Jules Undersea Lodge Lagoon Diving

The winds blew again today, so off to Jules Undersea Lodge Lagoon we went.

Jules Undersea Lodge Lagoon being right across the street from our dive shop makes it super easy to have a great back up dive location on days just like today.

http://jul.com/

What we saw at Jules today

As soon as we walked close to the Jules Undersea Lodge Lagoon today we notice that the viz. was so good we could see from the surface all the fish swimming on the bottom at 26 feet below us! As it is almost December, we were pleasantly surprised the water temp. was still 75F. This cooler water invites more growth in the lagoon, so we loved getting to see schools of Grunts, Parrotfish, Hogfish and Angelfish. We even found a few ruffled edge flat worms, which are so cool to watch. Their little horns on their heads makes them look like tiny dragons.

We swam around the underwater marine science lab, the lobster habitat boulders, and the old artifacts. We then swam around the Underwater Hotel, and peered into the large port hole windows. The best part of all is getting to go under the hotel, and come up inside the “moon – pool”, very James Bond like! Getting to take your regulators out and talk to each other knowing you are actually 20+ feet underwater is a super cool experience, and very few folks get to say they visited such a place.

Dive site conditions

As the Jules Undersea Lodge Lagoon is surrounded by mangrove trees, the high winds we have been having do not make even the slightest ripple on the surface of the water. We were treated to flat seas, no current, 50 foot+ of viz, and 75F water temp.

Remember when visiting that this lagoon is open to the Atlantic Ocean via Largo Sound just feet away from it, so you never know what Ocean creature you will get to see when diving here!

What we did

We had to complete a PADI ( Professional Association of Diving Instructors ) Advanced Open Water diver certification course today, so this ended up being the perfect location to do it.

Underwater navigation went perfectly with no current, or surge to deal with. Peak Performance Buoyancy training is great to do at Jules Undersea Lodge Lagoon, since they have set up these super cool swim through areas out of giant boulders. When swimming through these, we noticed some stone crabs, and lobsters.

Fish ID was a breeze to complete as well at Jules Undersea Lodge lagoon, as it was filled with so many fish! We even found a bunch of Blenny fish, and some cool flat worms too.

All in all, it just turned out to be a great day, even with this weather report on NOAA.gov

http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/data/Forecasts/FZUS52.KKEY.html

SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY IN EFFECT UNTIL WINDS DECREASE

THIS AFTERNOON SOUTHEAST WINDS NEAR 20 KNOTS…DECREASING TO NEAR 15 KNOTS. SEAS 3 TO 5 FEET…SUBSIDING TO 2 TO 3 FEET. NEARSHORE WATERS ROUGH…BECOMING A MODERATE CHOP. ISOLATED SHOWERS.