Northwest Dive Club

Has anyone done any diving from a beach in Oregon? Or is the surf too difficult to navigate? I have heard that there is a "trench" that runs about a few hundred yards off the beach on a line from the jetty to Yaquina Head and you can get down into it where you are protected from the surge. But I have never talked with anyone who has actually tried to dive it from shore, much less any other beach on the Oregon coast.

I think there are some beach dives listed here:
http://www.shorediving.com/Earth/USA_We ... /index.htm
You might also check with South Beach Scuba for info on the specific spot you asked about.

Sorry to necro this thing, but I thought I might be able to add something to this topic.

I have been shore diving off Oregon beaches a few times.

My personal favorite so far is Harris beach.
I have not done anything off the main beach that you can drive down to; instead I prefer to dive the 'south beach' which requires you to carry your gear down a windy blacktop trail. It seems like Memorial Day is a good time to dive that beach since the algae often isn't blooming that early unless it has been really sunny for several days.

The last time I was there the vis was about 20' and there is a ton of interesting life to see. there is pretty decent surge since the beach is in a cove that is fairly shallow. The nice thing about this beach is that it's basically a little cove that is protected from the currents that can mess up the vis. there is a kelp forest and a rock reef at this location.

Note that the kelp forest is not like those found in Monterey, it is a bit thicker and I do not think that gets as tall as the type of kelp found down in Monterey (just speculation).

For Labor Day this year I am currently considering diving a beach in Port Orford, just to see what's there. If anyone is interested in buddying let me know.

Thanks,
Brian

Brian,
I just happen to be looking for something to do that weekend. Lets chat.

Cool. I think right now I am planning to dive at Battle Rock state park. I think we and our friends are all camping at Humbug.

Anyway there is a big old rock that looked fairly interesting right there at the beach. I have been wanting to dive it for a few years.

I am thinking I will spearfish the thing.

Hey.
Off Yaquina Head in Newport there is the handicapped accessible tidepools, which are lame, but offer a decent easy entry to the ocean. At this former rock quarry (turned tidepool by the BLM) is an opening to the sea, where you can dive around the head, keeping the ledge to the right (if you go west) and to the left if you go east. Easy to navigate. Lots of cool features and whatnot. I have been not dived this yet, but plan to.

Please post up a dive report when you dive Yaquina Head -- The site sounds like an interesting one.

so the update for my trip is that I did not get to dive at Port Orford. Instead I went out on the boat with a friend who is also my instructor. We had pretty rough seas that day due to high winds, but the dive was pretty good in spite of poor surface conditions (although it was a really nice sunny day) I am thinking that there was about 30-40 foot of visibility. I had the opportunity to shoot at some fish but due to the physics of gas my speargun did not have enough power to do anything but make them take off.
After surfacing we moved to another spot where the vis was like 2 feet (a lot closer to shore where the vis mostly sucks in Crescent but the surface was not so rough). I managed to get some more pressure in my gun during the surface interval (thanks to the use of the captain's pump). I shot a perch but it unfortunately got off so I came home with nothing but a couple fun dives under my belt.

The conditions in Port Orford made me wish I could dive there; windy, but there was beautiful blue water and the wave activity wasn't as big as in Crescent. I am now looking forward to my next opportunity to dive

Wahoo!

I camped at Port Orford this summer just for fun. We stayed at Humbug state park and it was fantastic. I wish my wife dove because the water south of the head there was glassy smooth every day we were there. It would have been a great time to dive. We also saw a grey whale crest after spouting that was maybe 150 yards off from shore... maybe that far. That would have been cool to dive with...

we did bob creek and another nearby one, fun day