AOW=completed

[Sirelroka]

Thanks everybody, I was just so excited I had to spew my joy somewhere!

We're doing AOW soon. Did you find it fun or was it pretty laborous like the OW diving. I know you don't do the shared breating and mask floods and some of the more tedious things, but all in all was it fun or stressful?

Overall a great experience, with a few trouble spots for me. This was my first time in salt water and I had quite a bit of trouble with my buoyancy. This made the tasks we needed to do more difficult. So I didn't find the actual task difficult I just found doing them while fighting the buoyancy issues was. I think I'm going to look into the peak performacy buoyancy specialty (not everybody needs it, but I think I do). The other thing was I ended up chilling more than I expected and that made things slightly less enjoyable, but not unduly so. I also found the day we did four dives (wreck, navigation, night, and a bonus night dive) very taxing and was very tired when we got back to the dock. But I did have a super fantastic time!

 

[JodiBB]

So were there mask floods and those kind of skills? What type of skills do you learn in AOW that you don't in OW?

 

[BrianV]

Jodi I'm certain you don't do the mask flooding and reg retrieval. You do compass navigation, deep diving, hide and seek (search & recovery), and something else I'll have to check. Supposedly the not-fun things like mask clearing are not part of the AOW certification.

 

[Sirelroka]

So were there mask floods and those kind of skills? What type of skills do you learn in AOW that you don't in OW?

No mask flooding (my sensitive eyes rejoiced) or reg. recovery. The 5 dives we did were navigation, deep, wreck, peak performance buoyancy, and night, but other shops pick other dives. We did navigation practice on land and underwater and we also timed some kick cycles. On the deep dive we had to complete a task on the boat and then at depth (95 feet for us) to check for narcosis. On the wreck dive we had to report back with some points of interest and some possible hazzards. Lets see, what else...on the night dive we turned out our lights and watched some bioluminescent critters we stirred up. I didn't feel worried about any of the skills like I did in OW. It felt a lot like just doing those 5 dives for the first time with supervision. I don't know if other places are the same or if the place I went was just laid back (that was not necessarily a compliment). To be honest I was expecting more classroom work and testing, but it didn't happen. Anybody else? Similar experience? Differences?

 

[BrianV]

Thanks for the info. From what I understand there are three required courses, Deep, compass, and I think peak buoyancy; the other two are the shops picks.

 

[JodiBB]

Thanks for the information!! It helps a lot when I have to decide on my dives.

 

[Torcatdog]

Way to go!

My wife an I did our AOW Certification in the Bahamas aboard Blackbeard's Cruises. What a way to go! We were SDI certified Open Water, the PADI advanced certification required mandatory Deep and Navigation. There were 5 total specialties needed for the Advanced. We elected to do Boat (liveaboard), night, drift and fish ID (in addition to deep and navigation) due to the opportunities provided during that trip.

We thought that there might be more classroom testing, but both subscribe to the theory that you get as much out of something as you put into that something.

Hope that you enjoy the opportunities available to you with your new card!!

Happy/Safe Diving!
TCD

 

[jonix]

congrats to the new AOWs! now it's time to practice and enjoy yourselves!

dive safe guys!

 

[vkalia]

There isnt a huge mandatory formal classroom component to AOW. The AOW is an opportunity to accelerate your experience - you do 5 dives under different conditions, and hopefully get to improve/refine your key dive attributes - buoyancy, trim, weighting, air consumption, etc.

A lot of instructors add in additional things that are not part of the currciculum per se - for example, I do air consumption calculations, different kicking techniques, more in-depth decompression theory, proper awareness/dive planning/attitudes, etc.

But I try to minimize time spent in a formal classroom setting, however - preferring to do it in a more informal/interactive setting (on the boat before and after a dive, a half hour end of day debriefing over a beer, etc), with an emphasis on practical application ("what do you think we should do on this dive?", "what did you learn from this for next time" and that sort of stuff).

I see AOW as a chance to get the diver to really start thinking for himself/herself, and IMO, a classroom setting doesnt really encourage that.

So in short - the fact that there wasnt a lot of classroom/exam work in your AOW is neither unusual nor necessarily indicative of a "too laid back" approach. There are many approaches to teaching, and no single one is right for everyone.

Vandit

 

[jsmharley]

Congo-rats on the AOW!!! Can't wait for my g-friend and myself to take these. We hope our experience is as good as yours was....