This Journal contains general overviews which explain some of the elements pertaining to South Florida's diving, as well as specific dive sites, categorized by the type of experience they most represent. Divers of any ability level from novice to Technical diver will be able to obtain detailed information about exactly the dive they are looking for, what kind of dive boat they are most comfortable on (range from deluxe wait on you hand and foot to bare-bones water-taxi approach, to high tech support for specialty diving). This Journal will give you access to the type of accommodations you desire, and non-advertising based product reviews by local divers on what works well for diving in this region and what really stinks. And lastly, this Journal will contain an e-mail to the Editor section where opinions about anything pertaining to diving in this region can be expressed by anyone.

For a brief 100 miles of Coastline, the Gulf Stream turns inward toward land, frequently coming to within 1/4 mile from shore along the reef lines, sometimes even intruding into inlets. To divers this allows diving unlike any Caribbean, Keys or other exotic destination. It allows a unique blend of excellent visibility, beautiful live corals, and a rich life source of marine estuaries along the Palm Beach coastline. If this nutrification occurred along a Keys or Cayman type reef environment, the corals would all be killed by an oversupply of nutrient. In Palm Beach, the Gulf Steam constantly cleanses the coral reefs, and the inshore mixing zone provides a feeding ground for one of the worlds richest breeding grounds for marine life.

While Palm Beach reefs reefs are known for their large schools of fish

a large part of this dynamic ecosystem is derived from tiny forms of life many divers never notice. It's really not that hard to find the larger members of this "macro world" like the Squat Anmone Shrimp, where your first step is just looking for the much larger Sea Anemone it lives in.

Divers actually see many other members of this same macro world, often without even realizing it. One frequent example occurs when a diver in Palm Beach sees a cloud of what looks very much like mosquitoes, usually swarming around a ledge crevice or overhang.

If you were to get closer, and magnify these tiny creatures with a powerful macro lens, you'd see a tiny form of shrimp very important to the health of reef systems.

If you had this very powerful magnification, you would also see this similar species of shrimp shrimp sitting on a spicule (pore) of a sponge.

Drift Diving is like having your own dive scooter, except you don't have to carry it out of the water with you when you get back on the boat. Drift Diving also MEANS you don't have to expend energy swimming back to the boat at the end of the dive...the boat follows your float-ball (towed on a light line by you, someone in your group, or the divemaster). When you surface, the boat comes to you! And drift diving is just alot more fun than anchor diving.