South Carolina lake diving

[SunabeJunkie]

Hi all. I am in Okinawa but will soon be moving to South Carolina. This is where I grew up but I moved away many years ago, and long before I started diving. I was wondering about diving the lakes around the area, Santee, Murray. Is there any good places for doing shore dives there, what is the average vis, and what's down under of interest.

 

[xiSkiGuy]

Lake Jocassee in the Upstate of SC is the most popular lake diving location. You can do both shore and boat dives there. The average vis is about 20'.

When shore diving from the diver's ramp you can see 4 training platforms, a navigation course, an airplane wing, an airplane prop, a small boat, a plastic skeleton, and a submerged forest.

While boat diving you can find a Chinese Junk (boat), another platform, a motorcycle, another small boat, a flock of flamingos, an old graveyard, and an old church foundation.

For the boat diving tri-mix crowd, you can find an old bridge span and an old lodge.

 

[diveprof]

Clark Hill Lake (AKA Lake Thurmond) is about an hour from Columbia SC (near Augusta GA). There is an airplane at 35' (vis is currently about 12-15'). See the Winter Diving in the South thread for details of recent dives. Also, the Savannah River near Augusta makes for a great drift dive (also about an hour from Columbia). A lot of history on this dive with a shipwreck in 18', the old hamburg cotton docks in 15', the old Hamburg bridge in 18'. Vis varies depends on recent rain, but can be 10-15' + in the Summer. PM for details.