Vancouver Island Scuba Diving Pages

You slip backwards over the side of the boat, one hand holding your regulator, the other pressed against the side of your face-mask.

Below, in a small bay on the west coast of Quadra Island in Discovery Passage, lies the HMCS Columbia, a decommissioned destroyer sunk in 1996. Stripped of everything but her hull and gun turrets, the warship is now one of four artificial reefs along the east coast of Vancouver Island. The tide is low, and 28-feet down your light picks up the ship's towering mast. Following the slight angle of the mast you continue down, soon reaching the deck and a variety of marine life.

Jacques Costeau called Discovery Passage one of the best cold-water diving sites in the world. The narrow passage's tidal flows stir up nutrients, providing food for over 300 marine species. You scuba diver pic make your way to the bow of the Columbia, marveling at the starfish, anemones, octopus, wolf eels and fish - from perch to lingcod - that have made the artificial reef their home. Rounding the bow, you push off from the sandy bottom and begin your exploration of the 366-foot destroyer, now and then entering one of a number of holes cut in the side for easy access to the ship's interior. Motioning to your diving partner, you enter mid-ship and find yourself in the crew quarters. You glide past bedframes bolted to the walls, through a doorway, down a long narrow passage and into the huge dining room. Rising through a hole in the ceiling, you find yourself in the control room, the center of action during the Columbia's hunt for submarines. The radar equipment reflects your light and your air bubbles collect against the low ceiling. Slipping out another access hole, you find yourself outside the ship. As you rise up the sloping side toward the surface an octopus reaches out an arm as if to say goodbye.

Tomorrow you will head down island. Just off Nanaimo another artificial reef, the HMCS Saskatchewan, is teeming with life. Later, you will be in the waters off Victoria, exploring the HMCS MacKenzie and the G.B. Church.