Dive Review of Force-E/Admiral's Club in
The Continental USA

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Force-E/Admiral's Club, Mar, 2010, by Paul Selden, MI, US ( Contributor 16 reports with 2 Helpful votes). Report 5678.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food	N/A
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving
Snorkeling
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	If you want to dive Phil Foster Park in West Palm/Riviera Beach, you want the max convenience, aren’t allergic to a little pet dander from the owner’s dogs and cats, and don’t mind a do-it-yourself, non-resort atmosphere, staying at the Admiral’s Club on Singer Island is the absolute best place to stay, and Force-E scuba center is the handiest scuba shop around. Admiral’s Club is a small (approx. 10-14) room apartment building on the intra-coastal waterway that caters to divers and rents furnished full-kitchen rooms to those who don’t mind fending for themselves. Richard Baumgart, the owner/manager, has no website, doesn’t check his email every day (admiralsclub@aol.com), but does return calls and emails eventually. We stayed in a roomy two bedroom plus livingroom/kitchen apartment for $900/week. One of the main attractions about the Admiral’s Club is that Richard’s dock is fantastic, with a view west directly of Phil Foster Park, and steps down into the intra-coastal that allowed us to enter the water any time we felt like it. In case you haven’t been reading the dive magazines lately, you may have missed that Phil Foster Park (and the nearby waters, including Richard’s dock) is home to some unusual marine life. The east end of the Blue Heron Bridge, which connects the mainland to Singer Island, by way of Phil Foster Park, is under construction. That may be keeping some divers away, since diving under this part of the bridge (where a lot of the weird creatures hand out) is off-limits. But there is plenty of good diving off the park, under the east piers, and off Admiral’s Club itself. I saw my first sea spider in the sands off Phil Foster Park on a morning dive, and saw my first beaded sea cucumber at night under a dock just north of the Admiral’s Club dock. The place was a macro-photo heaven. I was so fascinated by the marine life that I never bothered doing any ocean dives by boat (which are also well worth doing). Diving in the intra-coastal, dive times are totally governed by the tides. There are two main rules, and you learn them fast. First, you can’t reasonably dive except for a period some 30-45 minutes before and after the tide turns, when the water is slack. At other times, the water flows like a river with high current. Second, the only time visibility is reasonably good is at high tide, when the ocean sweeps in; at low tide, murk, organic matter, leaves and twigs from the shallows sweep out, reducing visibility to a couple of feet or less. If you time things right, by luck or design, this means you can get in a couple of great dives per day, about 11-1/2 hours apart, so the time changes every day! I tried diving one low tide, but the visibility made it too tedious. Dives are shallow, only 8-20 feet, so one upside is that they are nice and long. I fell into a routine that usually included one morning, and one night dive. In the afternoon I’d pick up a pair of fresh tanks from the nice folks at the full-service, well-stocked Force-E Dive Center (on the same road as the Blue Heron Bridge, about a quarter mile to the west) and go sight seeing with my wife. Important: bring your dive hood, even if you only think you need a 3 mil for “sunny Florida.” This past winter and March were exceptionally cold in Florida, and for the first few dives I’d get very cold toward the end, even in my 7 mil. Buying a one mil hooded tunic at Force-E made all the difference between total comfort and having to tough it out. Topside, it was hot and great weather. We enjoyed driving around the island and looking at the beautiful homes along the seaside drives in the Palm Beach area. There are a lot of great restaurants in the area (we liked Johnny Longboats and the Sailfish Marina) if you don’t want to cook for yourself. The public beach and walking paths on Singer Island are well kept. Be sure to see the Flagler Museum in Palm Beach. Henry Flagler was an oil tycoon who built the railroad out to Key West. His 55-room estate has been nicely restored. The Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach is another gem. My rating for beginners is my opinion that beginning scuba divers might be bored by diving in the intra-coastal waterway or find diving at high tides to be too demanding, schedule-wise. But beginners would probably greatly enjoy a combo of boat diving with Force-E and a few dives in the intra-coastal around the park.
Websites	Force-E
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	251-500 dives
Where else diving	Galapagos, Caribbean, Vancouver Island, California
Closest Airport		Getting There
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, dry	Seas	calm, currents
Water Temp	64-70°F / 18-21°C	Wetsuit Thickness	7
Water Visibility	2-20 Ft/ 1-6 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	No remarkable restrictions. Solo diving okay.
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	None	Mantas	None
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	None	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals	N/A	Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish	N/A
Large Pelagics	N/A
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter		Boat Facilities	N/A
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities
UW Photo Comments	After each dive, you can rinse all gear with a fresh water hose and dry it on the dock. Cameras can be soaked in plenty of clean fresh water in the tub at your own apartment/room.

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Dive Review of Force-E/Admiral's Club in The Continental USA

Force-E/Admiral's Club, Mar, 2010,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Force-E/Admiral's Club in
The Continental USA