Palm Beach County v. The Keys

[uncfnp]

Dave Finch is the instructor on Narcosis. fincdav@hotmail.com. Tell him Lisa says Hi. He taught my solo class.

 

[BigRedDiver1]

Unfortunately we didn't do any wrecks while in WPB, but the reefs especially Breakers were just as active!


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[krawlings]

here is some dive out of Pompano Beach [video=youtube;4SxoHRjZj-8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SxoHRjZj-8&feature=c4-overview&list=UUPN3c5BeDD2xMO9ZH2f9vZQ[/video]
[video=youtube;Qpn9oMZdV7c]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qpn9oMZdV7c&list=UUPN3c5BeDD2xMO9ZH2f9vZQ[/video]
some great dives . diving out of Jupitor has some great dives .The tunnels sharks can be seen on this dive tricky at time do to currents

 

[acteg]

Wow is all the diving in Palm Beach as active as that wreck?? Very cool. Thanks to everyone who has posted thus far, this is all so helpful.

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Yes, for the most part, all of the common dive sites are active like that.

Personally, I am surprised S. FL isn't more of a diving destination.

1. Great warm water Diving year round w/lots of charter options
2. Short boat trips - dive sites just outside the inlet
3. Plentiful shore diving
4. Easy airport access - West Palm Beach, Ft. Lauderdale, Miami
5. Plenty of night life for those who like to have fun (Clematis, Atlantic Ave in Delray, Riverwalk, Brickle, etc).. or you can just as easily have a nice dinner somewhere and turn in early.
5. Many dive shops if you need additional gear or want to check out a variety of manufacturers
6. Affordable accommodations
7. Very walker/runner/biker friendly (when you're not diving)
8. Great beaches

 

[danvolker]

Yes, for the most part, all of the common dive sites are active like that.

Personally, I am surprised S. FL isn't more of a diving destination.

1. Great warm water Diving year round w/lots of charter options
2. Short boat trips - dive sites just outside the inlet
3. Plentiful shore diving
4. Easy airport access - West Palm Beach, Ft. Lauderdale, Miami
5. Plenty of night life for those who like to have fun (Clematis, Atlantic Ave in Delray, Riverwalk, Brickle, etc).. or you can just as easily have a nice dinner somewhere and turn in early.
5. Many dive shops if you need additional gear or want to check out a variety of manufacturers
6. Affordable accommodations
7. Very walker/runner/biker friendly (when you're not diving)
8. Great beaches

I think the reason Palm Beach is such a big secret to the diving world, is that back in the 80's, the Keys and Cayman formed very powerful dive and hotel based associations, and developed a large advertising budget....these were places with little to sell beyond diving, so it was easy to convince local businesses in the Keys and Cayman that this was the best way to capitalize....Palm Beach on the other hand, has an enormous diversity of things for tourists to do....and virtually no impetus for the Tourism Bureaus to consider a tiny niche market like diving. So 30 years or so of big ad budgets, and divers all over the world know about the Keys and Cayman...but Palm Beach is only getting attention now due to pass along by friends over social networks like Facebook, Scuba board, and actual get-togethers of friends. The dive magazines WILL NOT assist in getting the word out about Palm Beach, except for the 1 time a year type article where they have to pretend they are actually covering the world's diving....what they cover, is the diving areas of their big ADVERTISERS. If you don't advertise, you don't exist.

 

[devinesigns3]

Interesting! A well kept secret sounds like a great place to dive. I assume fewer crowds?

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[PatW]

The diving is very different.

Palm Beach
The he blue heron bridge is a world class muck dive. You can see bat fish, sea robins, sea horses, frog fish, flying gugnards and all sorts of macro life. The visibility is often limited.

West Palm and Jupiter offer large fish: sharks, turtles and Goliath groupers. The diving is towards the deep side with strong currents. Virtually no corals.

Key Largo

You can do great shallow reef diving with no current. You are talking 30'. The visibility is not great but not bad either. You have nice coral growth soft, large polyp and small polyp. You have very good reef life: angels, morays, grunts, snappers, butterfly fish, angels and so on. The fish populations are as good as I have seen anywhere in the Caribbean and far better than most places.

You can also go off shore and do deep wreck dives with current, large fish and better vis.

The dives are offshore and it is boat diving. It is a haul out so you tend to be limited to 2 dives per day. I think some boats will do an all day 3 tank dive.

So which is better? I like shallow tropical reefs with lots of fish, so I say Key Largo. If you like large fish, it is Jupiter. If you like muck dives with all sorts of weird stuff, it is BHB.

 

[CajunDiva]

It is a haul out so you tend to be limited to 2 dives per day. I think some boats will do an all day 3 tank dive.

Great input and comparison of three different areas within the same geographic region.

The only thing I would add is that in Key Largo, some dive ops have boats that go out for a 2-tank morning dive and also go out for a 2-tank afternoon dive. So if you really want to rack up some dives, you can do 4 a day

 

[Lorenzoid]

Two more questions to those in the know:

Are water temps the same in PB/Jupiter as Key Largo?

If 50% of the trip is for the purpose of practicing some skills and getting sorted with some new gear on a shallow reef, would you dissuade me from doing it in PB/Jupiter? I'm very familiar with Key Largo diving, and those reefs would certainly fit the bill. Should I consider PB/Jupiter for this particular trip or save it for a trip when I can experience the drift diving?

 

[MrChen]

I go to Blue Heron Bridge to test gear configurations, which is in WPB. There are also sponsored night dives at BHB several times a month which are my favorite BHB dives. Dive ops also do night dives from Jupiter/WPB, so you could do a 2 tank day dive and a 1 tank night dive. Some ops do a 3 tank dive and you could do a 4th night dive. The turtles are my favorite and I'm always bummed if I don't see a shark or a large ray.