Learning to Dive

[BigonaBianchi]

anybody else here learnt to scuba dive?

I am an adavanced padi openwater scuba diver...havea card to prove it to...did loads of dives in the caribean and Menorca ( night dives, cave dives wrecks, rescue , navigation etc) but wimped out in English waters...has been a few years since I took the plunge so wouldnt go back in now without a refresher.

So anybody scuba?

 

[ComedyPilot]

Done a bit of snorkelling, and sky diving.

 

[cookiemonster]

I need to learn how to dive quite soon as i will need it for my honours project for University in about a year or so time.

 

[Wigsie]

I lived in Hurghada and Marsa Alam in Egypt for a year working as a dive guide, have dived in Belize, Honduras, Australia, various Carribean Islands, the Med and errrr Newhaven!

Don't dive in the UK!

 

[snakehips]

I did the PADI first course in the Maldives a few years ago.

Snake

 

[montage]

PADI in Oman

 

[Cubist]

BSAC Sports Diver for me. Gave it up when Mrs C got pregnant, and one of my mates got a spinal bend in Cyprus.

Learnt in inland freshwater, then shore dives off North East Coast. English waters are more challenging (like the Canada off Spurn Point, great wreck, f*ck all vis)

Did a bit of wreck diving with a German dive school in Turkey, and a few live-aboards in the sound of Mull. Awesome sport, but I know too many people who have been disabled or killed doing it to want to keep going once I had a family to look after. I don't want to put anyone off but you have to be able to accept the risks, most of which can be minimised, but never eradicated.

 

[BigonaBianchi]

I lived in Hurghada and Marsa Alam in Egypt for a year working as a dive guide, have dived in Belize, Honduras, Australia, various Carribean Islands, the Med and errrr Newhaven!

Don't dive in the UK!

I forgot to add I dived in Brighton Marina once a long time ago..was dark cold and all I could hear were propeller blades at one point

I went down on the SS Rhone in the virgin islands which was superb..would love to Dive the Great Barrier reef and Truk lagoon one day...also have a weird desire to dive on the wrecks at scapa flow...erm..but that'll be 'hardcore' right?

Once in Menorca I surfaced under two naked girls swimming above the cave...that cave was pretty tight, like a long tube really.

The night dives were my favs...like being an astronout in an alien universe

 

[Wigsie]

...that cave was pretty tight, like a long tube really.

 

[BigonaBianchi]

I don't want to put anyone off but you have to be able to accept the risks, most of which can be minimised, but never eradicated.

exactly...

I remember getting Nitrogen Narcosis in Menorca.. I had been diving all week and hada plane to catch..so I knew I had to leave a day before flying and I wanted to dive so I was wreckless and did a 40m dive when I was right on my dive limits...I never knew what was happeneing really...on the ascent I stopped at 10m for a while then instead of deflating the bc I accidently inflated the theng and up I went like a rocket...I surfaced in some kind of weird spinning world felt very sick and drifted around the med ina state of confusion for a while until the dive boat picked me up.
I was a prat, took a silly risk and it could have been a lot worse.

Saw laods of huge barracuda on that dive.

Oh yeah..dunno if its technically a dive but I also got in a cage at Dyer island south africa..scary shoot.

 

[BigonaBianchi]

Quote:
Originally Posted by BigonaBianchi
...that cave was pretty tight, like a long tube really.

you find toothpaste funny????

 

[upsidedown]

Did my Navy diving course in Portsmouth, in February, most miserable experience of my life. Never felt the need to repeat the experience in the subsequent 20 years.

 

[BigonaBianchi]

when i was a kid i wanted to be a north sea oil rig diver..dunno why but something about diving in deep dark scary places appeal to me

 

[Globalti]

Only done it in a pool myself but Mrs RR was a BSAC diver and very experienced; she's done loads around British waters including some quarries and altitude dives and the German fleet in Scapa Flow. Also Red Sea, Med and somewhere off Africa. She says the quarry dives are the most scary and dangerous, especially those that go down obliquely to follow a seam.

 

[BigonaBianchi]

wow ..hats off to her for that!

Cave dives are pretty scary, I dont mean th epotholer type 'cos thats just crazy, anyway I'm to big to do that, but ocean caves...there really is something very humbling about being in such beautiful places under water, with no way directly up to the surface..you really are very vulnerable, if you have a problem in there you NEED your buddy FAST...