peengers
Registered
Today my dive buddy, his son, and I headed to do a 1:00 drift dive set with Jim Abernethy's Scuba Adventures.
Dive 1:
Water temp was 74 degrees, I dove with a thermal skin and a 5 mil farmer john. My buddy's son hadn't dove salt before so we had a mild shenanigans while we figured out his weights and we had to be re-dropped on the reef with some other stragglers because we were told to get out of the water while we fixed his weight system. Among those that needed to be re-dropped was what I am assuming to be a dive master and one of his students or buddies. We followed him and got a bottom time of about 19 minutes. Not bad considering all of the dicking around that we had to do on the surface with weights. Vis was about 50 feet, there was a little murk to the water but it was a good first salt experience for my friend's son, with some decent lessons about checking and rechecking your gear.
Dive 2:
This was much better. Bottom time was about 35 minutes, we surfaced about 2 minutes early because of some newbie air panting. Vis started at 50, reduced to about 30. We saw lots of moray, a sea turtle, and a pair of dolphins visited overhead during our deco stop. It was a good dive.
Okay, and now for a few comments about Abernethy's operation. Just because your boat can hold 48 scuba tanks doesn't mean that you can comfortably hold 24 divers, and we damn near had 24. The divemasters really weren't doing much of a job divemastering - this isn't really a suprise to me because during the last abernethy trip I took they were too busy lobstering to do their jobs. Apart from the dives, the overall experience was really unprofessional and my group pretty much agrees that this will be the last abernethy trip we take.
I would also like to shout out to all of the divers that I saw on the boat today. I'm not sure what it is about west palm or this operation in particular that attracts asses but I would like to thank the 350 pound 5' tall girl that was apparently too self-absorbed and important to move out of the way when asked. I was only exiting the water and trying to get myself and gear firmly set down and your pendulous mass was blocking my empty tank spot. Thank you Mr. Photographer guy that felt obliged to crawl over me while I was taking my fins off and getting ready to hand them to the the person assisting people getting out. And finally, thanks to all of the people that felt like common courtesy didn't apply to them and were just standing around chatting like it's a dinner party and getting in the way while divers are entering and exiting the boat. What the hell, guys. Maybe west palm is too close to miami.
Anyway, here's a picture to entertain you if you didn't find this dive report useful.
Dive 1:
Water temp was 74 degrees, I dove with a thermal skin and a 5 mil farmer john. My buddy's son hadn't dove salt before so we had a mild shenanigans while we figured out his weights and we had to be re-dropped on the reef with some other stragglers because we were told to get out of the water while we fixed his weight system. Among those that needed to be re-dropped was what I am assuming to be a dive master and one of his students or buddies. We followed him and got a bottom time of about 19 minutes. Not bad considering all of the dicking around that we had to do on the surface with weights. Vis was about 50 feet, there was a little murk to the water but it was a good first salt experience for my friend's son, with some decent lessons about checking and rechecking your gear.
Dive 2:
This was much better. Bottom time was about 35 minutes, we surfaced about 2 minutes early because of some newbie air panting. Vis started at 50, reduced to about 30. We saw lots of moray, a sea turtle, and a pair of dolphins visited overhead during our deco stop. It was a good dive.
Okay, and now for a few comments about Abernethy's operation. Just because your boat can hold 48 scuba tanks doesn't mean that you can comfortably hold 24 divers, and we damn near had 24. The divemasters really weren't doing much of a job divemastering - this isn't really a suprise to me because during the last abernethy trip I took they were too busy lobstering to do their jobs. Apart from the dives, the overall experience was really unprofessional and my group pretty much agrees that this will be the last abernethy trip we take.
I would also like to shout out to all of the divers that I saw on the boat today. I'm not sure what it is about west palm or this operation in particular that attracts asses but I would like to thank the 350 pound 5' tall girl that was apparently too self-absorbed and important to move out of the way when asked. I was only exiting the water and trying to get myself and gear firmly set down and your pendulous mass was blocking my empty tank spot. Thank you Mr. Photographer guy that felt obliged to crawl over me while I was taking my fins off and getting ready to hand them to the the person assisting people getting out. And finally, thanks to all of the people that felt like common courtesy didn't apply to them and were just standing around chatting like it's a dinner party and getting in the way while divers are entering and exiting the boat. What the hell, guys. Maybe west palm is too close to miami.
Anyway, here's a picture to entertain you if you didn't find this dive report useful.
