Question Cave Diving Courses advice

[jadairiii]

I recommend biting the financial bullet and splitting the training up into two trips with some practice in between. Unless a person has a significant amount of tech diving experience already, going into a "zero to hero" cave training program does not leave most people with the softer ("finer") skills.

Follow this advise. My own personal experience, I was whipped after Cave 1, I could not have done Full Cave right after. Plus, I was glad for doing cave dives between 1 and full cave.

As for location, Florida can be great, but it can also blow out due to weather and you end up diving only one cave and Blue Grotto. (my cave 1, done in January in High Springs, Florida had a wet winter and only 2 caves were open, all the others were blown) Mexico, especially in the winter, is a pretty safe bet, and due to how shallow most of the cave are in Mexico you can spend hours training. Florida caves trend a bit deeper so bottom time becomes a "limiter".

 

[InWay2Deep]

Given the cost of travel to get to caves to even take the training for you. What are your post certification plans for cave diving? Is there a specific location you have in mind for cave diving, if so, you should take the training there? If you never plan to visit FL to go cave diving it's kind of pointless to take the training there.

 

[Tribal]

Doing your intro in France shouldn’t cost a fortune.
Flying to France from Egypt and renting a appartement there for 7/10 days isn’t that expensive compared to all the other costs of cave diving in general.

 

[lukeb]

Following advice from here and elsewhere, I did Intro Cave, and then dived at the Intro level for a year before taking Full Cave. I highly recommend taking this slower route. Full Cave was extremely challenging, but I was so much more comfortable after having a year of intro cave dives under my belt. You will not get bored at the intro level! It may be more money, but it will definitely be worth it in the long run.

 

[Lorenzoid]

You will not get bored at the intro level! It may be more money, but it will definitely be worth it in the long run.

Agree. It occurs to me that if the cost difference between taking two trips abroad and attempting to do it all "zero-to-hero"-style on a single trip abroad is that crucial a factor to a diver, that diver is not going to be doing much cave diving. To keep up one's skills, one needs to dive. After cave certification, a cave diver who lives in a country without diveable caves is going to be taking a trip abroad once or twice a year. The diver may soon be acquiring and bringing along on these trips more gear of the type full cave divers use, such as additional regs for stage and deco. The gear and trips and possibly additional training soon add up to a lot of money. A few years from now, looking back in hindsight, the difference between the cost of one trip and two trips to become a full cave diver will seem small.

edit: I also agree with those who advise doing your training (or at least half) where you intend to do most of your diving later. Coming from Egypt, I would guess that might be France or elsewhere in Europe. If you do half your training there, do the other half in a place that offers different conditions, to challenge you. For North American cave diving, common advice is to do half your training in Florida and half in Mexico. I am not familiar with what Europeans advise in this regard, but I would look to their advice.

 

[flymolo]

Mexico is great because the shallower caves lend themselves to plenty of bottom time. you can learn to dive high flow caves later on, once you have basic cave diving skills and navigation out of the way. there's also lots of great diving you can do in mexico at the intro level, before you move on to full cave (which you should only do once you have built up sufficient experience, imo)

but also this question has been asked and answered quite a few times on this forum already, so you should search for those threads and read them

 

[BoltSnap]

Salam,

There are plenty of cave instructors and cave diving in Europe. Spain, France, Hungary and others have cave instructors and cave diving training. You can train with some of the best cave instructors in the world in these European countries.

 

[rddvet]

Hungry

Agree. After a day of cave class I'm starving. Mexico has tacos. Problems solved.
Eventhough they claim the best food in the world is French, I call BS. I'm a foodie and hated the food choices in the lot
Go get some tacos in Mexico.

 

[BoltSnap]

Agree. After a day of cave class I'm starving. Mexico has tacos. Problems solved.
Eventhough they claim the best food in the world is French, I call BS. I'm a foodie and hated the food choices in the lot
Go get some tacos in Mexico.

Hahahahahaha, the damned auto spell lol

 

[Manatee Diver]

Bang for your buck, I'd say Mexico if the flights aren't ridiculously expensive. You could spend a couple weeks in mexico taking the course then doing guided dives for the same or less as 7-10 days in Florida.

I'm not so sure about that anymore. I was looking at the costs recently, instructors prices are running about $300 a day for a number of instructors just like in the US.

ZG has tanks are $15 a tank and $9 for additional fills. While CCDS is $5 for the tank rental plus less than $10 per fill (AL80s).

Really I think that accommodations and food are the only thing cheaper these days, at least compared to PDC where I prefer to stay. Tulum is stupid expensive.

That being said the food is better in Mexico, and I can hire a sherpa to carry my stuff.