Dove the Florida Keys again September 6 (yes, one day only). Took the boat out from Tavernier Creek, and headed straight out toward The Eagle. On the way out, we passed a mooring buoy that we had never seen before. On the way back, we tied up to it and decided to spend some time on it.

We were in 25 feet of water, and when I looked over the edge of the boat, I could see the bottom, in fact the first thing I saw was a shark!...(ok, so it was just a nurse shark, but a shark none the less!). I couldn’t wait to get in the water. I suited up, and jumped in.

The reef was relatively small, maybe about an acre (about the size of a football field), and it was easy to stay on the reef and relatively close to the boat because beyond it in every direction was sand. The reef was swarming with fish. I saw two sharks, a sea turtle, a pretty big grouper, several fish I’ve never seen before, all different types of coral, and a fairly big Barracuda. He was following me around, probably looking for a handout.

At the end of the dive, I got back on board and mentioned what I saw below, specifically the Barracuda. I was told that he had been cleaning the bait off of the fishing lines for the entire time I was underwater. We decided to rig a line and put out a treat just for him. Within 2 minutes we had him on the line. It took about ten minutes to wear him down, but we finally got him on board. Took photos and weighed him (14 lb) then released him back into the water for other divers to swim with.