By Jeff Carr
Guest Writer, Dive News Network

In the fourth and final installment of our examination of Central Oregon Coast dive sites, we start in Florence and end in Depoe Bay. This part of the Oregon coast is no less tamed for a diver than the upper coast is and offers some diverse and adventurous diving. So far we have covered shore diving and boat dives within the jetty systems as well as many of the off shore sites. Now we go just a bit further.

Florence
The great sand dunes you see in the Florence area continue without a break for miles into the ocean. Exploring these sandy ridges may not be on anyone’s “bucket list” but it is not entirely dull either. There are no specific sites out there, but one can go offshore and pick a depth for a dive and bail in. You can expect to find a lot of sandy bottom, but there are creatures living in the sand such as the occasional halibut, sole and what most divers in Florence seek, Dungeness crab.

Arch Rock
Only a couple hundred feet from 905 is Arch Rock. This site is a bit more varied than the flat top feature of its close neighbor, but not less interesting. There are actually two arches and one “L” shaped swim-through here. On the north side is an impressive wall drops straight to 120 ft. in some places. The larger arch is on the western side and is around 70 ft. deep (this arch is about 15-18 feet wide) while its smaller cousin (about 10 feet wide) is nearby and at around 60 ft. The top part of Arch Rock reef is around 35 ft. although there are points a bit higher.

South Reef
Seldom visited, South Reef is just a short distance from the tip of the South Jetty in Newport. It is in shallow water and comes up into the surge zone, so this site is often sacrificed to pursue the deeper and livelier spots a few miles further south. For smaller boats or your first forays into the open sea, this is a good spot to begin. It is important to note it is not a good site for days with large surf as the surge in these shallow spots can be devastatingly strong.

Stonewall Banks
Fourteen miles southwest of Newport is a huge reef that is deep even at its shallowest points. With some effort you can find a spot that is within your depth range but deep diving experience is needed to even consider going out there. The top of the reef, in my searches, is around 125 ft. at the shallow spots and falls deeper quickly.

The Wreck of the Blue Magpie 
In 1983, the freighter Blue Magpie ran aground on the north side of the North Jetty in Newport and was destroyed quickly by the surf. On a very calm day, this site can be explored. It is beaten down and very little  of the ship is left, but the unpredictable shifting sands sometimes reveal a long hidden part of this huge shipwreck. The deteriorating wreckage provides shelter and nutrients to the marine life and is interesting. Somewhere in those sands is a 6-ton brass prop. Only highly experienced divers with many off-shore years under their weight-belts should consider this.

Yaquina Reef
This reef stretches over a mile north of the Newport Jetty system in a long, thin and broken rock formation. Line up the tip of the north Jetty with the Yaquina Head lighthouse and then proceed towards the beach. Don’t get too close to the North Jetty, as it gets shallow and sandy and the better diving is at least a half mile north. The channels and breaks in this reef are havens for creatures and an old worn out shipwreck called the John Aspen.

Yaquina Head, North 
Just north of the Yaquina Head Lighthouse by 300 yds and proceeding due west, you will find 3 submerged pinnacles that rise from the rocks around them, each about 100 yds from the next. This kind of reef exploration is something that you intrepid boaters will have to become accustomed to if you want to find your own spots. In the pre-GPS days we dove out here and since they didn’t have handheld Loran C units we just got close by sight and then found them using depth sounders.

The Woodell Ledges 
South of Depoe Bay is a rough cove called Rocky Creek Cove. Just past the is a series of houses called Miroco. Just south of the houses is an abandoned rock quarry and due west of the quarry is a submerged rock generally covered with kelp. The closer you get to the rock, the better the diving seems to be. The Woodell Ledges are similar to the rocks to the south and sticking out of the water. Most notably the massive Gull Rock several miles away. The ocean side of these ledges slopes up toward the beach from about 60 ft. until it reaches a plateau at 30 ft. and is thick with kelp. It then drops straight off to a boulder strewn bottom at 60 ft. and begins another slow rise to the next drop. These ledges almost seem like waves frozen in stone. This is the best diving in the area we have found.

Depoe Bay in General
The rockiness of the Depoe Bay area gives us a lifetime of diving exploration. Just outside the harbor a few hundred yards are canyons, crags, boulders and ledges awaiting exploration. Boat traffic near the harbor limits what you can do in the immediate vicinity, but as the coastal rocks straighten turn south towards Cape Foulweather and there are literally miles of dive sites.
This area can be an urchin haven where very few other creatures dwell, but some areas are thick with life.

Boiler Bay
This bay, which can be accessed from shore on a calm day, is just north of Depoe Bay. The bay itself was named after the steam boiler, from the ship J. Marhoffer washed ashore.

The ship wreckage was on the outside part of this bay and was purposely run aground due to fire on May 18, 1910. You may find bits of wreckage here if you are very astute in your searches but for the most part, don’t hope for a whole lot more than seeing remnants of the old boiler in the rocks in the tide pool area. For the diving, the bay is home to all the things we divers expect to see.
There you have it, the Oregon coast is an amazing place to dive with a little caution. Most of the shipwrecks my co-author Scott Boyd and I know about will be featured in the second edition of Northwest Wreck Dives which will be finished in a couple more years. If you see me out on the waves, come over and say hello. ■

Thank you to Jerry Leach for his help in completing this 4th chapter. Oregon has a lot to offer divers, and the dives presented in these four articles only touch on a few in the regions we have explored. Jake Andreason and Jeff Carr are staff members of Eugene Skin Divers Supply and Jeff is a coauthor with Scott Boyd of Northwest Wreck Dives.