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Buy right away: * Mask, gloves, boots. They're cheap and don't take much space, no reason not to buy them. And having stuff that fits you well takes away another stress factor. * Cheap open-heel fins that you'll replace with jet fins down the line anyway. Or try to find a pair of second hand jet fins. * Wetsuit. See above wrt fitting, also rental suits are gross. Fairly inexpensive, and if you mostly dive in warm water you can get away with a thin shorty or even just a rash guard. Skip the snorkel, it's a pointless item that nobody actually uses outside of the PADI OW course and is more hassle than it's worth. Buy when you know scuba is the thing for you and start going on serious trips where diving is the main purpose. * Computer. Potentially pricey, but you want to have one that you're used to and that has your own profile and dive log. * BCD or plate+wing. * First/second stage regs.
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Feb 13, 2018 15:37
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Collateral Damage posted:rental suits are gross Those that pee in wetsuits Those that lie about it
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Feb 13, 2018 17:22
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Does anyone have any camera/video recommendations? I looking for a simple point and click thing, as I don't really have time to learn anything too complex. I would assume some variety of GoPro is still the go-to, but is there anything else I should be looking at? I have an old Intova, but it is loving useless, had battery problems out of the box, and after a year of almost no use, it has started just giving blocked colour photos/video.
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Feb 14, 2018 11:11
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Sticko posted:Does anyone have any camera/video recommendations? I looking for a simple point and click thing, as I don't really have time to learn anything too complex. I would assume some variety of GoPro is still the go-to, but is there anything else I should be looking at? I have an old Intova, but it is loving useless, had battery problems out of the box, and after a year of almost no use, it has started just giving blocked colour photos/video. Photography is one of my hobbies and my GoPro 5 has been fine for photos and video while scuba diving. We usually scuba dive 4 weeks a year, maybe 6 on a good year, which influences my decision.
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Feb 14, 2018 11:30
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Ropes4u posted:Photography is one of my hobbies and my GoPro 5 has been fine for photos and video while scuba diving. We usually scuba dive 4 weeks a year, maybe 6 on a good year, which influences my decision.
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Feb 14, 2018 12:03
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Sticko posted:Sounds good, thanks. I'm not normally a huge photographer, but I sometimes feel the urge while diving. That and part of the deal on going on a liveaboard without the missus (to Raja Ampat - super excited!) is that I bring back plenty of photos. Do you use just the standard super suit, or a 3rd party housing? Any other gadgets/addons you'd recommend? I'll probably also get a red filter at minimum. Super suit, some version of a selfie stick, GoPro filter. I made a tray but the selfie stick is easier and gives me more reach. Lights and a tray would take better photos in deeper waters but for sharing photos and videos with friends its good enough. I was going to buy lights for my try but the cost doesn’t appear to be worth it for my use. If i lived on the coast, or move to Bonaire, I might change my mind but until then its a GoPro, selfie stick, and filter.
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Feb 14, 2018 12:43
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Collateral Damage posted:Skip the snorkel, it's a pointless item that nobody actually uses outside of the PADI OW course and is more hassle than it's worth. If your school INSISTS that you use a snorkel during class, either get the cheapest $9 compliance snorkel you can find, or find one you’d be comfortable snorkeling with. Dive trips often come with snorkeling opportunities. Collateral Damage posted:* BCD or plate+wing. The holy war has arrived.
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Feb 14, 2018 14:49
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Mini Trip Report With over a foot of snow hitting Chicago last weekend I knew I had to get the hell out of town and get somewhere warm. Combined with the fact that two of my close friends needed to finish their Openwater we all decided to load up the car and make the 20 hour drive to Crystal River, FL. I used to go down to Crystal River every year and swim with the manatees when I was a kid and it’s been a decade since I’ve been down there. Since our friends needed to finish their Openwater dives we decided to make three dives at Devil’s Den on Friday, 1 snorkel trip to Crystal River to swim with the manatees, and a drift dive on Rainbow River on Saturday. We arrived at a fantastic Air BnB on the river in Homosassa and got ready to dive Devi’s Den on Friday morning. Devil’s Den - Devil’s Den is a limestone spring and dry cave that’s a fantastic place to train new divers. It’s a unique underground cave that’s also entirely an open environment that is one of the most unqiue dive sites in central Florida. I used to dive Devi’s Den on a fairly regular basis when I would lead Openwater trips to this part of Florida and in the 10 years since I’ve been to this part of Florida I was happy to see not much had changed. They built up the area around the entrance and replaced the old wooden dock inside the cave with a metal one but otherwise it’s still the same charming site with a friendly staff and dogs and cats wandering around the site. My wife is working on her Divemaster (currently a NAUI Training Assistant) so once she lead the tour dive around the Den while I took photos and observed. Three Sisters - Three Sisters is one of the most well known manatee sites in Crystal River. It was originally made famous by Jacques Cousteau in his “The Forgotten Mermaids” documentary. The manatees are now anything but forgotten down here. The past few decades of being a protected species has been great for the manatee population here. Every winter the manatees come into the springs around Crystal River seeking warmth and on cold days you can find hundreds of manatees in sites like Three Sisters. Unfortunately for us Crystal River was having a warm February so the manatees were few and far between. Three Sisters had 3 manatees present for us to snorkel with and they mostly hung out in the protected areas. So while not a great manatee experience we still had a good time and at least got to see a few manatees. Rainbow River - Rainbow River is not actually a river but is instead a massive spring system that flows like a river. The shallow depths and fantastic visibility makes it a fantastic dive to acclimate scuba students to boat and drift diving. The main spring itself flows at a few million gallons a day and it’s a lot of fun to pull your way down to the entrance (you’re not going to make it down to it otherwise.) On the last day we went to the Dali Museum and the beach down in the Tampa-St. Pete area. After to that it was time to load up the car and head back to the frozen tundra that is Chicago. When in the hell is summer going to be here?  First dive in Devil's Den   My wife leading the students   You can see the opening to the sinkhole pretty clearly behind us     Sadie got her mask in the face by another diver on the boat on the final dive of her Openwater training. She replaced and cleared her mask while still horizontal and neutral. I was quite proud haha   Shell hunting  Looking pretty good on his final OW dive  My wife at the entrance to the Rainbow River mainspring  Gear drying before heading home. I'm so loving ready for it to be summer.
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Feb 14, 2018 19:20
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MrYenko posted:If your school INSISTS that you use a snorkel during class, either get the cheapest $9 compliance snorkel you can find, or find one you’d be comfortable snorkeling with. Dive trips often come with snorkeling opportunities. The cheapo $9 snorkels are usually better for diving anyway. They tend to be rigid and curve around the head which makes them quite a bit more streamlined for both diving and snorkeling. I wear an old-school J valve while teaching and I forget I have it on my mask sometimes. quote:The holy war has arrived. Please god no EugeneDebsWasCool fucked around with this message at 19:33 on Feb 14, 2018 |
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Feb 14, 2018 19:24
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MrYenko posted:The holy war has arrived.  That's why I said to wait until you're properly into diving. Ideally get a chance to try both and see what you like. 
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Feb 14, 2018 19:29
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I have a Zeagle Stiletto and am going to buy a back plate and wing - because I want to try one out. I think it depends on your goals we knew we would be reef diving for a while and that it didn’t matter which system we started out with, but i could afford to swap if i needed to or wanted. Off topic. I have seen more and more solo divers in Bonaire and in Florida most of them have been people my age (50s) is this a thing now?
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Feb 14, 2018 20:29
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mobby_6kl posted:Had my orientation for PADI open water course yesterday. There's a decent amount of homework study and since the class will be mostly on work days, scheduling the group was a pain in the rear end because some rear end in a top hat has every evening booked a month in advance. Still, looks like a lot of fun and would give me some cool opportunities when traveling. I've been licensed for about 10 years now and only done 40 or 50 dives, and I don't own any more than fins, mask & snorkel, boots and gloves. I would stick with just those until you get a feel for how much you'll do it. The friend I learned with has bought all the gear but he has dived thousands of times. I've never felt I needed anything more, and if I decide to dive while I'm overseas I'll just hire everything for the extra few bucks anyway and save me lugging that stuff about. Obviously this would be different if I went on a specific dive holiday, but it isn't that big a part of my life.
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Feb 15, 2018 00:50
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I wish I hadn't bought anything beyond boots/fins/snorkel/mask and computer because I'm already tired of schlepping it around the world.
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Feb 15, 2018 03:47
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Luceo posted:I wish I hadn't bought anything beyond boots/fins/snorkel/mask and computer because I'm already tired of schlepping it around the world. I'm the opposite. I rented gear for the first time in a cruise list year and it was awful. The whole time I was wishing I had my own equipment with me. EugeneDebsWasCool fucked around with this message at 15:50 on Feb 15, 2018 |
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Feb 15, 2018 03:56
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EugeneDebsWasCool posted:I wear an old-school J valve while teaching and I forget I have it on my mask sometimes. Is this a troll? Is this within standards of any agency to dive with a J valve? This sounds patently unsafe.
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Feb 15, 2018 04:36
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I've saved hundreds by having my own gear. However, I go on dive vacations where that's pretty much all I do, making it very worth it. A normal vacation? Probably not as much.
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Feb 15, 2018 04:39
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lord1234 posted:Is this a troll? Is this within standards of any agency to dive with a J valve? This sounds patently unsafe. Brain fart. J snorkel not j valve haha. Like a Cressi Gringo.
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Feb 15, 2018 05:33
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EugeneDebsWasCool posted:Mini Trip Report Great pictures, too!
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Feb 15, 2018 08:54
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We take dive vacations and work travels me to Florida where we can dive, so buying our own gear was more affordable. I also think that owning your own gear provides some level of comfort that is has been cleaned and cared for on a regular basis. I have rented both skydiving and scuba gear but I usually consider the first jump or dive the dummy test.
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Feb 15, 2018 10:42
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EugeneDebsWasCool posted:Brain fart. J snorkel not j valve haha. Like a Cressi Gringo.  slight difference
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Feb 15, 2018 15:31
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Work takes me to FL or I take me to FL once a month to go diving. I'm skipping March because I am having a week long trip to Bonaire! Never been before, but can't wait!
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Feb 15, 2018 15:40
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EugeneDebsWasCool posted:Mini Trip Report I did my final OW check out dive as a drift dive down Rainbow River. I really enjoyed the whole experience of going up river via boat, dumping everything overboard, and followed by the drift back. We had friendly kayakers keeping a perimeter around us.
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Feb 15, 2018 15:56
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Collateral Damage posted:I wish I could just gently caress off to somewhere warm as well right now. I'm jealous. I'm so tired of the loving winter. If my wife would let me we would move to somewhere like Tampa tomorrow. Given her line of work we'll probably end up in LA which I'm okay with too. I love Chicago but I've been here 7 years and I am just about done with these winters. sharkytm posted:
Just a bit. Although when I first started helping with and teaching classes in the late '90s and early '00s we had a few j-valves in rental that had the reserve mechanism disengaged. So they were essentially hard to carry k valves. And (with NAUI at least) you can still use a j-valve in training so long as the student is also equipped with a SPG and they start the dive with the mechanism in the down position. They still have a few paragraphs about them in the Scuba Diver manual (as well as a few paragraphs on horse collars.) The Electronaut posted:I did my final OW check out dive as a drift dive down Rainbow River. I really enjoyed the whole experience of going up river via boat, dumping everything overboard, and followed by the drift back. We had friendly kayakers keeping a perimeter around us. I think it's a fantastic dive for open water students. It gives you an opportunity to sample a lot of different types of diving in once place. It's also a great to dive to practice buoyancy control on because the depth can change so dramatically so it presents a challenge. EugeneDebsWasCool fucked around with this message at 16:05 on Feb 15, 2018 |
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Feb 15, 2018 16:01
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My first rainbow river dive, we had little fish eating something in whatever sediment we kicked up, then every now and again we’d see a cormorant barreling past us underwater with one of those little fish hanging out of its mouth. The sand-boils were really cool too, and the drift was slow enough to linger on something if you really wanted to.
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Feb 15, 2018 16:20
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lord1234 posted:Work takes me to FL or I take me to FL once a month to go diving. I'm skipping March because I am having a week long trip to Bonaire! Never been before, but can't wait! We are on week two in Bonaire, three days to go but one of them might be spent looking at condos. Its not without issues but we love it here.
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Feb 15, 2018 18:58
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Jealousy... Thy name is ropes4u
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Feb 15, 2018 21:25
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My kid and I drifted down the Rainbow River last year. The noteworthy bit was when I knew we must be close to our exit, KP Hole, and when I surfaced, I didn't recognize the surroundings. I was afraid we had gone past it while under water, which means the next place to get out was five miles down stream. I asked a passing kayaker where KP Hole was... He never heard of it. I was dragging us through the shallows to tresspass on private property and asked a couple more kayakers going by... Yes, KP Hole was just around the next bend. But we love Devil's Den, and Blue Grotto, across the street. We've stayed at the BG cabins.
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Feb 15, 2018 21:46
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GORDON posted:My kid and I drifted down the Rainbow River last year. The noteworthy bit was when I knew we must be close to our exit, KP Hole, and when I surfaced, I didn't recognize the surroundings. I was afraid we had gone past it while under water, which means the next place to get out was five miles down stream. I asked a passing kayaker where KP Hole was... He never heard of it. I was dragging us through the shallows to tresspass on private property and asked a couple more kayakers going by... Yes, KP Hole was just around the next bend. I was expecting a lot less from Blue Grotto I first heard that's where the OW check out dives were going to be done without doing any reseach. I was really pleasantly surprised by it, it's a wonderful site facilities wise.
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Feb 15, 2018 23:02
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The Electronaut posted:I was expecting a lot less from Blue Grotto I first heard that's where the OW check out dives were going to be done without doing any reseach. I was really pleasantly surprised by it, it's a wonderful site facilities wise. Yeah, last.year it was our first dive of the year, down from Ohio. The owner went above and beyond when we had some minor, but potentially vacation-killing, equipment issues. Sold us a new high pressure hose, installed it, and replaced it when it was defective, heh. But yeah, good people there.
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Feb 16, 2018 00:11
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Sticko posted:Does anyone have any camera/video recommendations? I looking for a simple point and click thing, as I don't really have time to learn anything too complex. I would assume some variety of GoPro is still the go-to, but is there anything else I should be looking at? I have an old Intova, but it is loving useless, had battery problems out of the box, and after a year of almost no use, it has started just giving blocked colour photos/video. If you think you might lean more toward stills than video, you may want to look into the Olympus TG-5. Very flexible, works for snorkeling, diving (with housing), topside, etc. https://www.backscatter.com/reviews/post/Olympus-TG-5-Underwater-Camera-and-Housing-Review I have been super impressed with pics my friends are posting from this camera. If you mainly want to shoot video though it’s hard to beat a GoPro!
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Feb 16, 2018 00:23
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Thanks all. I'll probably get the mask, fins and boots for now. Even the instructor mentioned that most people don't bother with the snorkel in practice but I might get one anyway if I decide to actually just go snorkeling. In the course we'll be using the BCD so I'll postpone so I'll stick with that and hopefully avoid the controversy for now. For photos, I have a Xiaomi Yi (a gopro clone) with underwater housing. I used it a few times when snorkeling and the results haven't been that great tbh. Apparently an extra light source is very helpful? Are housings for SLRs worth it? I have a Canon 550D I could use for this, though it's autofocusing isn't that great especially in for video.
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Feb 16, 2018 12:40
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DSLR housings are a hefty investment (Usually $1500+), and lugging a big camera rig around under water is a an entire set of skills in its own. At the hobbyist level the GoPro really is the go to solution. There are tons of accessories for turning the humble gopro into a capable underwater camera. At the bare minimum you want a filter mount with color filters and some kind of handle that lets you mount a light to it. There's a pretty good starter guide here: http://www.divephotoguide.com/underwater-photography-special-features/article/guide-gopro-underwater-accessories/. You also want some software to post-process your images for improved composition, white level correction, etc. GIMP is free and capable enough. Quick guide for color correcting images with GIMP. e: I should mention that the starter guide was written a few years ago. One of the main things is that backscatter now makes a two-filter mount called the FLIP6 which is great because it lets you have a color filter and a macro lens attached at the same time. Collateral Damage fucked around with this message at 13:26 on Feb 16, 2018 |
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Feb 16, 2018 13:15
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A snorkel isn't the first idea ever, though in reality it won't get a lot of use. If you go on specific dive vacations you'll typically find yourself without much to do on your last day before your flight, in which case I recommend a snorkel tour. Sounds lame to go snorkeling after a week of diving, but you'd be surprised.
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Feb 16, 2018 15:43
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I mean, you can't dive ALL day or you'll get bent, right? Snorkeling is great for filling in those gaps. On the last dive trip I went on with my family, me and my brother were snorkeling in the shallows near our hotel one afternoon and found a couple interesting squid (some variety of cuttlefish, I think?) and followed them around for like half an hour. It was one of the coolest things we saw on that trip.
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Feb 16, 2018 20:36
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DontMockMySmock posted:I mean, you can't dive ALL day or you'll get bent, right? Snorkeling is great for filling in those gaps. I saw a video once, I think they were Humboldt Squid... they worked as a group and tried to drown a diver. Broke his wrist with a tiny beak. So that's what I'd think of if I swam into a squid. edit - Here's a 3-minute show about it, with footage. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Fkl312lldQ GORDON fucked around with this message at 20:54 on Feb 16, 2018 |
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Feb 16, 2018 20:48
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I know there are people who dive all day everyday but that isn’t us. I used to think 3-4 dives a day was perfect. Buy we have settled into a routine where we usually dive twice a day then wash and clean gear, chow down, relax, sleep and then start over. Over the last few weeks we have dived 20 times. We were supposed to dive again today but I woke up with a headache like none other so I’m watching Netflix and eating cookies. This is the second time we have taken a day off. Tomorrow we are driving up to the national park and packing for the trip home to the cold. I have been debating if I’m old or if two dives a day is reasonable?
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Feb 16, 2018 21:08
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We did 4 a day on a liveaboard, and everyone seemed fairly done after the 3rd (we did one night dive where only 5/22 people got in). Granted that's on a boat and not shore diving, but I think 4 longer dives (40 minutes or more) is where people start running into issues with fatigue. That's a lot of swimming and diving burns a lot of calories to start with (especially if you're already chilled). I dive in an aquarium as a volunteer where the water gets a little chilly after sitting still-ish for 20-30 minutes, scrubbing fake coral and when I get home I feel pretty spent.
Icon Of Sin fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Feb 16, 2018 |
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Feb 16, 2018 21:37
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GORDON posted:I saw a video once, I think they were Humboldt Squid... they worked as a group and tried to drown a diver. Broke his wrist with a tiny beak. Well the squid dudes my brother and I found were like 4-6 inches long and hanging out in about four feet of water, so I don't think we were in any danger of wrist breakage 
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Feb 16, 2018 21:39
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These two might have given us a pass and taken a small child instead.. 
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Feb 16, 2018 21:54
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If I'm doing three dives a day I'm usually using all my available surface time to eat and sleep.
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Feb 16, 2018 23:42
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