Bucket list dive spots?

[BikerBecca]

OK everyone. This is going to be nice comment so you can get into my head. It's about the "Bounce Dive" comment. To me it's all about the planning that excites me. At 400 feet I'll see whatever mud my light shines on and maybe some sort of sea slug. That's not why I want to do it. I want to do it for the planning. Let me explain...

I am also a pilot. When I am not flying aerobatics in an IAC competition I love flight planning. Here is a perfect example. My favorite plane was what I called the "Mini Airliner." It was a PA-32R (Piper Lance and Piper Saratoga). Club seating in the back. Cargo space further back and a beautiful panel up front in my office. I especially loved the auto pilot.

Before I would take my friends on "$100 Hamburger Runs" I loved doing the flight planning. Penciling it out on my Sectional. Listening to the weather and looking for awesome tail winds. Using my E6B to calculate direction, fuel consumption, etc. Writing the plan down. VOR headings, compass headings, times between way-points. The engineer in me loves doing this. Then I'd file my flight plan, do my pre-flight, and welcome my friends aboard. Today we are going from LI MacArthur to Providence, RI.

Let the flight begin. Taxing? BORING! Take off? BORING? But when I opened my flight plan, asked NY Radio for flight following I was at my happiest. I wanted to make a perfect flight for my friends, smooth as silk and fast as possible. However, as they were having fun in the back I was counting every second that went by, planning the next course change, making sure I hit each way-point at the exact second I planned it. Then my approaches were epic. I'd have them planned way way way way out. We'd come in smooth as silk and at exactly the time I planned. One time a scared new flyer boyfriend of my friend popped his head up front and said, "We Landed!!!" It was that smooth. A perfect greaser.


That's what makes me happy and I want to do that level of planning on a dive. Gas mixtures, which to use at each depth, how long at each depth. Deco time, and all the 1000 other anal things to make the dive perfect.

It's not a bounce dive to me. It's a well planned mission of adventure and making it happen exactly as my calculations said it would.

Sorry for the long post but yes, my bucket list dive is 400 fsw.

 

[Ministryofgiraffes]

I see both sides of this, sort of, but a bounce to that depth is something that perhaps shouldn’t be shouted about on a forum where other inexperienced divers may feel that that is something that is the norm or a ‘rite of passage’ .it is an extremely risky endeavour and whilst I believe that that facet of diving/pushing the limits etc shouldn’t be completely vilified, it also should be normalized either. Enough research will show you that there are plenty of operations around the world where, if you show up with enough cashola, anything is possible..I think there is a responsibility to ‘disclaimer’ highly risky dives like this incase others think it’s the norm... that’s my ‘Swiss 2 cents’

 

[Ministryofgiraffes]

I perhaps didn’t emphasis enough that this wasn’t a ‘wagging finger’ response. I don’t think the OP was braggidocious at all and I would be keen to watch the endeavour documented. I just think it needs a bit of a ‘professionals on a closed course’ flavour to the message

 

[BikerBecca]

I see both sides of this, sort of, but a bounce to that depth is something that perhaps shouldn’t be shouted about on a forum where other inexperienced divers may feel that that is something that is the norm or a ‘rite of passage’ .it is an extremely risky endeavour and whilst I believe that that facet of diving/pushing the limits etc shouldn’t be completely vilified, it also should be normalized either. Enough research will show you that there are plenty of operations around the world where, if you show up with enough cashola, anything is possible..I think there is a responsibility to ‘disclaimer’ highly risky dives like this incase others think it’s the norm... that’s my ‘Swiss 2 cents’

I am in no way normalizing it, and you are correct, it s not a thing to be taken lightly and should never be seen as a rite of passage. I only answered the question of what was MY bucket list dive. You are 100% correct about it being an extremely risky endeavor.

 

[BikerBecca]

I just think it needs a bit of a ‘professionals on a closed course’ flavour to the message

Perfect description! Thank you!

 

[Esprise Me]

Thanks for the explanation, BikerBecca. Not that you owed me one, but I hadn't been able to come up with a rationale for wanting to dive to a specific depth other than wanting to see something at that depth or wanting to be able to brag about having gone to that depth. Your explanation makes sense, even though it doesn't sound like my cup of tea.

 

[Princess Chris]

Well reading this thread was a massive mistake, my dive bucket list just got twice as long. I can definitely vouch for some of the places that have been mentioned. Gods pocket is fantastic you just have to make sure you go in the winter so the viz is half decent. Vanuatu is ridiculous, especially the Coolidge at night and mele bay is like diving in a postcard.

The sardine run has been on my list since i first watched blue planet but apparently you do have to be pretty lucky as the bait balls aren't the easiest to find and its one dive boat only per ball (too many divers in the water create distractions for the predators).
The Poor Knights is on there as is the MS Mikhail Lermontov
Scapa flow
Heard good things about Madagascar but apparently its only nice in the water.

 

[BikerBecca]

Thanks for the explanation, BikerBecca. Not that you owed me one, but I hadn't been able to come up with a rationale for wanting to dive to a specific depth other than wanting to see something at that depth or wanting to be able to brag about having gone to that depth. Your explanation makes sense, even though it doesn't sound like my cup of tea.

You're welcome. However, after reading the bounce dive comment I felt I owed ScubaBoard an explanation. I feared my original post made me sound like a reckless, maverick, even dangerous diver. I am the complete opposite. So I thought a fun, and true, story of who I am as a person and why this interests me would help people understand I am not being reckless.

I have no idea how to do that dive, but I have been talking with my Tech Instructor friend and we will start that training and certification one day. Even after training and certification, he won't let me do anything like that until he knows I can do it safely. Which is exactly why I want him as my instructor.

 

[Wingy]

Well reading this thread was a massive mistake, my dive bucket list just got twice as long. I can definitely vouch for some of the places that have been mentioned. Gods pocket is fantastic you just have to make sure you go in the winter so the viz is half decent. Vanuatu is ridiculous, especially the Coolidge at night and mele bay is like diving in a postcard.


Heard good things about Madagascar but apparently its only nice in the water.

Madagascar - only nice in the water? Applicable if in Antananarivo I've had one of the best trips of my life in Madagascar topside and diving. Dancing like a lemur or seeing your dive buddy get bitten by a chameleon when you have an entire Eco 5 star private resort does not appeal to you? Trekking through Lakobe to find some of the worlds most endangered animals and having a kip under a palm tree waiting for the tide to come in doesn't do it for you?

I do love the old girl, not a huge wreck lover but when I have a lust for rust it's either Yongala or Coolidge that put a happy smile on my face. Tanna was interesting to dive too.

I heard on tonight's news NSW have just given a permit for scuba diving with whales under strict conditions obviously but ..sounds like a worthy inclusion to any bucket list.

 

[mcohen1021]

Socorro, Truk Lagoon,

Anyone who does not have Socorro on their bucket list does not know what they're missing!!

I'm already waiting for another sale to go back in 2020