After pushing my luck with the current at Whisky Point (March 6, 2009), I had planned to do a second dive on the other side of Quadra Island where the current isn't much of a concern. I had such a good dive at Whisky Point though, and it was one of those rare "good current" days, so I decided to use my second tank on another Discovery Pass dive. There's another pull-out area for cars to park next to the water less than a kilometer back up the road from Whisky Point. Whisky Point is at the "end of the road" so I'm assuming this place is the site that the dive charters call "Middle of the Road". It's hard to imagine a place with easier access. You can park just a few feet from the water. In the shallows, there was the same small drop with urchins and young bull kelp that I saw at Whisky Point. Below about 15 feet deep, there was a sandy slope with scattered rocks. The rocks were covered with more urchins and cup corals. I saw a few sea pens and spawning sunflower stars. Visibility was about 50 feet, but I couldn't see any steeper, rocky areas down deeper. I swam out to the left. There seemed to be more and more rocks and then I came across a rocky wall going down to about 55 feet deep. This wall and the rocks around it were covered with much of the same species I saw at Whisky Point. The rocks mostly looked pink and yellow from the strawberry anemones and sponges. There were even some impressive sand dunes formed by the current around some of the rocky points. I saw some kelp greenlings and small lingcod, but fish weren't the main attraction here. As at Whisky Point, I was impressed by the coating of colour on the rocks. I started to feel a tug of current, but it was going in the direction I wanted so I rode it back to where I parked. I hear that on "normal current" days, divers diving from a boat do a drift dive from Whisky Point to here. If I didn't know better, I would get the impression from my dives that these are safe and easy places to have a relaxing dive. The coating of life on the rocks and warnings from other divers (not to mention a glance at the current tables), tell me that this can be a dangerous area to dive without a boat waiting to pick you up. I hope I haven't given the impression that it's safe for swarms of eager divers to catch the ferry and dive this area from shore on an average day.
