This unassuming shore dive inside the mouth of the Tweed River, close to Jack Evans Boat Harbour, has become one of the better-known muck and critter dives on the northern NSW coast, prized far more for what lives among the rubble than for any scenery. The site sits on the last bend of the river before it opens to the ocean, where a low rock wall and adjacent sandy/silty bottom in 3 to 12 m create a sheltered nursery habitat quite different from anything on the exposed reefs outside. Because the river channel brings a steady recruitment of tropical larvae down from the north on the East Australian Current, particularly through late summer and autumn, this is one of the most reliable spots in the region for juvenile tropical reef fish well south of where you would expect to find them, alongside a resident population of frogfish, ghost pipefish, shrimp gobies and their commensal shrimp, blennies, scorpionfish and moray eels working the cracks in the rock wall.

Butterflyfish, angelfish and leatherjackets pick over the structure, and by torchlight at night the site comes even more alive with nocturnal crustaceans and cephalopods. The catch is the tide: this is a genuinely tidal site, with a real current running in and out of the river mouth, so it must only be dived on the incoming tide or at high slack, when the water is calmest and clearest — diving on the ebb risks being swept out toward the river bar and open ocean. Visibility is never great by reef standards, typically 5 to 10 m and often driven by how much rain has fallen upstream in the preceding days, but that murk is part of what makes this a genuine muck-diving destination rather than a scenic dive.

It requires no boat, making it an easy, low-cost, high-reward option for shore-based photographers and macro enthusiasts, and it doubles as a convenient night dive and a training venue for local dive shops, provided divers respect the tide window and keep a float up for the boat traffic that shares the harbour.

From the Tweed Heads town centre, drive or walk to Jack Evans Boat Harbour on Wharf Street; park in the public car park by the boat harbour and walk down to the rock wall or the small beach area. Gear up at the car and carry equipment 50–100 m to the water's edge; there are no steps or ladders, just a walk down the grassed bank and rock wall. Enter on the last hour of the incoming tide or at high slack for the calmest water and best visibility.

Current is tide-driven rather than swell-driven: outgoing tide produces a strong seaward flow through the channel that is unsafe for casual diving, so this site is only dived on a rising tide or at high slack, roughly a one-to-two-hour window either side of high water. Heavy rain in the Tweed catchment browns the water for days and can bring debris downriver; avoid diving for at least 2-3 days after significant rain. Boat and jet-ski traffic is heaviest on weekends and public holidays.

Enter at high slack and work slowly along the base of the rock wall at 3-8 m, checking crevices and rubble for critters, using a torch even by day to pick out shrimp gobies and gobies in burrows; turn back well before the tide turns and surface close to the wall away from boat channels, towing a dive flag/float throughout.

No boat operator required; Tweed Sea Sports and other local dive shops run guided shore dives and night dives here for training and photography groups.