Northwest Dive Club

Melissa and I are going down to cottage grove this weekend to help the daughter with her house, and we want to get a dive in on friday, before the work starts. Any suggestions? Not too far out of the way, hopefully. We are coming from Longview Wa..

Clear Lake is a wonderful dive if you don't mind the cold...

http://www.campingfriend.com/ClearLakeResort/

- Jeff

Middle of winter, bring your drysuit and dive dexter resivour, off hwy 58. Snow melt cold and runoff brown/green water. Its the only resivour that is full year round. Clear lake is almost 3 hrs from cottage grove . Wildwood falls (stewart lesalles park) is a fun dive a bowl with a waterfall and a airpocket cavern, but it probably looks like a roaring rapid this time of year. Dorena lake, cottage grove lake, fern ridge lake, fall creek resivour and many others are all for flood control and are drained in september october and left semi dry until may or so. Sharps creek out of cottage grove is going to be another raging river this time of year, but fun in the summer after the snow melt. The mac kenzie river out of springfield is also running really fast in the winter.


places I dive in the winter:Newport south jetty; Florence north and south jetty; Woahink lake, florence; Clear Lake; Lake Marie, reedsport; other coastal lakes; (alaska )

I haven't been told where I get to do a midnight dive friday

Clear lake might be doable if we head up there on the way down, but it would add 100 miles or so to the trip. How's the vis in dexter res? Melissa got a new dry suit and she wants to get a dive in a week til she gets the hang of it.

Bob

its winter time but its been nice this week 32-60F and sunny, so the silt may have settled, I dove the covered bridge last year summertime and viz was 5-10 near surface and 5 ft at a dark depth of 40ft. Dexter Res. is about 25 minutes off I5 on hwy 58(just south of eugene)

clear lake is 2 hrs from I5 east on hwy 126

with or without ice??

its open yearround, (when the snow plow can keep up) the spring that fills the lake and makes the mac kenzie river is 37F year round at the source. There are cabins on the north end and a campground at the south end. Mosquitoes will bite you when its mosquito season( ) its going to be warmer and dryer in the summertime. full moon night dives are the best with 200 ft of viz

OOh that sounds collllddd! I am not the lucky one with the dry suit! Oh well, I'll appreciate it more when I get it! Nice-diver- how is the diving on the Oregon coast? Have you ever taken a trip offshore to any of the reefs? Many moons ago I dove the south jetty at newport. We weren't there long though, my buddy got a little touch of motion sickness in the surge. I'd like to try it again.

Scubagirl45 wrote:I would love to dive Clear Lake someday, if some of you other Oregon divers would be interested. When is the best time of year to dive it?

i'd be interested, too, if plans are made to dive clear lake.

I have done 3 boat dives out of charelston (coos bay) a 2day/4tank and a 1 day/2 tank. spearfishing trips, but i brought my camera with also on the 1 day ( i shot the most fish). It was fun 40 ft depths, big fish and abundant sealife on the bottom.

by the way: there is only ice at the end of clear lake, dive up to it and try to make holes from the bottom side.

I love diving newport south jetty, its my favorite so far.

Well we drove by clear lake, but the forest service hasn't dug the snow out yet. They said that they would probably have the road clear by May. So if you're wanting to try this dive, thats the scoop. We want to go back, but I'll have to wait tilll may gets closer to make plans.

I've mountain biked down there and the viz is amazing!

Ok for those of you who want to dive Clear Lake. The lake is open year round. The entrance ma be closed. But the exit is always open, even when the gate looks closed. You drive to the exit. That's the next entrance a little bit past the first entrance to Clear Lake. you get out of your rig and you open the gate. Yes it is ok to do that no matter what the signs say. I have done it over and over. No one has ever said any thing. We were told we could do that. Then you drive down and make a sharp left to go to the lodge. Find a parking spot and dive. The ice is on the far left side of the lake. You don't have to go that far, nor do you have to dive under it. If you don't have the trainning then don't do it. Yes there is a lot of snow up there right now. But it is awsome. Ware some extra layers under your suit. Wet or dry, you can dive it. My wife just dove it in her wet suit the other night at midnight. Yes a dry suit would be nice. But not every one can afford one. I have done as many as 5 wet suit dives in Clear lake in one day and night. The viz is worth it. and so is the drive. The water temp is around 37. If you keep moving during your dive, feet and fingers, you will be ok. My wife wares long johns than a dive skin and then a 7 mm wet suit hyperstretch anderson. She said she was fine. You can also dive on the left hand side further down the hill. There is a lake, I dont' know the name of it, but you drive by it on the way up. There is a dam on your left. if you go farther, you can make aleft to go to these camp grounds on the back side, and you can dive were the water dumps into the lake. The viz is pretty good. about 40 to 80. the depth is around 30 to 60. Any way just a few subjestions.

Wow!! Amazing pics! ...and I hope you don't mind me saying, your wife is one tough hombre! :naka: ...in the most femenine way, of course! She must be amazing! I could NOT do what she did in a wet suit, and it would be touch in my dry suit!!

Thank you Tom, you have some pretty amazing photos on Flicker your self. How did you add that link attatchement at the bottom of your e-mail. I have a flicker account two. I would like to do that.

narcosis Junky wrote:Thank you Tom, you have some pretty amazing photos on Flicker your self. How did you add that link attatchement at the bottom of your e-mail. I have a flicker account two. I would like to do that.

Glad you enjoyed the pics! That's a TON of pics to drill through...

I'm not an 'expert' at navigating this site, but there is a place in your personal info for a signature line that will show up every time you post. You can insert the links there, I think there are instruction on how to make certain text be a specific link.

Thank you for the input. I never paid for the pro status, I just delete some of my photos. every once in a while. But I post a lot of photos. Again thank you

narcosis Junky wrote:Thank you for the input. I never paid for the pro status, I just delete some of my photos. every once in a while. But I post a lot of photos. Again thank you

$25 bucks a year seemed like a good deal so I just went ahead and bit the bullet after much futzing around with various "free" sites and never getting quite what I wanted. Several folks here use Smugmug as well and seem to be pretty happy with it.

I have a bunch of tech dives coming up Jully. I guess I would rather save the $25 and put that toward my nitrox. And I have a few trips coming up. Going up to Washington to dive. And I have to go to the Oceanic seminar in Washington. All these trips cost more and more in gas. I guess what I'm trying to say is I cut back little things so that I can dive more. I'm a scuba addict. I would eat less if I had to.

Boy do I understand the penny pinching aspects of this thing we call Scuba!

Oh and did I mention I have to buy the old laddy a $3200 DUI dry suit this summer. And I have some more toys I want to get. I'm contemplating between the dive right tech comp and the VR3 comp. I'm thinking about VR3 right now. Any way. lot's of stuff.Any body want to give me some $$$$?

Your wife is HARDCORE and so are you for ice diving. Yee Haw. the coldest I ever did was 40 and man I thought I would never thaw out. I was a scuba-sicle.
Please contact me the next time you go to Florence or Newport, I would actually love to dive in Oregon. We always go to washington...I have heard good stuff about Florence....let me know. Weekends are hard, but weekdays are good. It's time for me to dive my OWN state! I live in Salem, oh so centrally located. I would love to do Clear Lake in the summer on a camp out. Let's do it!

Well, I will be diving Newport the 3 rd finger on Sunday the 13 th. spear fishing to be exact. 4:45 am to be exact. It's kind of a night/day dive. night on the first, day on the second. Got to dive the high tide.

Did you get any dives in? Eugene skin divers usually go to florence to dive around there I think...

No. We just looked. We're heading up to puget sound this weekend though. I've got a four day weekend, so we should have some fun. Melissa wants to get her bouyancy down with her dry suit, four days should help!
Bob