Best Place For First Dive

[herman]

Your welcome Joe.
Things like buoyancy, trim and just plain confidence can only be improved by diving. If you add too much at one time, its a sure recipe for disaster. Any time you add a new varible to the dive, it gets more complicated but if the core skills are basically automatic then you can consentrate on the new ones. The best example that I can think of it driving a car. Remember when you first started to drive and how difficult it was to get everything right? How on earth can anyone steer, shift gears, watchout for the other drivers, eat and talk at the same time? Bet you can now, diving is a lot like that. I was diving in Bonaire last March with a young lady that I had met there. She was doing fine, good buoyancy control and trim until I handed her my camera, something new to her. Her control went totally out the window. Her control was not instinctive and when she shifted her attention to the camera, which by the way takes a lot of attention, she lost all control.
Bonaire would also a good place for you to go. Shallow reefs with little current, lots of fish and lots of sand patches to practice over

 

[WunderDuck]

I did a lot of my early dives in Cozumel. The biggest challenge I had there was drifting safety stops at 15-18 feet. The currents aren't a big issue as you typicaly don't go back to the boat, the boat follows you downstream and picks you up at the end. Drift diving. The clarity of the water and the temperatures were wonderful. As it's been said already, buoyancy control and trim are the big isue. If you can master your buoyancy to where it is second nature, you're on your way to being able to dive most places. I dove as much as I could, even in the lakes and quarries. You can always work on some skills. In fact, the uglier the surroundings, the less distracted I found myself. You can learn a lot about navigation diving in 5' vis.

 

[TekDiveGirl]

What are your goals? Do you plan on being a vacation warm water diver or do aspire to local wreck diving? These are the things you want to think about.

If all you want to do is warm water vacation diving - by all means - get certified in those conditions. If you want to save some money look at doing your classroom and confined water dives locally then doing the open water dives as a referral somewhere else - say in they keys or some other tropical location.

If you plan on being a local diver - I would do the dives locally. I got certified in the cold - low visibility pacific ocean. That was the diving I was going to be doing and I wanted to learn where I was going to dive. It did not make sense not to learn in the conditions where I was going to be diving.

Kimber

Courage doesn't always roar. Sometimes it is the quiet voice at the end of the day that says I'll try again tomorrow.

 

[TekDiveGirl]

Hah - you were talking first dives AFTER certification -- hehe - ok blonde girl can't read -- (-; NEVERMIND! I would go somewhere fun with warm water ewasy diving too! So disregard everything I just said!

 

[dvrliz1]

I have to agree with Herman, Bonaire is definitely the best place to go. That is where I took my first dives. I too am a New Jerseyan and took my checkout dives in the tidal rivers of NJ. I found that the Dive Masters were fantastic with me as I was a new diver. Also, I loved the fact that I could do shore diving VERY EASY with my experienced dive buddy. After a few boat dives, we did shore dives and I was surprised how easy they were. Vis was and still is great and you see so much! Definitely Bonaire!

Liz