Blue Heron Bridge Newbie's Experience

[2airishuman]

Thanks for the post. It was an interesting read, and I'll go back to it if I'm in the area and have an opportunity to dive BHB.

It ought to really pay off for someone with the aptitude and resources to put in the time and effort to get good at diving there.

I've enjoyed your posts but I'm not sure how much shore diving you've done. I find that solo shore diving in general demands a level of navigation skill beyond that of boat dives or guided dives. I suppose there's an aptitude side of it but I think mainly it's just a matter of navigational experience. Once acquired, I find it transfers from site to site to a remarkable degree.

 

[drrich2]

Hi:

My shore diving has been a mix of quarry and (overwhelmingly) shore diving Bonaire. With Bonaire, I had a sloping reef wall, near shore, lines in the sand like the wall parallel the shore line, and shore is due east. Wade out, surface swim out a ways, drop down, fin along the wall at a chosen depth north or south, hit turn pressure, go up a little shallower, come back, pop up and hope to be fairly close to the exit point near the truck. If not, usually no big deal, just fin over to it. No dive float/flag.

Blue Heron Bridge was a different matter. Partly because it was very new to me. Partly because circling around the pilings can get disorienting, and partly because I know there's a boating area out beyond the snorkeling trail, and plenty of boats in sight at the surface. Plus the viz. wasn't as good as Bonaire the time I dove.

If I were going back, I'd want to repeatedly review the map, get a better sense of what all's on the snorkel trail, make a plan to fin along the snorkel trail the 1st part of the dive then come back to explore the pilings.

In Bonaire, on the other hand, assuming sea conditions are good and we're talking mainstream west coast sites, it's more like driving along the coast and 'Hey, that yellow rock up the road looks good!'

Richard.

 

[kelemvor]

If you ever make it back, check out the underside of that fishing pier. Especially if it's a night dive. The best stuff I've seen at bhb has all been either under that pier or around the large pilings. Last time I did a night dive there, the pier was downright infested with octopi! The "snorkel trail" you found out near the edge is imo the least interesting part of bhb.

That said, I've spent time checking out that boat and pilings you visited which are at the edge of the boat channel. The one time I saw a shark at BHB it was over near that stuff.

 

[jimw]

http://i1.wp.com/www.puravidadivers.com/pvd2/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/blue-heron-bridge-map.jpg

This BHB map shows a little more constricted dive area than I normally consider the "diveable" area-I expect they do this in order to help bridge newbies stay out of the boat channel especially on the west side. It is easy peasy to stay away from the channel on the east side as it is further out there. That said, we had a small boat or jetski over us under the east bridge yesterday. The east bridge is a low one, my 18 ft with center console and t top will not fit under it for example.

I use my compass diving BHB every dive. For the west dive--mess around on the shopping carts, snorkel trail, mirror wreck, until maybe a half hour before hi tide--head nw to intersect the bridge-follow the south side of the bridge piers west to the "wall"--wait if needed for slack tide-go down the "tunnel"--NE to the fishing pier and to the rubble pile midway on the north side--when the tide turns-head SW toward the beach exit.

The tunnel and rubble pile are some of the fishiest spots, go slow! I usually do not circle piers, but rather 2 or 3 sides and continue in the original direction! Know when the predicted hi tide is and use the currents to power your dive--ride'em!

The tunnel is between the last single long solid bridge pier and the boat channel under the east bridge which is well marked at the surface--it's narrow and well populated on the wall especially.....go thru there after slack tide begins. Slack may be 40 minutes or more or may be very short, so pay attention. If you feel the slightest current going back toward the inlet to the south--head toward the beach exit.