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Alright cool. We don't use a pool/tub just practice in the ocean so I'll head out snorkeling right now and try that until I get over it. Thanks.
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# ? Jul 22, 2013 20:02 |
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# ? Mar 28, 2024 12:38 |
One slight thing I do is that flooding my mask entirely, to get rid of fog, used to scare the crap out of me. I wouldn't breathe out my nose, but I would get a little panicky. I then realized that you can let in the tinest amount of water you can, and it'll still be enough to defog the lenses. If they're fogging up a whole bunch, don't even clear the mask, just keep a little bit in and swish your head around every so often, if you have to.
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# ? Jul 22, 2013 20:30 |
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SgtScruffy posted:One slight thing I do is that flooding my mask entirely, to get rid of fog, used to scare the crap out of me. I wouldn't breathe out my nose, but I would get a little panicky. I then realized that you can let in the tinest amount of water you can, and it'll still be enough to defog the lenses. If they're fogging up a whole bunch, don't even clear the mask, just keep a little bit in and swish your head around every so often, if you have to. Yeah, you don't need to flood the mask to clean the fog out. Just break the seal a bit and then look down and let it swish across the lens, then blow the water out. Also in regards to the flooding the mask. Focus on your breathing the first few times and make the mask your secondary concern. If you're not focused on the mask as your primary task, it may help you with the skill. Be glad you're not doing cavern training where you have to take your mask off, close your eyes and find your way out of the cavern using the guide lines alone. I hit my head a couple times.
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# ? Jul 22, 2013 21:55 |
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So got three dives in with the fiancé in a lake yesterday. We dropped to 65 feet, which was the first time she had been below 20 feet, and her first real non-training dive. All went well, but she said she felt a little loopy when she went under. She's obviously never felt narcosis before, so she wasn't sure if that was it. The lake is at 3,500 feet, so adjusted for altitude it was equivalent to an 80 foot dive at sea level. I've been to the bottom at 85 feet (100) several times, and never felt anything. We were also pretty dehydrated yesterday, so that may have had something to do with it. Anyone have any input?
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# ? Jul 22, 2013 22:31 |
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I talked about this a few weeks ago, but I actually had to deploy my backup mask for the first time ever because my primary lost a lense. Really wasn't a big deal. I got my backup out of a hip pocket by feel, but the other option people always forget about is that if you really have to, you can open your eyes in salt water and see. It's going to sting a bit but if you feel that you need to it's a better option than panicking. Also seconding the advice to worry about your breathing and buoyancy first even if you encounter a mask issue. A complete mask failure is really rare, usually it's just an annoying leak because some hair got stuck in the seal or whatever. It's far more important to maintain decent buoyancy awareness than getting your mask fixed. Don't let tunnel vision take over and before you know it you've risen 40 feet while messing with your mask.Akula Raskolnikova posted:So got three dives in with the fiancé in a lake yesterday. We dropped to 65 feet, which was the first time she had been below 20 feet, and her first real non-training dive. All went well, but she said she felt a little loopy when she went under. She's obviously never felt narcosis before, so she wasn't sure if that was it. The lake is at 3,500 feet, so adjusted for altitude it was equivalent to an 80 foot dive at sea level. I've been to the bottom at 85 feet (100) several times, and never felt anything. We were also pretty dehydrated yesterday, so that may have had something to do with it. Anyone have any input? Bishop fucked around with this message at 23:51 on Jul 22, 2013 |
# ? Jul 22, 2013 23:26 |
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Just got back from snorkeling, I got breathing without the mask down its just when I open my eyes I start to get a little panicky and inhale some water through my nose. It seems when I turn on my eyes I take everything in and forget/stop focusing on breathing and thats when the problems start. It takes a few moments of me choking and remembering how to breathe to calm down and then everythings fine. I can clear my mask and keep on swimming. I think I just need to keep practicing and I'll get it.
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 00:29 |
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That's about all you can do really. Make a checklist of things you need to do or remember. Go through the checklist. When I was training it helped to hold the regulator with your hand, as a subtle reminder that it's there and you'll be fine.
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 01:06 |
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Yeah: I have a friend who dives with me every couple years and for a while each time he did, he simply could not get past the breathing through a regulator part and had to spend some time in a pool just practicing and letting his subconscious adjust to the concept. That seems to have passed now but even before he was a pretty drat competent diver after he got over that hump.
Bishop fucked around with this message at 08:01 on Jul 23, 2013 |
# ? Jul 23, 2013 07:39 |
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Turns out I was just sick, guys. Sinuses cleared up just in time for class last evening. Anyway, one more class session and then I just have to pony up for my open water dives! I'm hoping to do that next month/paycheck. I also hadn't ever really done anything with a snorkel before yesterday, aside from paddling around a pool for a bit, and I liked even that. I'm really, really hoping this rumored winter trip to Belize happens, or at least somewhere warm where I can try real world scuba/snorkeling/both. I'm definitely not going to go crazy buying gear, especially not before I get my certification and actually go real diving, but I am curious about necessity and general recommendation. On the one hand, my instructors suggest building up a full array of dive stuff once I'm, well, into the sport enough to drop thousands of dollars on it. One of my instructors told me his octopus was the first thing he bought. My friend, on the other hand, doesn't think it's worth purchasing a tank, BCD or octopus. Is it only a matter of opinion whether someone personally owns every piece of gear? More specifically, apparently I don't swim so well normally in terms of actually using my legs to kick, so my instructor advised me to get "the best fins I can". I've been looking at split fins a little, but am pretty lost considering the stuff on Leisure Pro ranges from twenty bucks to over a hundred. Does anyone have any fin experiences they wouldn't mind sharing?
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 14:59 |
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morcant posted:Turns out I was just sick, guys. Sinuses cleared up just in time for class last evening. Why you'd buy an octo first is beyond me. If I had to rank the importance of items to buy, this is how i'd rank them. 1. Mask/Snorkel/Fins 2.Thermal Protection (if you're a tropical vacation diver only, disregard. Some of us dive lovely cold water and being cold loving sucks and is a safety issue, so i rank thermal protection highly) 3. Regulators - Packs well/light for vacations and you are sure it has been maintained properly. 4. BCD- (If you're a vacation diver swap 4-5). 5. Computer- Yes i know computers are becoming standard dive gear, but you can dive tables just fine too so i put this lower priority than other stuff. 6. Tank- Really only own a tank if you are a frequent local diver. What kind of diver do you think you'll be? Frequent local diver or sparse vacation diver? That will also determine what gear and when to get it. If you're only doing a few days diving a few times a year renting is cost effective. If you plan to dive once-twice a month, rental fees will add up QUICK and you'll want your own gear.
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 18:36 |
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Crunkjuice posted:Why you'd buy an octo first is beyond me. If I had to rank the importance of items to buy, this is how i'd rank them. Ask your instructor about fixing your kicking technique, don't just throw money at the problem. The thing about tanks though, an AL80 is like one of the cheapest things on your list. Always nice to have air on hand in case you want to head out and can't get a rental.
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 20:08 |
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morcant posted:One of my instructors told me his octopus was the first thing he bought. My friend, on the other hand, doesn't think it's worth purchasing a tank, BCD or octopus. Just to be a grammar nazi, I believe you mean regulator. The octo is a backup second stage reg that is part of your overall regulator setup (1st stage/2nd stage/octo/pressure gauge).
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 21:01 |
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Crunkjuice posted:What kind of diver do you think you'll be? Frequent local diver or sparse vacation diver? That will also determine what gear and when to get it. If you're only doing a few days diving a few times a year renting is cost effective. If you plan to dive once-twice a month, rental fees will add up QUICK and you'll want your own gear. It more depends on whether I have anyone to dive with. The only friend I'm aware of that is certified refuses to dive in quarries/lakes/anywhere not tropical, so I don't know how often I'll end up going after getting my certification. Still, I was definitely intending to start with the mask/snorkel/fins because they seem reasonably inexpensive and useful outside diving besides. I do have my eye on thermal protection as well - even in class, in an indoor pool of about 70F I'm shivering by the end of class, but I am also possibly a big baby. Cru Jones posted:Ask your instructor about fixing your kicking technique, don't just throw money at the problem. That's a good point. I also have access to the other pools at this gym, so I could practice on my own time as well. Before this class, it'd actually been multiple years since I'd been in a body of water bigger than a hot tub. And I pretty quickly found the AL80 on Google, and have bookmarked that. Does $270 sound about right? They also seem to come in pretty rad colors, which I guess I should have picked up on, being that my tank in class has either been pink or lime green. Mr.AARP posted:Just to be a grammar nazi, I believe you mean regulator. The octo is a backup second stage reg that is part of your overall regulator setup (1st stage/2nd stage/octo/pressure gauge). No, being a grammar nazi is good - I still have a quiz to pass tomorrow at class and not misusing basic terms would probably be helpful.
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 22:21 |
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morcant posted:And I pretty quickly found the AL80 on Google, and have bookmarked that. Does $270 sound about right? They also seem to come in pretty rad colors, which I guess I should have picked up on, being that my tank in class has either been pink or lime green. Jesus no. http://www.scubatoys.com/store/detail.asp?PRODUCT_ID=AL80 . The candy colored (neon ones) run about 20 bucks more and its free ground shipping over 100 bucks with an extra handling charge for the weight. I think leisure pro has catalina al80s for like 162 shipped. As for thermal protection, 70 is loving cold for no wetsuit. Our pool is 82 and we put our students in 3mm shorties because even THAT gets cold after a while. I might even personally wear a full 3mm, just because i'm seriously lovely with dealing with cold water. Crunkjuice fucked around with this message at 22:45 on Jul 23, 2013 |
# ? Jul 23, 2013 22:32 |
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Any recommendations on dive shops in the LA area? We are up north of the city so an hour drive each way just to check out a shop on the coast is something I want to minimize. Getting pretty annoyed with sport chalet, hope not to go back after finishing the AOW class next weekend.
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 23:02 |
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I like these guys: http://www.yelp.com/biz/eco-dive-center-culver-city
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# ? Jul 23, 2013 23:57 |
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morcant posted:And I pretty quickly found the AL80 on Google, and have bookmarked that. Does $270 sound about right? They also seem to come in pretty rad colors, which I guess I should have picked up on, being that my tank in class has either been pink or lime green. As far as fins go, don't spend too much money if you are wavering on how much diving you plan to do. Based off of what you said, as long as you are comfortable with them and they aren't going to fall apart on you within 10 dives, almost anything should work. If you plan on doing fun ocean dives don't over-think fins too much as long as they work. Bishop fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Jul 24, 2013 |
# ? Jul 24, 2013 01:24 |
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The Vikings posted:Any recommendations on dive shops in the LA area? We are up north of the city so an hour drive each way just to check out a shop on the coast is something I want to minimize. Getting pretty annoyed with sport chalet, hope not to go back after finishing the AOW class next weekend. I think the instruction at Hollywood Divers is absolutely excellent. Both the owner (Hal), and my instructor (Nikki) are genuinely helpful to new divers and very friendly. Everyone else I've met there has been very cool as well. Classes are usually small with 4 students max to an instructor for OW and less than that for AOW. A fair number of instructors and dm's out of that shop are seriously into the dir/gue thing, but they don't let it filter down to ow/aow unless a student asks for / about it. They certainly would like to sell you a full Halcyon bp/w setup, but that doesn't mean you need to buy one. It does mean you get to rent a very nice bp/w for only a little more than renting a normal bcd. What part of town are you in and are you looking for a dive buddy? I'm hoping to go out diving at sometime in August.
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# ? Jul 24, 2013 01:40 |
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So dove with a Steel 100 recently and man there is a huge difference, felt like the drat thing was trying to make me do rolls all dive. Also was overweighted on the first dive so my ears discovered what it was like to go from surface to 15 feet in seconds, good thing I pressurize my ears on the surface. I realized after the fact that I had forgot to do a proper weight check after removing what I thought was the correct amount of lead. I think I may just stick with AL for now especially for buying my first tanks.
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# ? Jul 24, 2013 06:09 |
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Gindack posted:So dove with a Steel 100 recently and man there is a huge difference, felt like the drat thing was trying to make me do rolls all dive. Also was overweighted on the first dive so my ears discovered what it was like to go from surface to 15 feet in seconds, good thing I pressurize my ears on the surface. I realized after the fact that I had forgot to do a proper weight check after removing what I thought was the correct amount of lead. What temperature is the water you dive? Generally steel is awesome for colder water while aluminum is just fine for tropical waters.
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# ? Jul 24, 2013 10:23 |
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Mr.AARP posted:What temperature is the water you dive? Generally steel is awesome for colder water while aluminum is just fine for tropical waters. Around 74 degrees and 68 around 30 feet didn't go lower than that since I was in a shorty, but the main reason I wanted to try it because I can cut down on the lead I gotta haul around.
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# ? Jul 24, 2013 11:25 |
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Crunkjuice posted:Jesus no. http://www.scubatoys.com/store/detail.asp?PRODUCT_ID=AL80 . The candy colored (neon ones) run about 20 bucks more and its free ground shipping over 100 bucks with an extra handling charge for the weight. I think leisure pro has catalina al80s for like 162 shipped. Bishop posted:Oh goodness no... an AL80 should run you around $150 in my experience. Maybe a bit more with online shipping. Well hell. Good to know. Granted, a tank is pretty low on my list after mask, snorkel, fins and wetsuit. Which themselves might be even further off if various nerd conventions I'm attending next month bankrupt me. Thanks for the link, though - I've bookmarked it for when I do have the funds for all this. I'm not sure on the actual temp of the pool we've been using - I just know that after 20 minutes, if I'm not completely submerged, I feel pretty chilly. And this one other guy, super skinny, shivers a whole lot. It's better for me at least since I started eating before class, and anyway we only have one more day in that pool, if that. Tonight's the last night and I honestly can't remember if there's anything we'll need to get into the water for.
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# ? Jul 24, 2013 15:43 |
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With the tank, remember that unlike all the other gear, you need to go to a shop to get the tank refilled every time, so if you're going to end up having to go to a shop to get a tank filled, it might actually be better to just rent one each time. This is all dependent on how often you go of course. I wouldn't mind having a neon green one I could paint with random poo poo though.
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# ? Jul 24, 2013 18:13 |
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Had an awesome hour-long night dive at Veteran's Park in Redondo last night. Felt nice to be back under the water after 3 weeks backpacking around Europe. Saw more baby octopi than I could count along with the biggest sheep crab I've ever seen, a spanish shawl nudibranch, and a couple of salps. Max depth 65 feet with the water dipping to a chilly 55F down there.
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# ? Jul 25, 2013 04:15 |
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I checked out the local Scubapro and Hollis dealers to try on the jet fins and F1s. The F1s fit better but they don't bring in the ones with the yellow tips and "you'll have to wait months for an order to arrive", so I ended up buying a pair online. Hopefully they'll get here before my weekend LOB trip next week.
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# ? Jul 25, 2013 13:40 |
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So I'm starting to look into picking up a computer, I dive with a group that is pretty aggressive and I'd like to be able to keep up. The Scubapro board doesn't really have a well organized list (that I can find), am I correct in assuming that anything from the top name brands will work just fine? If anyone has any specific suggestions, I'm looking for a standard wrist computer that can do Nitrox if I ever decide to go through the training, don't really care about the crazy bells and whistles that the high end ones offer.
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# ? Jul 25, 2013 17:58 |
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How long does it take for your body to get used to the pressure? The deepest I can tolerate is like 6 feet and I've never felt any progress.
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# ? Jul 25, 2013 18:10 |
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Repaired a leak in a drysuit with a bike patch. Going to test it tomorrow on my dive to complete BSAC sport diver
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# ? Jul 25, 2013 18:15 |
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Transcendent Man posted:How long does it take for your body to get used to the pressure? The deepest I can tolerate is like 6 feet and I've never felt any progress. Everyone is different. Some people take 10 minutes to descend to 30 feet while others can drop like a stone (relatively) and get there quickly.
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# ? Jul 25, 2013 18:41 |
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Back from another Cozumel trip; Already booked again for September. Love diving with Aldora. Steel 120s and Steel 100s are great for Caribbean diving. With 32% and 36% our average dives were between 70 and 80 minutes. My longest dive on the trip was 101 minutes. :-) My Hollis DG03 was not very happy, hit some deco on just about every dive. My Oceanic backup computer is pretty aggressive but never actually hit deco. Also got to snorkel with whale sharks & manta rays. I've been wanting to do that the last 10 years but finally had a day free to do it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=up-0lZTlgw4 Diving Brenton Reef Lightship LV 39 on Saturday. Not quite the 83f that Cozumel was but it should be fun if conditions are good. http://www.northernatlanticdive.com/shipwrecks/brenton_reef/brenton_reef_39.htm macado fucked around with this message at 20:25 on Jul 25, 2013 |
# ? Jul 25, 2013 20:14 |
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So labyrinthitis is an uncommon thing then, right?
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# ? Jul 26, 2013 05:19 |
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Anyone have first hand experience diving in the Dominican Republic? We went to Cozumel last year and we want to try a new place. Obviously we're not expecting Cozumel levels of enjoyment but I hope there is more than sand and the occasional wreck. We're probably going to stay in Punta Cana.
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# ? Jul 26, 2013 21:00 |
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Kaddish posted:Anyone have first hand experience diving in the Dominican Republic? We went to Cozumel last year and we want to try a new place. Obviously we're not expecting Cozumel levels of enjoyment but I hope there is more than sand and the occasional wreck. I personally do not, but a coworker is heading there next week. I'll give ya a trip report via him. After loving my middle ears up 2 weeks ago I'm finally better. A check up tomorrow with a ANT doctor and I should be good. Yep, I'm the idiot that pushed too hard in a lake at 10 foot of water and gave himself middle ear barotrauma....I haven't dove in years and was a bit "cocky" I guess. If it doesn't feel right then its not, don't press things..
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# ? Jul 29, 2013 04:05 |
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I had a beautiful 25 minute mud dive at 170fsw on Saturday. We shot lined the wreck and I guess we ended up being about 100ft away from actual wreck. 3 divers found it but it took them 15 minutes. The rest of us spend entire planned bottom time searching for it. Tied off to shot line and did a search for it but we had to have missed it by like 20-25ft. It was slightly disappointing but still a successful trimix dive. Runtime: 72 minutes. Water temperature: 47f Visiblity: 10-15ft.
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# ? Jul 29, 2013 16:14 |
Hey guys, I've got a question about decompression sickness. My husband and I have done four dives each before, although we've never been certified, they were just the "intro dive" type things on the Great Barrier Reef. We're thinking of doing some again on our trip to Hawaii, but because of scheduling we'd like to do it at a time that would leave us basically exactly 18 hours before our inter-island flight. Is it safe to assume that after two basic beginner dives, waiting 18 hours, then taking a one-hour flight to the Big Island our odds of decompression sickness are pretty low, or should we do the dive the day before and wait 36 hours just to be safe? Thanks for the answers, I don't know much about decompression sickness at all.
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# ? Jul 30, 2013 20:12 |
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HookShot posted:Hey guys, I've got a question about decompression sickness. You'll be fine. The PADI guidelines are 18 hours for repetitive dives.
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# ? Jul 30, 2013 20:18 |
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ignore
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# ? Jul 30, 2013 20:18 |
Luceo posted:You'll be fine. The PADI guidelines are 18 hours for repetitive dives. Ok awesome, thanks!!
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# ? Jul 30, 2013 20:20 |
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Kaddish posted:Anyone have first hand experience diving in the Dominican Republic? We went to Cozumel last year and we want to try a new place. Obviously we're not expecting Cozumel levels of enjoyment but I hope there is more than sand and the occasional wreck. They said there's not very great diving on that side of the island. Instead we took an hour-long bus ride across the island to the Caribbean side, then a half-hour or so boat ride to a wall reef. It went down at least 60 feet before leveling off, and probably went deeper, though we had lots of newbies in the group and they didn't want to push it. There was another feature a half-hour boat ride away called the pool that had shallower diving with fewer reef features, but a decent concentration of fish. All in all it was definitely some decent diving. Nothing mindblowing by Caribbean standards, but that's still a great trip. The only downside is all the transit time, meaning you can only fit a few dives in a day before you have to pack up and get back. I took some pictures with my parents' underwater camera, I'll see if I can get a hold of them.
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# ? Jul 31, 2013 00:00 |
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# ? Mar 28, 2024 12:38 |
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DarkHorse posted:I was in Punta Cana this year and took the lazy route of booking a trip through on-resort scuba shop since diving wasn't the focus of the trip. Cool, thanks for the info. This is in-line with the research I've done as well. We'll have to decide if this is a decent trade-off for visiting a new island. DR is attractive because it's still pretty cheap. We were thinking about Bonaire but it's too expensive for what we want. We might just end up going back to Cozumel since the diving was so fantastic.
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# ? Jul 31, 2013 15:37 |