Moving To NC

[Micah Roe]

In late April or early May, I will be moving to the Jacksonville, NC area for school. Anyone familiar with diving in the area? I am a new diver, and would like to meet people who are knowledgeable of the area, diving wise.Dive shops, boats/charters, dive sites, etc. Thanks!

 

[Steve_C]

There are a number of NC divers that lurk and post.

Short version. There are several quarries to practice in. Fantasy Lake near Raleigh is the one I use. There is lots of ocean diving. Comes in two flavors. Wrecks and Ledges. Ledges form offshore reefs. Boats primarily leave from three areas. Hatteras, Morehead, Wilmington, (and a couple in Southport).

Note that the boats do not put guides in the water. But you can rent a DM pretty cheaply if you want to do that at first. Just make reservations ahead of time.
You need to either bring tanks and weights or rent them.

The different boats have different philosophies, cancelation policies, etc. Some are more conservative about going out in rough water (I like). Some tend to cancel at the last minute while others try to cancel by 6 the night before (I like) (but weather is fickle). Some primarily focus on going further offshore. Some have more intermediate sites also (I like).

I tend to primarily dive with Aquatic Safaris out of Wilmington. They fit what I am looking for. There are a number of other good ops along the coast I am sure you will hear from their fans.

Welcome to NC. There are some old NC Dive Photos on my website. Most of my newer pictures are on Facebook. Look for words like Gill, Hyde, Dredge, Stone.

Note that the further offshore the more challenging the diving can be sometimes. I primarily dive within 25 miles of shore off of Wilmington and have yet to deal with really strong currents.

 

[DiverDownD3]

Being in Jacksonville you are pretty much right in the middle of Wilmington and Morehead City. Both offer some really good diving. Steve hit on most of the ones in Wilmington.

Olympus and Discovery are the two dive shops out of Morehead City/Beaufort. There is also Tortuga Charters. All of very reputable and have been operating out of this area for a long time. Everyone is pretty friendly. I've been diving for less than a year myself and I know I've gotten a lot of info by just going in the shop in the slow season like this and talking to whoever is working that day.

Pretty much all the diving around here you are going to need a boat. You can dive the Morehead City high rise bridge and Radio Island, but the currents and viz are pretty bad. But its a good place if you want to test new gear before going off shore.

There are several wrecks around 12 miles out of Beaufort Inlet. The Indra being the most popular. I think just about every diver certified in this area has dove the Indra for their certification dive. Big, easy wreck sitting in 60'. Viz can vary around 15' up to 50'+. The other wrecks are the Titan and Parker, and they are sinking another ship this spring.

Water will be warming up around the time you move here. Boats will be starting to run plenty of charters around that time.

Welcome to the area.

 

[drrich2]

After my Morehead City trip with Olympus Dive Center in Aug. 2015, I wrote up my trip report to share my research on the destination with fellow out-of-state divers considering NC for dive tourism. While your experience as a local will be different, it may have some info. of use to you. Link to thread.

Richard.

 

[Lake Hickory Scuba]

Hello Micah Roe, We are in the foothills of North Carolina approximately 5 hours from Jacksonville. As some have stated there are several different quarries (Club affiliated, PDRA, Piedmont Diving & Rescue Association — NCPDRA) that offer great diving, and there are a ton of dive shops all through out the state. Feel free to check us out on all the social media sites, or stop by if you happen to be in the area.

 

[NC myerssl]

Micah,

I work in Jville during the week and crew on the Outrageous V in Beaufort (Discovery Diving) on the weekends. Like DiverDown said, most of the diving is on boats with the exception of Radio Island. If your new to ocean diving then the best bet is to go to the Indra with Discovery or Olympus for your first introduction to NC wreckdiving. After that the ocean is your oyster.

With any luck you will find other divers in the community that have boats that want to go diving as well

 

[myshadeofred]

I'm new to the east coast and diving with Olympus over Memorial Day weekend. I did do a dive out of Virginia beach and though not as colorful as I'm used to it's definitely something different to see. I will post after about my experience. I'm planning on 7 dives over that weekend, goal is to see the sandbar tiger sharks.

 

[Steve_C]

I'm new to the east coast and diving with Olympus over Memorial Day weekend. I did do a dive out of Virginia beach and though not as colorful as I'm used to it's definitely something different to see. I will post after about my experience. I'm planning on 7 dives over that weekend, goal is to see the sandbar tiger sharks.

Hope you have good dives.

There are sandtiger sharks (the most common). The sandbar are also around. They are more streamlined and with much larger dorsal fins than the sandtiger. They also tend to be more hyper.

We do get some tropicals in the warmer months. Bring a light. A lot of the coral and sponges and some of the fish do not show their colors without additional light due to the deeper depths. It is not a tropical reef but there is a lot of color

Gill and Hyde on Oct. 17, 2015 | Facebook

 

[myshadeofred]

Hope you have good dives.

There are sandtiger sharks (the most common). The sandbar are also around. They are more streamlined and with much larger dorsal fins than the sandtiger. They also tend to be more hyper.

We do get some tropicals in the warmer months. Bring a light. A lot of the coral and sponges and some of the fish do not show their colors without additional light due to the deeper depths. It is not a tropical reef but there is a lot of color

Gill and Hyde on Oct. 17, 2015 | Facebook

Thank you. Will do.

 

[Micah Roe]

Thank you everyone for the information and suggestions. I haven't been able to do much lately in the way of connecting with any other divers or the local dive shops. As soon as I arrived, I hit the ground running with school and moving my family here. Things are just now starting to slow down a bit so I plan to get back in the water within the next month or so. Thanks again for the info!