- 1 Conditions
- 1.1 Entire Area
- 1.2 Monterey Bay
- 1.3 Carmel Area
- 2 Webcams
- 3 Gone
Are conditions good, or bad? These are the websites I use when I'm planning a dive trip.
Coming soon: How to read each site and compare the sites for each area.
Let me know if you have a favorite site that's not listed here!
Conditions
Entire Area
- Chuck Tribolet's Monterey Bay Sea Conditions (his discussion of how to read them is also useful)
- Coastal Data Information Program
- Facebook - Monterey County Dive Reports
- Monterey Health Department - Water Quality
- Solspot 5-day surf forecast
- Surfer.com wave forecast
- TempBreak (look at Latest Chloro 3 Day Composite for algae levels)
- WillyWeather - Tide Times and Heights
Monterey Bay
(Monterey State Beach, San Carlos Beach, McAbee Beach, Lovers Point, Coral Street)
- NOAA buoy 46240 (off Lovers Point) has swell size and direction
- NOAA buoy 46098 (middle of Monterey Bay) and NOAA station MEYC1 (on municipal wharf) have water temp and wind
- NOAA Near-Shore Wave Prediction System (times are UTC*)
- NOAA Weather Forecast (check for small craft advisory)
- SOFAR spotter buoy off McAbee Beach
- SwellInfo (kinda flaky/unreliable; may be missing data)
- WillyWeather - San Carlos Beach and south
- WillyWeather - Lovers Point and north
- Windy (swells; the waves and winds tabs are also useful)
*NOAA predictions use UTC; subtract 8 hours (or 7 hours if daylight saving time) to get local time. This has the effect of shifting the data left (or the time axis right). For example, if NWPS shows a peak swell in Monterey bay at 11 pm Saturday, it's actually at 3 pm or 4 pm Saturday. That makes sense, because wind waves are highest in the afternoon. You can also look at the historical wave data from the corresponding buoy, which has both GMT/UTC and local time.
Carmel Area
(Stillwater Cove Monastery Beach, Point Lobos)
- Magic Seaweed surf report for Carmel Beach (happy surfers = sad divers)
- NOAA buoy 46239 (off Big Sur)
- NOAA Near-Shore Wave Prediction System (times are UTC*)
- NOAA Weather Forecast (check for small craft advisory)
- SOFAR spotter buoy off Point Joe
- SwellInfo (kinda flaky/unreliable; may be missing data)
- WillyWeather
- Windy
Webcams
- Adventures By The Sea (Monterey State Beach, Harbor, and San Carlos Beach)
- If the boat masts are rocking wildly in the harbor, it means there will be surge (even if it's calm at the surface).
- If there's sea foam at the point on the breakwater side, vis is likely to be less than 3'.
- If you can see whitecaps in the distance, there will be surge and lower vis in the shallows along the wall.
- A Taste of Monterey (Cannery Row)
- Fish Hopper (McAbee Beach)
- Monterey Bay Aquarium (Cannery Row)
- Pebble Beach (Stillwater Cove)
- Portola Hotel Webcam (Monterey Harbor)
- Tickle Pink Inn (Carmel)
Gone
These sites are broken or obsolete. But sometimes it's useful to know what isn't working, so you know what you won't find.
- NOAA WaveWatch Multi-1 (decommissioned March 2021)