White Lake Bridge, Arnprior

A dive that I’ve been interested in checking out for a while.  With no great surprise, the visibility was poor.  Through the Ottawa Divers forum, I posted a note asking for a partner to join me on a sunday afternoon dive.  Visiting a cottage of a great friends nearby this dive site was a no brainer.  As my friend said, enjoying the friends hospitality and diving on the same day, I got my cake and ate it to! 

Alexi Perepelkine saw my cry for a partner, and was able to oblige me.  As often, I meet my dive buddy for the first time.  It’s so easy to jump into conversation with strangers when you both have the same passion.  After lugging all my gear from the highway to the shore we geared up. 

We dove down about 10 feet and found the rope leading to the sunken bridge.  A 2-3 minute swim later we found the end of the rope.

Diving along side the zebra muscles I couldn’t help but to think “I wish this muscles would clean up this water!”  Alexi and i began swimming along the top of the two laned bridge.  I guess it only took a minute or two before we got bored.  The underside of the bridge was where the excitement was!  No!  It was a scary pitch black surrounding! 

We did immediately find a pillar, which gave some support to hold on to.  This was the first experience for me that at points i had no reference whether I was headed up or down.  A little disconcerting.  We found a line strung from one pillar to another.  We followed this line to the next pillar where it ended.  Next, we had noticed a line that headed straight down from the bridge.  Alexi signaled for me to take the lead… to the middle of nowhere! 

After returning from the black hole (not much to see in a stirred up pitch blackness) I suggested we swim along the bridge to the other end.  This to turned out to be all the excitement.  The garbage we found was priceless!  Do people throwing garbage off the modern White Lake Bridge ever think it’s landing on the old bridge?

      

                                      Road sign         

                                        VCR

                                Air Conditioner

 

                                     Shopping Cart

                                 I’m taking offers

           Commercial Microwave

                                       A Friend

We swam to the end of the bridge on the right hand lane (starting from the Arnprior side), and then swam back on the left hand lane.  Once we got back to the beginning we were at around 70min.  We decided to end the dive.

Alexi with his side mount setup.  It was entertaining.  When I get a new killer light perhaps the underside will be more interesting.  All thou the Madawaska river wouldn’t appreciate it, I would enjoy some rotating trash!