Holy sweet feathery mother of Jesus!!!



Crew
Our supreme commander, Jim "Hollywood" Zurbrick went out shopping for the Jolly Rogers 3 so the wheel got spun by the capable hands of Freeshaft with D4B as master of ceremonies. John Riddick (SB screenname Redneck) came along to help out, and to bust on Bubblejunkie.

Guests
Bubblejunkie, Catfish, Spearooo, LuvMyRedDog, and Walt Quinn. Thanks to Spearooo and LuvMy who jumped on some cancellations last minute. Spearooo ran out of gas a couple miles away from the marina, and pushed his car in rather than miss the slingfest .

Sea Conditions
*Steinhatchee is cold.
*Steinhatchee water feels even colder, 58-60 degrees in most spots. Brrr! I went to urinate on Saturday after a dive, and discovered that my penis had shrunk to a negative three inches.
*Vis was top to bottom all weekend.
*Seas were flat calm on Friday. Friday night it blew up to 3'-4', and laid down to 2'-3' during the day Saturday.

Kinder, Gentler Eco-Harvesting
The forecast forebode terrible nastiness on Sunday so instead of a Middle Grounds trip we decided on an Offshore Steinhatchee single overnighter. We spent Friday hitting rockpiles, and although the depth range we were in was not as loaded as it was two weeks ago, Herculean stringers by any other standard were brought up by most. On the first rockpile, Spearooo shot the trip winning gag (26#) within the first 30 seconds of the dive while I, employing the patented crawl on the seafloor like nudibranch stalking technique, was able to get three gags (18#, 18#, and 16#), and a hoop-load of hogfish. During team two's sling session on another pile loaded with jacks, Spearooo showed us his mad freediving skills by slaying two aj's on his first two freedives in about ninety seconds time total.

That night we anchored on the double-secret, blindfold you in the bilge, look at the GPS, and I'll slap your mammy wreck in a little deeper water. Catfish was the only one who seduced a gag into taking a sardine so everyone turned in early. It was team one's turn to drop the following morning, but since Bubblejunkie was way behind on the eight ball, we altruistically let him jump with us. The initial minute of the dive was reminiscent of the first scene in the movie Gladiator as steel rained down toward the bottom that was carpeted with gags. While Spearooo, Catfish, and Bubblejunkie worked in the wreck itself, I stayed out on the surrounding hard bottom managing five gags all over 10#. Spearooo lost an estimated forty pounder in the wreck, and Bubblejunkie simply crushed them. Let's just put it this way, the picture of his stringer would be way too hot for Spearboard! Teams two, and three backdove still continuing to harvest gags in addition to some very nice mangos that we didn't even pay attention to on the first dive. We rounded out the day on some deeper rockpiles, and ledges to fully top off the box.....again.

Another great trip, and thanks to the four JR2 newcomers. I think we impressed them enough that they are going come back again. Massive thanks also to Bubblejunkie (unofficial second mate). The guy pays to go on the charter, and then starts doing all my work. Relax, you're making me look bad !

Funny story. Spearooo in typical So Fla style came on the boat with Riffe and Rob Allen line guns. After seeing me shoot multiple fish with my SS Commercial Rhino in the time it took him to shoot one, he cuts the line off the Rob Allen. A few dives later, the line is slashed on the Riffe. Another born again freeshafter joins the spiritual line-free movement!

Slaytistics
Realize this was a only a four tank trip with 1.5 days of diving.
Gag Grouper=64 (six of them over 20#)
Red Grouper=1
Hogfish=74 (real endangered )
Mango Snapper=11
Amberjack=14

Pictures posted soon, standing by.

AJ Suarez