In Reply to: Re: How come nobody ever comes up here to dive? posted by stephen clark on August 02, 2007 at 06:53:38:

The diving is every bit as good as they say...when you can get in, and that's the clincher. Actually it's more of a tease.
I've seen the vis at zero and up to 60 feet. I've seen the swells at zero and up to 30 feet in the winter. That's quite a sight to behold, let me tell you!
I was out in my boat once and the swells went from 6 feet to over 12 feet in 2 hours.
Imagine the outside of San miguel Island as the main coastline of Socal and that's about what you have on the North Coast.
Monterey is good, but the North Coast is better...when you can get in. I say "It's like having 80 miles of Point Lobos all to myself".
There are no dive charters, why? because there are too many times during the year when you can't get in and so the numbers don't work.
Some people have kayaks or small inflatables. I have an 18 foot northern dory all set up for diving. The rest ot the people shore dive. There are several places to shore dive from. some of the spots are real easy access and others require some mountain goat trails.
But even though the hikes may be more treacherous than down south they are a lot shorter.
The big draw of course are the abalone. In the last few years it seems all the campgrounds have been filled, many with divers from all over. There are dozens of campgrounds on the northern stretch of Hwy 1 between Bodega Bay and beyond Ft. Bragg.

Hope this answers some of your questions