sudden we hear a boat engine and a boat starts doing donuts at full throttle above our bubbles, with us less than 10 feet from the top. There was clearly a dive flag flying high above our boat which was less than thirty feet away from this idiot. Not only should he not have been that close to our boat in the first place, he put our lives in jeapordy with that prop spinning so close to us. Some people should be sent to an island...
Anyway we headed back in shallow to try a beach dive in about 15'. The viz here was just as good, around 20' with fish everywhere. Lobster were few and far between, and I mean few. We only caught one bug at the spot we chose and didn't see any others. I reckon they just got picked through pretty good the first couple weeks of the season. We shot speared some mangrove snapper and took some pictures, soaking in all the wonder that is underwater Florida.
Dove again in the shallow stuff on Labor Day with my buddy who hasn't dove in a couple years due to an accident. We caught 5 lobster and let a bunch go that were too short. Tropical fish were extremely abundant as were smaller snappers and your typical reef dwellers. Another awesome day of diving and spending time in another, quieter world.