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Since you're going to be in New Zealand anyway, how about diving the Poor Knights island and the Bay of Islands?

How about 5 stars if you're still alive after 2000 dives?

Thanks. Two people have suggested putting either your tongue or two fingers into the mouthpiece to stop a freeflow. I am interested to know how that works.

I'm 72 years old, the wife slightly younger. We didn't want to put our BCD/tank on while on shore because the swell was going to knock us over. We didn't want to walk backwards with fins on. We wanted to carry our kit past the breakers and put our kit on in the water.

All four are Aeris A1 regulators. Super simple design and easy to take apart and put together.

No external adjustments on the regs. I opened all four and found half a teaspoon of sand in three of them. This was AFTER I rinsed the regs in fresh water! From now on I will open them and clean them after each dive to make sure there is no collection of rubbish inside. There is only one...

I agree. Start them young. My son was 13 when he learned to dive. Started night diving with me at 14 years of age. Loves lobster diving and is now over 40 years old.

Thanks for the suggestion. One more bit of information... I tried breathing through my freeflowing regulator and it breathed ok. Whenever I stoped inhaling it continued to freeflow while the reg was in my mouth. After a few minutes started working ok. Lost about 75 bar of air in several...

Neither had ever done so before. We entered the water off a beach with a 2 foot swell breaking on the beach. Hauled the gear through the water past the breakers and both our primary regs started freeflowing. The secondaries were ok. Pressing purge putton on the wife's reg a few times stoped...

My son works for us and if I'm Keen to go diving we pay him his regular wage to accompany me. Poor kid!

Two things you can do to improve your SAC... 1). Dive a lot to get more comfortable/relaxed while underwater 2). Try to minimize your need for air by moving slowly and staying in trim. I have observed that people who are moving around constantly run out of air sooner than people moving...

Nitrox is not worth the effort or expense for me. This is a personal observation based on hundreds of dives over three years. The limitations on depth outweigh the advantages for me.

OK, not as many as last year and slowing down a bit. It must be the 72 year-old blues but next year will be better. My son has returned to New Zealand and loves diving for lobster/crayfish so will be out there a bit more than normal. :-)

Intriguing. I have a dry suit but my son (with kids who require a vast amount of dollars to keep clothed and fed) might be interested in a low cost option. Do you know if they make compressed neoprene ones?

We use an engine driven high pressure CAT pump to force water through a membrane to turn very salty ocean water into fresh water quite inexpensively. The resulting water is so pure you have add minerals or take supplements to prevent the pure water from leaching minerals from your body when...

I understand completely. It's funny considering different people's take on things. You don't dive solo on boat dives and I only dive solo on boat dives! If I am diving with my wife or son I don't take a pony bottle. If I'm on a boat dive without the son of wife I take the pony bottle and...

A lot of good comments and suggestions... But in the end one really good reason for redundant equipment is that many/most dive operators will not let you dive solo without the redundant equipment.

Try to contact Dive Tutukaka in Northland, New Zealand. They may be able to provide some information. The diving here is very seasonal and Dive Tutukaka hires foreigners during the summer season (December - April?). They are the largest operator around with 6 or 7 boats from small (6...

Diving in poo. Wanaka diver deep in poo wins fame, sympathy

Thanks for the suggestion runsongas. To get the USA pony bottle certified for use in New Zealand costs more than a new pony bottle. It's kind of funny because New Zealand does not allow lawsuits (for personal injury) whereas the USA is known for its litigious ways so I would think that tanks...