CHEAP diving near St. Louis?

[rottielover]

Hi all,

The wife and I are in a sort of $$$ crunch.

Anyone know of really cheap dives near St. Louis? We've been to Mermet Springs a few times, it's really nice, but costs us a bit more than we like in total (gasoline, hotel, food, etc.)

We own our gear sans tanks/weights, but we get those from our LDS rental pretty cheap.

Mermet's nice, but after you factor in gas for the truck and hotel, it's just a bit too much right now.

Any other dive sights around we could do really cheap?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Wkndbum]

Hi all,

The wife and I are in a sort of $$$ crunch.

Anyone know of really cheap dives near St. Louis? We've been to Mermet Springs a few times, it's really nice, but costs us a bit more than we like in total (gasoline, hotel, food, etc.)

We own our gear sans tanks/weights, but we get those from our LDS rental pretty cheap.

Mermet's nice, but after you factor in gas for the truck and hotel, it's just a bit too much right now.

Any other dive sights around we could do really cheap?

Thanks in advance!

Try this site http://www.midwestdive.com/forums/

A lot of divers from the St Louis area frequient this site.

 

[theskull]

As in many things, cheap (diving near St. Louis) is not good.

There are some diveable private lakes that you can do if you know someone who knows someone with property there to give you permission to enter the "village". These are typically spring-fed (cold) and have limited viz, and often some dangerous boaters and jetskiers to beware of.

Nearest and cheapest commercial dive site is Quail Run Divers Quarry in Rolla, MO, a little over an hour drive from St. Louis and I believe $15 entry fee. Depths of 10-30 ft., and viz varies with how many OW classes are there on any given day.

Also Brickyard Quarry near St. Elmo, IL, is a little over an hour drive and about a $15 fee, but this typically has bad viz and is only open by appointment.

Slightly cheaper than a trip to Mermet, and pretty good diving, is a trip to Table Rock Lake in Branson, MO (over 3 hour drive, though). No fee to dive the lake, many of the motels are inexpensive, and air fills are available at the State Park Marina, SCUBA Sports, and a couple other locations.

If you find anything else, please let ME know!

Dive safe and have fun,
theskull

 

[rottielover]

Hey thanks for the link!

Hi Skull, it's hard to find cheap diving around here isn't it!

Mermet is great and where we usually go, but it add's up when you look at food, gas, and hotel. Rolla isn't too awful far, about 2 hours with all the construction on 44, I used to go there a lot for my company, but I've never been to the quarry there. Not to mention the local "word on the street" is that it's basically a "mud hole" (I have yet to hear anyone say viz there was over 3-5 feet, at least mermet you can get 20 or so below the thermocline).

Looks like I might be limited to pools (dive tanks?)... I'll checkout that link and let you know if by some twist of fate I'm able to find something.

 

[cummings66]

For me one of the big things I did to reduce the cost of diving is to start camping. A tent site at State Park campgrounds in Branson is $8 a day. Add $6 if you want electricity. I like the KOA at Beaver lake, although C&J has some as well. The Table Rock diving at Dewey Short just happens to be maybe a mile from the campgrounds. If things go right I'll be there this weekend, keeping fingers crossed. Gas still costs me however, I'll spend about $45 to get there and back.

Bonus, my 3.5 year old loves camping so it's a major win for me, and with clean showers and facilities it's as good as a motel anyhow, minus the TV.

If you don't like camping then I know of no other cheap way to do it.

 

[rottielover]

Yea, part of the problem is that my dive buddy (a.k.a. "the wife" ) is the biggest princess ...

First time we ever went to mermet, we booked at the Best Western... that lasted all of 10 min, she couldn't sleep on the bed, we had to checkout and go down to the Drury Inn.

 

[cummings66]

Boy, things are tough here. My wife is ok with the camping, more for my daughters sake I think than mine but she does it. I guess the Table Rock Inn is out of the question because on a good day it's not even in the same league as a Best Western.

Not a lot of divers camp from what I've seen, it's just a couple here and there and most of them seem to take the 2 places near Dewey Short. I do sometimes just to have access to a pool instead of Moonshine Beach.