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| Recent Diving Observations |
| Date |
Submitter |
Visibility |
Remarks |
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| 7/17/2010 |
Mathew Bull |
30-40' |
Vis was great, flow was prevelant. I was surprised at how big the passages are there, kinda like Leon Sinks except with cream colored walls, broken up by sinkholes every few hundred feet. Awesome dive. Apparently its extraordinarily clear for the moment. |
| 10/5/2009 |
bob Knazik |
1 - 15 |
Dove Kitty sink on 10/3/09. Vis was low, as usual. Entered at Kitty sink and went a small distance towards Sweet sink, then turned and went past Kitty, past Trap and to the Nostrils I & II sinks. Line was partially buried in places. Turned after he Nostrils and exited at Kitty. Tough exit, water was down below lowest concrete step. |
| 9/7/2009 |
Brian Richardson |
10' at best |
dove upstream from kitty a good ways.
vis is nasty. cave was interesting |
| 8/29/2009 |
Brian Richardson |
15-20 |
Line is in very bad shape from LFB to snake. we tightened it up a little but you'll have to gap it at least once when it goes into mud/debris.
flow is kicking pretty good |
| 6/3/2009 |
Kelly Jessop |
0 |
Blown due to rising river |
| 1/24/2009 |
Raphael Tremblay |
25 |
High flow. Vis not bad going in. A lot of stuff coming out the ceiling. Vis improving the further in. |
| 1/18/2009 |
Tom Johnson (tj) |
20 |
Low vis coming back, but high flow for this cave system. Line was under the muck approaching Green Sink. Overall, better than normal. |
| 11/30/2008 |
Cwalters |
20' |
It was an excellent dive with viz. of 20' on average; although the viz. varied from place to place. There was very noticeable flow with lots of fluffy material coming down from the ceiling. I was surprised at how big the passage was and a couple of times couldn't see any rock, just the line disappearing into the gloom. One observation is that I saw nothing alive in the system - no fish, no crawfish, not a thing moving. Otherwise, we thought the cave had the look and feel of many of the Suwannee River spring systems.
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| 9/9/2007 |
Bob Schulte |
10'-15' |
Entered in at the headspring, swam under the natural bridge and ran a line into the main spring opening. Line is to the right, among the remains of several catfish. Some kind of biomass is all over the place, reminds me of a wreck dive - line looks like its 1" thick, but you shake it and it returns to the expected dimensions. Short swim to Snake Sink, we ran the gap the whole way with a primary reel. We swam from there up to Green Sink. Did another gap across Green Sink. Swam upstream a ways and then turned the dive.
Vis was 10'-15' throughout, the line is very well run, the PVC stakes that raise it above the silt floor are great, very easy to keep track of the line in the low vis.
So my final impressions as a spoiled rotten Ginnie diver are that it is not something I would be especially interested in returning to unless the vis improved to 30' or so - there are huge rooms in there that I would love to see - at some parts you are hovering above the line and you cannot see the ceiling, the floor, or walls - just this muck covered line running ahead into the darkness. |
| 5/4/2007 |
Anonymous |
10' |
System is very cloudy right now and viz is down. |
| 8/21/2006 |
Frank Lavallee |
30' |
We decided to access the cave system at Kitty Sink. The water level was down to the bottom concrete step, the layer of duckweed was gone, and the visibility was good in the basin.
We swam downstream towards Green Sink, passing by several sinkhole openings on the way. Visibility was poor-to-fair for most of the dive because of a lot of particulate in the water. We arrived at Green Sink 36 minutes into the dive. We turned the dive at that point. The line was littered with wooden clothes pins every few feet, and I had considered removing them, but I didn't. We arrived back at Kitty Sink 72 minutes into the dive.
Our gas supply was still good, so we decided to continue upstream towards Trap Sink. Visibility remained poor-to-fair. We swam past Trap Sink and continued towards Nostrils I and II Sinks. We turned the dive prior to reaching them. We arrived back at Kitty Sink for the second time 113 minutes into the dive.
(Note: Access to the cave system at Trap Sink is not advised at this time for 2 reasons: Visibility in the basin is practically zero, and a rotten tree has fallen into it) |
| 7/30/2006 |
Randy Beeson |
20ft max |
Dove Blue Spring on the 26th,Large opening into the cavern, which seemed to eat up my light. Line is covered with algae hanging down 2 ft in places. Followed the line about 200 ft and could make out the light from snake sink. Another 100 ft and we were in 3ft deep water going against a strong current. Finally back in deep water flow subsided and we entered another large cavern equally dark , found the line and followed it to nearby Yana sink. or is it Green Sink I don't know. Its said there are a total of 23 openings, many on private property. |
| 4/6/2006 |
Charles Read |
20' |
It's nice that the state park now allows diving. Visibility was low by Florida standards, quite fast flow in places. My buddy (my cave instructor Brent Booth) had warned me that this wasn't his favorite dive. Nor is it mine, but I still enjoyed it. |
| 4/3/2006 |
Dave McLaren |
20-30' |
Entered at Blue Spring, Swam almost to Stevens Sink. Vis was as low as 10' in some areas, but the majority of the dive it was 20-30'. |
| 3/24/2006 |
Mike McAuliffe |
15-20' |
Got a chance to jump into this system (off park property since NO solo diving is allowed in State Parks). Conditions were approx 15-20ft vis with what I would call moderate flow.
This system isn't for everybody, I understand that with the typical low vis and a somewhat challenging entry point, but for the people that are diving the NFL caves a lot and want something a little different, come on out to the State Park and giver a try. Annual park passes are honored for your diving and we have "walk-in" tent camping for $10/nite. |
| 1/19/2006 |
State Park Manager |
OPEN |
The river is down and the system is now open for diving. |
| 1/6/2006 |
PSSP |
SITE CLOSED |
This site is currently closed due to rising river levels. |
| 11/13/2005 |
Walter Pickel |
5' - 20' |
Eric and I entered at Lafayette Blue and ended up going a couple thousand feet. Conditions were actually best between Blue Spring and Green Sink. After Green Sink, the viz got pretty milky and was down to 5' most of the way.
When looking for the mainlines, the lines can be found on the divers right in Blue, Snake (Yana), and Green. With the limited viz they can be a little difficult to locate. The main lines are gold so don't be fooled by some of the old white line that runs for a few feet and then straight into the bottom -- the gold lines are there. |
| 11/6/2005 |
Tom Hundley |
20 |
Opened this weekend for diving. ( Apprentice and higher due to vis) Vis is not the best and since its not been dove on the park side for awhile it still need some cleaning up from trash removal in the system. So if you dive it please take some trash out with you when you exit and help clean it up. Line have been worked on but we did find old line so be careful. Strong siphon in places and the sinks are large and shallow. The park itself was nice and lot of hard work has been done to make it look nicer. The state plans of spend a good bit of money here and when the vis is a bit better will be a very nice. |
| 10/16/2005 |
Walter Pickel |
Basin is clear |
We stopped by this morning to look at the site and maybe enter through Kitty Sink. We ended up talking to the rangers for a while and got the low down on diving Lafayette.
We were told that they expect to open the park to divers in November but scooters were not going to be allowed. They also said that the state is looking to ban scooters from all state parks. I am not sure if anyone else has heard this rumor. If you have, let me know what you think about it and who you heard it from. |
| 10/3/2005 |
Cindy Butler |
25 |
Now owned by DEP. Managed by Suwannee River park. Will be open for public diving as soon as the line and signs are in. System can still be accessed from Kitty and Trap by permission of land owners. |
