Blue Water Park

Tucked into an industrial park just off Highway 31 in Pelham, Blue Water Park turns a flooded rock quarry into what its owners bill as “Alabama’s Premier Inland Scuba Dive Site.” For divers in the Birmingham metro who don’t want to drive to the coast to log open-water time, it’s one of the closest options around, and it draws certified divers as well as newcomers working toward their first certification.

The property was previously operated as Dive Alabama before Mark DiGiorgio, owner of Birmingham-based ScubaVentures Inc., purchased the quarry and relaunched it under the Blue Water Park name. Since then it has grown from a swimming hole into a full-service operation built around the water itself, with a retail shop, training programs, and a rental counter all on-site rather than divers having to bring everything from home.

Diving is the headline activity, but Blue Water Park runs like a full dive shop wrapped around a quarry. On-site services include recreational and technical dive training, gear and tank rentals, including dry suits, air and nitrox fills, and gear and tank repair, along with a retail shop for divers who need to replace or upgrade equipment before getting in the water. The quarry is also open to kayakers and paddleboarders who want time on the water without dive gear, giving the park a broader draw than divers alone.

A day pass for quarry diving runs thirty-five dollars, and the park offers Open Water certification courses, taught in both monthly weekday classes and weekend formats, for seven hundred fifty dollars per person. Divers who need to knock the rust off after time away from the sport can take a refresher course for four hundred twenty-five dollars. Regulars also get a loyalty perk, with every fifth visit free, which adds up for divers who make the quarry a regular training spot.

Because visibility and water temperature in a quarry can shift with the seasons, Blue Water Park posts current conditions online so divers can check before making the drive out. Public hours lean toward the weekend: Friday, Saturday, and Sunday are open for walk-in visitors, while Monday through Thursday access is limited to scheduled appointments for instructors and private groups, a schedule that shifts further in the off-season between November and March each year.

The park also organizes hosted dive trips and group travel for certified divers looking to explore beyond the quarry, and it maintains a dedicated instructor portal so local dive shops and independent instructors can coordinate lessons on-site rather than building their own facility from scratch. Blue Water Park sits at 100 Industrial Park Drive in Pelham, a short drive from Interstate 65, and can be reached at 205-663-7428 or through its website for bookings and instructor coordination. For anyone already certified, or looking to get certified, without a coastline nearby, it fills a niche that few other spots in the Birmingham area can match. The park also welcomes local dive clubs and school groups looking to plan an outing around the water, and staff coordinate group bookings separately from the standard day-pass walk-in traffic that fills the quarry on a typical weekend.

The setting inside a working industrial park is easy to overlook from the road, and first-time visitors sometimes drive past the entrance before realizing the quarry sits just beyond the parking lot. Once inside, though, the site functions much like a small marina, with a shop counter, air fill station, and staff on hand to check gear before anyone gets in the water. For divers building certification hours or just looking for a place to practice skills close to home, that combination of infrastructure and a genuine open-water site is what keeps Blue Water Park busy on a typical weekend.

Because the quarry is privately owned and operated rather than run as a public swimming area, all visitors, including kayakers and paddleboarders, are expected to check in with staff and follow posted rules before heading out onto the water. That oversight is part of what distinguishes Blue Water Park from an informal swimming hole and what has allowed it to build a following among certified divers across central Alabama.