1st Official OW Dive w/Daughter (pics attached)...

[Resqdivemedic]

Congrats on your first official dive. Sounds like you had a great time. My son was 14 when he got his cert, our first dive was memorable but in a bad way, some heavy surf built up after we entered and we took a beating crawling up the rocks which was the only way out. Our 2nd and 3rd dives were awesome, went on a cruise and dove in the Bahamas. Made up for the first one. He still reminds me of that first dive. Dive safe!

 

[1000RR]

... He still reminds me of that first dive. Dive safe!

Good to be able to laugh (sorta) about it now I guess. Our next dive is in another week and a half and will be a boat dive down off of West Palm Beach. 1st Boat Dive and this particular outfit is attune to me having a Jr. Diver and us both being newb's. They came recommended as it pertains to younger divers so we're really looking forward to it.

Next summer, we have reservations in Grand Cayman so that's going to be awesome for sure. We're still working on who to dive with out there, but by that time we'll have quite a bit more dives under our belt, so that'll be perfect. We'll do a couple shore dives down there too I'd imagine.

One thing I learned on this dive (original post, previous page) is that the Compass is smarter than I am. I was all jacked up (direction-wise) under the water. I seemed to be about 90* off and really thought my compass was off LOL. I knew I wanted to head East and then after a ways out, head North... I thought I was beginning to head North, but it still had me at East... of course this was during our effort to find rocks for weights... so there you go. I popped up (newb) to double check and sure enough, I was heading in the direction the compass said I was... LOL. So I'll be trying to pay more attention to that as well.

 

[KDAD]

I like the bin idea and I have a couple of those for our rinsing of gear, maybe I'll do that?

The bin is used for soaking and rinsing gear and then all of the gear goes right into the bin after everything has dried.

My early lesson was in wetsuit use - make sure the rear zip is up before gearing up otherwise it makes for a very sharp shock as 8C water hit my back!.

I did a dive last week in warm water so I was wearing a hooded vest lava core only. After the dive I was a bit chilled and something didn't feel right. I realized that I left the hood down the whole dive.

In my defense the dm had us suit up while still at the dock so I didn't want to overheat and left the hood down. In the rush to gear up at splash time I forgot all about it.

 

[Steve_C]

Mental lists are mental lists. I have those but most importantly I have a list of scuba gear in my iphone. There are two things I do on every dive. Check that list before leaving home. Take a deep breath off my reg while looking at the guage before stepping off the boat.

 

[1000RR]

Mental lists are mental lists. I have those but most importantly I have a list of scuba gear in my iphone. There are two things I do on every dive. Check that list before leaving home. Take a deep breath off my reg while looking at the guage before stepping off the boat.

^^^^ This! ^^^^^

I like that Steve! I will put a list in my phone for sure!

 

[iamrushman]

thanks for sharing your report.....glad everything worked out....

 

[Doctorfish]

I'm a little uneasy with this story. If you were both near neutral at start of the dive, you would have been much more buoyant at the end. Drop a rock by accident and you have potential for an uncontrolled ascent. Also, first open water dive and camera is a bad combo. My advise would be to develop diving skills for a while and then start taking pictures.

 

[1000RR]

I'm a little uneasy with this story. If you were both near neutral at start of the dive, you would have been much more buoyant at the end. Drop a rock by accident and you have potential for an uncontrolled ascent.

I was of the same opinion going in so we made sure we had enough weight to do the job. Keep in mind I was really needing about 6lbs and her 8lbs. I was in charge of rock searching. She actually dropped her rock towards the end... just turned and went and got it. Avg depth on dive was 10-12', max depth was 20-22'. neither of us were human bobbers or we woulda fingered out a plan c.

I was of the same concern originally though. Given then circumstances and shallow dive I felt ok about it. Neither of us were human bobbers.

 

[DanielRJones]

Must be nice with only 6-8lb
I dive with 23 and the wife with 15

 

[1000RR]

Must be nice with only 6-8lb
I dive with 23 and the wife with 15

Is that with a wetsuit? We were just in rash guards and shorts.