The Bridge

Local divers simply call it The Bridge. It is the span at Blue Heron Boulevard that crosses the Intracoastal Waterway from the mainland in Riviera Beach, Florida, just east of Dixie Highway (US-1), to Singer Island. The bridge is south of the Lake Park town line. It is a high fixed bridge to allow navigation without opening. At the east end, before reaching Singer Island, is Phil Foster County Park. There is plenty of free parking and a no-charge boat launching ramp in the park on the north side of Blue Heron Bridge. There are restrooms, showers, toilets and picnic tables.

Underneath the bridge is a small beach that is county lifeguard patrolled with a protected swim area. Scuba diving is permitted outside the protected beach area that allows plenty of beach access. When the beach and park are not crowded on weekdays, savvy bridge divers park close to the lifeguard tower, set up their gear, carry a dive flag and walk down to the water.

Diving here is from 8 to about 18-feet deep. The rewards for patience and close observation are spectacular.

“Last night I saw a striated frog fish, a pregnant frog fish and several sea horses,” said dive instructor and underwater photographer Elaine Blum.

The Bridge is one of Elaine’s favorite places to dive. She brings her students here to learn about marine organisms and when it is high and slack tide she dives herself, digital camera in hand. The images Elaine captures are nothing short of spectacular.

Divers comb the world to find dive destinations touted for their exotic frilly sea horses, almost invisible frog fish, pipe fish and miniature sealife.

I am one of those that seek out exotic marine species around the globe to get photographs for my books and articles. In the hundreds of dives I make each year in Florida waters, I never returned to my roots until Elaine showed me pictures she obtained diving off the beach at the Blue Heron Bridge.

As a kid I’d be dropped off at the nearby Texaco Fuel and Mail Dock that used to be on the south side of the Palm Beach Inlet. I’d spend my whole day diving and snorkeling the rocks near shore. I was too young to drive so I’d be picked up in time to get home for dinner with many tales of exotic creatures I spotted in the shallow water.

Gulf Stream diving now takes precedence. I dive most days about a mile offshore where the Stream eddies. We drift dive deeper reefs where large sea creatures abound.

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I only returned to the shallows with Elaine’s encouragement and because of her amazing underwater images. I was rewarded almost immediately with a small octopus scooting under an old hanging boat mooring line. Boaters have taken up an itinerant residence in the waterway’s south cove, sheltered by the bridge and beach. Their old lines and chains criss-cross the bottom. Rubble and junk litter the sand. It may not be beautiful to the human beholder, but to juvenile and exotic species of sea dwellers, it is home.

The little octopus changed form and color, squirted ink and remained perfectly still hiding in plain sight. I took a lot of pictures and only moved on at Elaine’s beckoning. She discovered a frilly striated sea horse. It was almost impossible to distinguish the little sea horse from seaweed on a rope hanging down from a surface float. I looked but until Elaine moved the rope with her finger I didn’t see it. Nearby were tiny, juvenile lobsters. Their little antennas poked out from niches they found in the old hemp. They were concealed for the most part, although their bodies were about an inch long.

There is stuff you never see, at least not in the open ocean. It’s there but it is so difficult to spot on a deep ocean reef that most divers never see a frog fish diving offshore. This time it was my turn. Elaine passed it by. She was looking closely at a long rope that was strung along the bottom. I followed, careful not to kick up any sand. There it was, a striated frog fish, so perfectly concealed in the hemp and algae that it was almost invisible. We took photos galore while the sedentary creature remained still, perfectly disguised.

I spent almost 15 minutes on my previous ocean reef dive trying to photograph a tiny juvenile angel fish. The little fella wouldn’t cooperate at all. When I was on one side of a basket sponge it swam around to the other side. Here in 12 feet of sea water were tribes of them. Tiny jack knife fish swam in little schools together. It was hard to stop photographing one thing and move on to find more.

Some creatures were so exotic that I had trouble identifying them. One appeared to be a juvenile bat fish. Elaine thought it was a juvenile sea robin akin to an adult she’d just photographed. There were juvenile peacock flounders and sea urchins too.

Afterward we made a grand loop around the anchorage looking for exotics on old ropes, chains and on the hulls of wrecked boats that remain sunk on the bottom, victims of Florida’s various hurricanes. We swam toward a small span that span connects the end of the main Blue Heron Bridge to Singer Island. The span is supported by concrete pillars that are overgrown with life, and many marine organisms hide among attaching organisms on the pillars or near rocks that are strewn on the bottom. An old sailboat lies partially upright under the bridge, stuffed there by hurricane winds and is now abandoned underwater.

Peacock flounder swim in the sand here. One avid underwater photographer with an amazing camera set up called us over to look at a microscopic nudibranch. The photographer handed us a magnifying lens just to see it as it moved along in coarse sand almost imperceptibly. The same photographer later shared a striped pipe fish with me, courteously moving aside so that I could take its picture.

There is real camaraderie at The Bridge. Divers meet at picnic tables and showers and exchange their observations. “Did you see the burgundy frog fish?”

“Where is it?” Then directions, difficult to follow for any but a bridge afficionado. “Go out past the second long rope, past the crossed chain and it’s there near the plow anchor.” Landmarks to the initiated.

I dove a second time with Elaine and Captain Craig Smart, who owns and operates the dive boat Starfish Enterprise out of Lantana. It was one of those dive-boat-owner’s holidays, the rare afternoon off when the tide was right.

Craig gathered up trash thrown in by generations of live-aboard sailors and even spotted a striated sea horse, impossibly camouflaged in an old mooring line.

I was able to photograph a baby octopus on that dive, rather commonplace for The Bridge. Then I found five bucks. Yep, the sea floor is covered by sea urchins. They gather up all manner of stuff to cover themselves in some makeshift disguise. One had a plastic spoon among small rocks, others had bits and pieces of litter placed on top for protection from invading fish seeking a tasty morsel.

I saw the five-dollar bill from twenty feet away. I swam toward it quickly then adjusted my camera for a fast picture before any competition moved in to snatch it. Photo done I swiped the bill from two sea urchins that were sharing it as a protective umbrella. Once in my hands I had to snap it in front of Elaine and Craig.

Elaine laughed through her regulator. “I found a dollar bill that way earlier this year,” she said as we surfaced, removed our fins and started for the beach.

“Yeah but I’m four up on you,” I answered.

“But I found two singles last year,” was her retort.

The Bridge is fun. Camaraderie and friendly competition to find camouflaged creatures among divers that come there regularly adds to the enjoyment of a good dive. Talk about exotic species spotted and photographed is animated. The enthusiasm is catching.

Author/photgapher John Christopher Fine is a marine biologist and expert in marine and maritime affairs. Dr. Fine has authored 24 books, most about ocean and environmental issues. He holds the highest licenses as a Master Scuba Instructor and Instructor Trainer. Photos ©2009, John Christopher Fine.