Best Wall Dive
Browning Wall, Port Hardy on Vancouver Island
Perhaps the best wall dive in British Columbia (near Port Hardy) and the front runner for the title of the most outstanding, most amazing and pretty damn cool wall dive in the world, is Browning Wall near Port Hardy on Vancouver Island.
The colors on this piece of kelp are amazing - what a great photo by Bob (the Greatful Diver) Bailey.
From the rugged, forested coastline above, this wall drops straight down past beautiful kelp forests to the ocean floor some 80 meters (260 feet) below.
Yikes – check your depth gauge often and wear a drysuit!
For legendary dive and accommodation packages for great Port Hardy area dives, you'll want to check out the Browning Pass Hideaway dive lodge.
This trip report quote from Bob (The Grateful Diver) Bailey, sums up this best wall dive:
"Our second dive of the day was the apex, though … Browning Wall.
If I had to choose just three words to describe this site they would be “Oh My God” …
I’d be at a loss to do it justice with any other verbal
description.
There isn’t just life growing on every conceivable surface here … there’s life growing on the life.
Barnacles the size of your fist covered with soft corals, sponges, tunicates, basket stars, and just about anything else that could find a place to hold on to."
Read his whole Port Hardy Trip Report in pdf. format...
This drift and wall dive is for intermediate to advanced divers only and you should come as part of a guided group.
Since it is quite isolated up in this area, you would certainly want to book with one of the best local
Port Hardy scuba charter outfits.
Watch out for jelly fish in the area, boats when you surface and maybe even an Orca whale or two?
During one of your dives at the amazing Browning Wall, you can expect to see an incredible, colorful wall with masses of brightly colored coral, sponges and plumose anemones, basket stars, kelp greenlings, red urchins, rock scallops, nudibranch and nudibranch eggs, giant barnacles, grunt and longfin sculpins, many varieties of crabs, starfish, bryozoans, red irish lords, Puget Sound king crabs, the occasional octopus, and various varieties of rockfish (Puget Sound, Yellowtail, and China), deadman's finger sponges and large scallops sticking out from the wall.
And lot's more if you look carefully!
Get a glimpse of what you can expect to see with this Best Wall Dive YouTube video.
As always, dive with a group and a trusted buddy and watch the currents and tides.
Many Port Hardy and area scuba divers also love these breathtaking British Columbia kayaking tours.
Please remember to send in a dive site review of this site after your dives.
We can offer divers a couple of fantastic options for viewing this amazing best wall dive and other fantastic dive sites in the Port Hardy Area:
Browning Pass Hideaway Resort
Nautilus Swell Liveaboard dive trip
Mamro Liveaboard dive trip
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