Alligator Reef

Alligator Reef was my other favorite dive, along with Florida Keys Dry Rocks/Christ of the Abyss. Alligator Reef is part of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary and is along a border between the shallower reefs of the upper Keys and the deeper reefs of the middle Keys, about 3.5 nm southeast of Upper Matecumbe Key. The water here ranged from 12-30 feet, mostly 20-30 feet in the spots we dove. 

We’d cruised to Alligator the previous afternoon from Rodriguez Key so we could dive early the next day. We hit the water by 9:30 am accompanied by only one other dive boat. We enjoyed two dives, separated by only a quick snack and a hop over to another mooring ball at the other end of the reef. All told we were dove here for a glorious 2.25 hours and saw the greatest variety of fish here of all our dives. We saw several young nurse sharks, all swimming rather than hanging out on the bottom. We also saw two green morays, two sea turtles, numerous full grown barracuda and groupers, and quite a variety of adult parrotfish, plus all the other typical reef fish. I eventually gave up taking pictures on the second dive so I could just enjoy the view.

Our early dive strategy paid off because all six mooring balls had just filled up as we were surfacing from our second dive. We ate lunch then cruised toward Davis Reef to anchor for the night. We spent a lovely evening watching a movie in the hammocks after dinner then moved to the tramps to sip rum and gaze at the stars. We even caught a few shooting stars, probably the tail end of the Pleiades meteor shower.

So here is my Alligator Reef slideshow video. It takes me too long to select and apply music, so you’ll have to listen to my regulator for this one. Maybe I’ll add music and repost in the future. Enjoy!

P.S.- Dave had a close encounter with a barracuda while following a sea turtle here. I caught it on video, but you’ll have to wait until a future post to see it (unless you check out my FB page, where I posted it back in August). I’m planning a video post of Dave’s sealife interactions.