Hi,
I dive Lakes Jocassee, Keowee and Hartwell. Jocassee is the first choice for me but there are things in Keowee to do as well as Hartwell. Keowee has the Pumphouse at 80 feet which is a water purification plant that used to treat the drinking water for the town of Seneca, SC. It is a penetrable dive using reels and cavern diving tenchniques. It is a three story building of concrete and brick and water settling vats. The vis can be 10 feet or if you disturb the silt and the overhead it can be almost zero. There is also the Hot Hole which is the warm water discharge of the Duke Power Oconee Nuclear Station Plant. And no we don't glow after a dip; we have taken a counter in and it is just fine. This dive consists of a double eddie current body of water with two opposite currents beside each other. One current is clockwise and the other counter clockwise. This is a fun dive with the current taking you off in its circle at depths of 20 to 45 feet and one deeper place at 60 feet. The water is very warm at this time of the year between the upper 80's and lower 90's. The fish abound here and when there are fishing tournaments it is a disallowed area to fish, (wonder why). We use this area for training for drift dives and night dives to simulate the Cooper River conditions.
Lake Hartwell is just fine to dive if you use the area near the dam from Singing Pines, Overlook and the SC Dam section on the SC side. On the GA side there is good diving from Big Oaks to the GA side of the dam. I like to dive along the rip rap of rocks and see the fish in the day or for a night dive. Some of these dives can be to 70 or better and the vis can be at 10-15 in these areas only. The rest of the lake is very muddy to dive in. The fish that interplay here are the shad, brim, all kinds of bass, carp, crappie, and the large aligator gar fish.
I am an avid Cooper River diver and also work with Off The Wall Diving Charters. The Cooper River is not just for everyone to dive. Yes there are alligators and snakes on the river and large fish in the water. Mostly these critters want to move away from you quickly. It is a brackish water dive and there are log jams and fresh water grasses that cover your mask at times to shake your nerves up, yet is is nice to see the bottom of the river's contours and the life cycle there while hunting for fossils. Some of the latest finds have been rather good: a giant beaver's tooth (extinct), ivory from the wooly mammoth or the mastodom, tapir jaw with 2 of the four teeth, many 4" or better megalodon shark teeth, whale tooth, whale ear bones, a 4 1/2" width by 16" length whale rib bone,turtle shell sections, medicine bottle, wine bottle, and Indian arrow points and pottery sections. The best time of the year to dive the Cooper is the winter in a drysuit. There is less traffic and more turn over in the river bottom. Check out the website
http://www.offthewalldiving.com for the latest finds and conditions on all the above dive sites including the Cooper River.
We're actually going to be on the other side of the state, Aiken, but we're considering driving on across to spend the rest of the holiday weekend on the beach. If we do, I'll give you a holler.
