65+ Grumpy Old Divers (or NOT Grumpy)

[Jonesy65]

You are kidding me? Just turned 65 in April. Completed certification in Bonaire in May. This is an absolute blast!! I'm on dive 25 and freaking loving it. Just bought my "kit" and love to be under water. Now looking for female divers in Rochester, NY area to join in the fun. God bless all us old farts still getting after it!

 

[JamesBon92007]

I will be 72 in a couple months. Lived 55 years in Las Vegas (diving there sucks) but just moved to FL to dive more...Went on trip three weeks ago and had great time on Exuma Bank. Dive master asked me at end of week if I would join crew for a trip two weeks later to explore for new sites...twist my arm there!!! Did another 8 days of dives, just DM and me, and today I went looking for a new BC to replace my 25 year old Zeagle....I am going to dive till I die, now all I need is more old guys to go diving with......

Well now, I just posted a thread about Exuma a little while ago. Did you see the pigs?

 

[drbill]

I am 71and have been diving now for 56 years. I am not grumpy as long as I am in the water!

 

[cudachaser]

68 and going strong. Diving since 1964.

 

[captain]

74, started diving at age 13, self taught and solo.

 

[John Bantin]

Stan Waterman stopped diving at 92. I believe his last trip was to dive with white sharks at Guadalupe. I dived with him on one of his 85th birthdays at Cocos. (You read that right). He said - "When you get to my age - liveaboard." I enjoyed watching younger divers giving him advice. At 71 myself now, I've learned to respond with a jolly "Good for You!" just as he did. You can learn a lot from older people. A few months later he was ar Rangiroa, where he had another 85th birthday. It seems at that age you can have as many birthdays as you like.

 

[pelan-pelan]

Don't know what I'm doing here. Never quite sure how old I am. The other half would say something about feeling a little old. (It's Brit-humour if you don't get it, like feeling a little Grumpy.)
Diving is good for you in all ways. And exercise is now deemed the new medication for ageing. I can still read the papers in good daylight! Seriously, diving brought me back from a bad place - I had pneumonia and couldn't walk more than a few yards and left with habitual cough. There's nothing like travelling, breathing properly, neutral buoyancy and a load of fish and critters to get you back on track.
And no-one on a dive boat has commented on my age - yet . . . when the day comes, read about it in the Accidents Thread under the heading of Horrendous Maiming (victim left alive but unrecognisable).

 

[W W Meixner]

Wow, 50-years-old seems like a kid to me now. I just turned 65 and I'm wondering how many of us there are. Actually, I'm not all that grumpy except when they tell me I have to use all that newfangled stuff like SPGs, BCs, and depth gauges etc. One dive op even told me I had to have an octopus on my regulator. So far nobody told me I have to have a computer

In the past year (2017) I dove Cozumel, Isla Mujeres, Puerto Vallarta (two trips), and Catalina Island (California). My girlfriend just got certified in PV at the age of 66. I've been certified since 1969 and have been diving fairly steadily all this time. Before they let me become certified I did a lot of free-diving and spearfishing. We are planning on Hawai'i soon and of course will visit Cozumel at least once this year. Lots of other places sound great and we expect to visit Bonaire, US Virgin Islands, and probably Belize sometime in the near future. We'll probably try some lake diving in Minnesota this summer. And at our age we'd better not wait too long!

JB...

Waddaya mean...there's no room for my walker on this fri**in dive boat...

70 in May...the numbers are down a tad...only because I don't stop and dive every deep pot-hole in the road any more...

The HP steel doubles have given way to rebreathers...

Back in the ''young'' days...dives 100' + were the exception and have now become the norm...and bottom times are longer than they ever were...

Requiring much more exercise these days to make up for muscle/bone mass loss...only skinny chicken bones to begin with...can't afford to lose any more...

The biggest problem up here in Canada at 70 is the long winter down time...warm climate winter vacations are only a tease...

''YOU DON'T STOP PLAYING BECAUSE YOU GET OLD...YOU GET OLD BECAUSE YOU STOP PLAYING...

Seasons Greetings to Everyone...

Warren

 

[timetraveler]

Hi kids! I'm 74. My most recent dive was a shore dive this morning in Bonaire. My first certification was from the Florida State Seminole Divers in 1964. I don't know how many dives I've done because there was no such thing as a log book when I started diving.

 

[JamesBon92007]

Hi kids! I'm 74. My most recent dive was a shore dive this morning in Bonaire. My first certification was from the Florida State Seminole Divers in 1964. I don't know how many dives I've done because there was no such thing as a log book when I started diving.

I just did a guestimate when I got to ScubaBoard. I'd never heard of counting dives any more than I'd heard of counting trips to the grocery store or the gas station.

I read your post about the cruise ship not letting you dive and I think we should all go down there and shake our sticks at them!