Certification in Maui?

[cranked13]

Sorry if this has been asked before, I couldn't find anything that completely answered my questions (don't think I know the correct jargon yet).

My wife and I did 3 dives on Moorea, Tahiti last year, and fell in love with diving. We did an inside reef to 30 feet, and two outside reef dives to [-]60[/-] 45 feet.

We are heading to Maui in February, and are looking to get certified while we are there. We would like to sign up with a shop, get prework materials, do our prework at home, and just do our dives while on the island.

Has anyone done something similar? Can anyone recommend a shop? There seem to be numerous shops that do this.

Thanks in advance!

 

[DiveMaven]

We did our OW and AOW on Maui nearly 3 years ago with Lahaina Divers and were VERY pleased with the high level of instruction we received. We've been back numerous times since our OW certification and it's always fun to dive with our instructor, who has turned into a good friend.

We go to Maui at least once a year and in December will be heading back to do our Rescue certification. This time we chose Maui Dreams as they were recommended highly as an excellent shore diving operation.

 

[Scuba-Josh]

I have heard great things about the Maui Dive Shop too!

 

[rpm88yb]

I just did my AOW with B&B dive shop out of Kihei (south-east Maui) in Sept and had a fantastic time. I did all my work ahead of time (I live in Seattle), and would highly recommend them.

 

[cranked13]

I will look into all the suggestions...

 

[jeffrey-c]

First, glad you're hooked, and welcome to a great sport! Doing all the course work is great to do at home, and it is common to then go someplace idyllic like Maui to do your open water dives.

To add another recommendation, I did my Advanced cert through Maui Dreams Dive Co. and would highly recommend them. Although I didn't request it (or pay for it) I ended up having private instruction 1:1 with my instructor (who was one of the owners). I recommended them to a friend who got her OW cert and she also had 1:1 instruction for the normal price, and she was also delighted with their service. In addition to this private attention, they include all equipment needed in their cost (no nickle and diming you), and their cost was was much lower than anyone else I found. They're a small outfit of people who basically seem to live to show you how much fun diving is!

 

[paintsnow]

B&B Scuba is the best shop in my opinion
they are the first ones out of the boat launch and have a nice boat and awsome crew
great instructors and overall everybody is very knowladgeable
they dont advertise and are owned by Brad and Blesi who work there everyday and are on every dive trip as far as i know
their website is www.bbscuba.com

 

[LiveforDiving]

Have a look at these folks: http://www.sfscubaschools.com/

They do a LOT of referrals (They call it the Tropical Referral Program on their site), especially to B&B Scuba.

I took some classes with them and they are really great, they made the referral process (All the knowledge development and pool work) easy and even set up all the dates on Maui for me.

Living

 

[justleesa]

Moving this to the Ohana Forum

What you want to do is called a referral certification. You do the paperwork, the classroom and confined water stuff at a local dive shop and then complete the 4 (or 5 - depending on which agency you get certified with) on Maui.

And tsk, tsk, tsk that they took you to 60' on your discover dives

 

[cranked13]

And tsk, tsk, tsk that they took you to 60' on your discover dives

Just talked to my wife...we didn't go deeper than 45 feet on our discover dives. Getting ahead of myself :14:

Thanks for the info...we will be doing the referral dives in SF and will finish certification in Maui.

Thanks for the help everyone!