Steve Stephens's Dive Log

Wow! The winter storms this year have really changed this site. The first thing we noticed as we crossed the bridge was that there seemed to be more visible sand in the bay at low tide. Next we discovered that the trail going down to the beach was partially blocked by all of the new logs and assorted driftwood accumulated over the winter. And finally to re-enforce our initial perception, the sand level of the beach was at least 5-8 ft higher than before. So all of this elevated some concerns about the site and we treated it like a brand new site that we hadn't ever dived before. My wife was uncomfortable with the changes, so we modified the plan to do only one dive and wait until it was positively slack tide to get in. Normally we get in about a half hour before the slack and deal with the current. We modified our usual entry point by parking along side the highway and unloading the gear, then moving the truck to a turnout about 50 yards up the road. There were steps going down to the beach there and it was only about 100 yards to the staging area from there. The plus was that there was no steep trail to climb up and down and we didn't have to negotiate the pile of drift wood. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the bottom topography was relatively unchanged. The crab bowl seemed smaller from the surface but we got right down to about 45' and found the usual rocky bottom with lost crab rings etc. This continues to be our favorite dive site on the Oregon Coast. I learn something new about it each time we dive here.

The pic and site description are a bit deceiving, as things look a lot closer than they really are. But once on the beach, everything else was great. We walked out to the rock wall and jumped in. Dropped straight down to about 45' and followed the wall inshore. Vis was great for the NW at about 6'. Dove this site at low slack and saw many crabs, mostly females and undersize males. Our dive buddies managed to take home some keepers though. I do have to re-emphasize what some others have said... this is DEFINITELY a slack tide dive.... the current rips through here very fast during an exchange.

This is an addendum to my last review. The dive shop is gone. When we asked at the marina bait shop they said the guy who owned it is building condos on that site. The bait shop will be adding some limited dive shop type services soon.

This site was our first of the day, and probably the best. The vis sucked…. Had to get so close to the bottom to see anything that we kept bouncing off it, thus causing the vis to get worse. We also had a pretty strong current. Unfortunately, this may have been poor planning on our part as there was a huge swing in the tide (8.5 ft) so that caused most of our current problems. I would probably try this dive again when the tidal shift is smaller.