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1/31/2016 53° at 113 feet Extremely clear for Lake Pleasant.

Phoenix, AZ here. Right in the middle of the desert. I have one dive spot near my place. It is a lake with about 15 feet of visibility. There isn't much as far as life to look at in the lake, but it's still pretty cool. The lake was made by a dam on a river, so many of the trees that were in...

I do it every weekend now. I don't have any issue with being cold, even on subsequent dives. Although, the air temperature is 45 C (113 F), so it's pretty easy to warm up between dives.

So if I do only one of my checkout dives for AOW, I'm an Adventure Diver? Wouldn't that mean I have to sign up for an AOW course to be able to get Adventure Diver? So with PADI, I can't do the Deep Diver cert with just an Open Water.

PADI has them listed as two separate things on their certification flow chart.

OK... All this discussion has me really confused. I was thinking of getting my AOW to get experience in doing deeper dives. Given the attitude toward the AOW in this thread, I figured I'd look up the Deep Diver Specialty, instead of the AOW. PADI's website says that an "Adventure Diver rating"...

Maybe you should talk with the local dive shop here in Phoenix that does the Public Safety Diving courses. They would probably know more about local opportunities for becoming a public safety diver. The Academy of Scuba does PADI Public Safety Courses.

I'm kind of surprised nobody has posted PADI's course outline. This is their path of certifications for recreational diving. Once you have your "Open Water Diver" you are certified. Everything after that is additional certification that allows for different types of diving and different depths.

Texanguy, since you are not certified yet, I would wait until after certification to make a decision. My certification classes didn't even go over using the tables, so a watch would be nearly useless to me. I was able to pick up two dive computers after my certification fairly cheap. The first...

As someone who hasn't done a dive outside the US, I am curious. What benefit does having both do for someone who learned the imperial system? It's not like anyone else is using your SPG, and if you know the imperial system better than the metric system, shouldn't that be enough? I am just having...

I use the diviac.com website. You can get to that site from the SB Logbook at the top of the page, but be warned, it will add the ScubaBoard logo and ads to the site. It's primary purpose is a dive log website, and it works very well for that. It also allows you to add gear, set recurring...

Why don't you ask the dive shop that will be doing the service how much the regulator kit costs each year for the regulators you are looking at?

Buoyancy issues might not actually be issues with your weight, but rather issues with your training (which you didn't do much of). When properly weighted, you may still slightly float near the surface. As you go down, it will be easier to stay down. You can go down by exhaling, or by swimming...

Did you have a hard time with the primary too? Sounds more like an equipment problem then a technique problem. As long as you keep your mouth closed around the mouthpiece, you shouldn't have any issue with getting water in the regulator or clearing it with the purge button.

I'm a fairly new diver myself, but from what I've read, this sounds like a pretty common occurrence for a panicked diver. It also sounds to me like you were over weighted. Even if your BCD completely fails, you shouldn't have so much weight that it becomes difficult to swim upwards. This is...

Is there some reason you can't just push the purge button on the regulator instead of blowing harder to clear it? I know a few people in my class preferred that.

See if there is a dive club near you, or on Facebook for your area. The one near me always has someone looking for a buddy for local and semi-local trips.

I know it's not quite what you mean, but how about "there's no crying before diving". Last weekend, my girlfriend got stung by a bee for the first time in her life. She wasn't expecting the bee sting to hurt as much as it did, and it caused her to tear up. It was only a few minutes before our...

Do your bottles of alcohol or vinegar have a "use by" date? I would guess there isn't much chance for bacteria to grow in that mix.

I would try to get out to the lakes, even if the visibility is low. The freshwater fish can be really cool, and who knows what you might find down there! I try to dive at the local lake as often as possible, even though the best visibility we've had was about 10-15 feet. As for the kids, teach...