Spanish Fork Reservoir

Spanish Fork Reservoir in Utah County, Utah, provides freshwater divers in the Wasatch Front region with a conveniently located reservoir dive option in the Spanish Fork River canyon—a site whose proximity to the Provo-Orem metropolitan area makes it a practical local resource for Utah Valley's diving community between trips to the more famous Deer Creek or Strawberry Reservoir sites further into the Wasatch highlands. Spanish Fork Canyon, carved by the Spanish Fork River through the southern Wasatch Range, creates the natural bowl that the reservoir occupies, with canyon walls providing the scenic framing that distinguishes mountain reservoir diving from flat-country lake diving. The reservoir serves multiple purposes in Utah County's water management system—providing irrigation water storage, flood control, and recreational access in a canyon that the Spanish Fork River has shaped into one of Utah County's most accessible mountain corridors. The canyon's accessibility from the urban Wasatch Front, via the highway that runs through Spanish Fork Canyon toward Price and Carbon County, means that reaching the reservoir requires minimal driving time from the region's largest population centers—a practical advantage that makes it the kind of dive site that can accommodate a genuine weeknight dive rather than requiring weekend-level commitment. Water conditions at Spanish Fork Reservoir follow the pattern of Utah's mid-elevation mountain reservoirs: spring runoff from the Spanish Fork River drainage can carry significant turbidity into the reservoir in high-flow periods, while the late summer and fall transition to lower flows and cooling temperatures typically produces the clearest conditions of the year. Divers who time their visits to the optimal seasonal window—typically August through October in most years—find conditions significantly better than spring visits, and the additional benefit of warm air temperatures making above-water gear management comfortable. Fish populations in Spanish Fork Reservoir include the species typical of Utah mountain reservoirs—rainbow and brown trout stocked by the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, along with warm-water species that have established populations in the reservoir's shallower, warmer sections. The trout fishing that Spanish Fork supports creates the freshwater wildlife encounter potential that motivates the drive to mountain reservoir diving: encountering a large reservoir trout in clear water is one of freshwater diving's genuine pleasures, and the sight of a substantial brown trout hovering in clear mountain reservoir water is a wildlife quality that many ocean divers don't anticipate from inland freshwater sites.