Shrewsbury Rocks

Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks

The Shrewsbury Rocks are a wide area of rocky bottom that stretches from fourteen feet of water out to the fifty-foot mark off of Monmouth Beach. Some of the formations are twenty feet tall or more and can be very pretty under good conditions, which are unfortunately seldom this far north. The stone itself is a type of sandstone known as Greensand.

Further south are the Elberon Rocks ( or Grounds. ) This is a wide expanse of somewhat lower rocks and rough bottom. Much lower outcroppings occur even further south, such as the Klondike Rocks.

from AWOIS: 1538

FE331SS/89 -- OPR-C147-HE-89; CONTACT #12 FROM ABOVE SURVEY; DIVERS FOUND A LARGE ROCK THAT WAS COVERED WITH CORAL AND OTHER SEA LIFE, AND HUNDREDS OF LEAD FISHING WEIGHTS; SURROUNDING BOTTOM WAS SAND; ROCK HAS A VERY STEEP NORTH FACE AND, AT THAT POINT, RISES ABOUT 8 FT OFF THE BOTTOM; PNEUMATIC DEPTH GAUGE LEAST DEPTH OF 46 FT. (UPDATED MSD 7/91)

Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
Looks almost like a Caribbean reef. Almost ...
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
Colorful sponges, coral, hydroids, and anemones
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
A section of sandstone sawn-through by the boat's anchor chain
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
Ledges and crevices
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
Shrewsbury / Elberon Rocks
A rocky pinnacle

George Washington is reported to have fished the Shrewsbury Rocks, and on any nice day you can easily make out the location of the rocks from high on Twin Lights by the concentration of boats there. The Shrewsbury Rocks are tall enough in places to merit not just one but two navigation buoys.

Images courtesy of
Donna L. Blaszcak
uwimages@earthlink.net
Nature Photographer

Shrewsbury Rocks at lower-left in this NOAA side-scan imagery
Close-up, with Twin Lights at upper-left

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The heavyweight cold-water wetsuit is probably responsible for the premature demise of more nascent diving careers than any other factor. These awful things are simply uncomfortable and ineffective. For all the stiffness, squeezing, bulk, and extra weight of 5-7mm wetsuit, in the end, it really doesn't keep you warm, and most cold-water wetsuit divers are pretty miserable creatures. I have seen the constriction and topside overheating of one of these things make its poor wearer sick on dry land, never mind on a boat out at sea.

manual

For an excellent guide to drysuit use, pick up a copy of DUI's drysuit owner's manual, available at most dealers for under $10.

Or just download it.

The argument that heavy cold-water wetsuits are easier to use is patently false. A wetsuit has a mind of its own and will make wide depth-dependant swings in buoyancy over which the wearer has no control. How is that better than a drysuit, which the user can consciously trim for constant buoyancy during the descent, and which semi-automatically trims itself during ascent?