Costs of diving$$$

[ScubaMikeM]

I understand the up front costs are what they are but diving regularly is the only way to learn and improve.
From what I've seen, a typical dive trip for 2 would be about $200. This doesn't include any travel, meals, or lodging if needed. Even though we live in southwest Florida, the local diving here seems to be minimal, so we would have to travel about a couple of hours.
I don't understand how one can dive regularly and affordably.
Any thoughts on this?

 

[Outbound]

It depends on where you live and where you want to dive. Sure, a dive trip is going to cost you a lot more than a local dive would. For me, my local dives only cost me an air fill (plus all the money I have invested in my equipment, but that gets amortized over the lifetime of the gear). But yeah, overall, diving ain't a cheap sport/hobby.

 

[tbone1004]

find places to dive that you don't have to go on a boat. SW I'll assume to be Ft. Myers. Unfortunately Ft. Myers is flat as a pancake and you need a 2+ hour boat ride to get out there. Drive over to Ft. Lauderdale and you can get on a boat for cheap, or do a ton of different shore diving if you want to be in the ocean. Same travel time, but 300 miles round trip in a car is less than $50 in gas which is a lot less than the boat fee. Coral heads are about a football field off the shore which isn't bad at all and if you use your own gear, it's $20 for 4x air fills. Total cost to do that day of diving is around $200 for meals/lodging if you didn't daytrip, etc.
Hop on one of the boats and they're cheap out there around $80/diver with tip for 2 dives.

5 hours and you're in cave country up north where again, diving is cheap. Park entry to Ginnie is like $20pp if you don't have a pass, but into a myriad of other sites is either free or less than $5/car. Own your own equipment and you're only paying for gas fills.

The key is to find local spots where you don't have to get on a boat, and own your own stuff if you want to keep the cost down

 

[northernone]

Owning and maintaining my own equipment and mainly diving locally from shore I regularly dive at a cost of a few dollars per hour underwater. Blue Heron Bridge might be an option for you or Tampa bay. The mangroves are lovely

"Premium" generally dive locations cost more if hiring a boat. It can be done "inexpensively " (from a first world financial perspective) with choose inexpensive flights, apartment rentals and a kitchen.

A step further, when I had nearly no money we built a hand powered surface pump system and would dive for nearly free. The mask cost a couple dollars. The parts were scrap.

It can be done.
Cameron

 

[DogDiver]

A weekend in the Keys is your best option. Lots of affordable lodging and dive operators. I’ve been using Florida Keys Dive Center for over 10 years. Never issues. The drive for me is 8 hours one way so we usually do a 4 day weekend. As for my usual cave diving, I’m 45 minutes drive from over 20 cave systems.

 

[nolatom]

,Yeah, if you "just" boat-dive when you drive somewhere, it'll cost you about $50 per dive for a two-dive day (a bit less for three or four dives), plus the tank rental (here I'm assuming you own dive gear except for the tank). Obviously double that if there are two of you and only one of you is paying.

Is that "expensive"?? Depends on your perspective and how much it cost you to get there, I guess. Me, I enjoy not only the dive but also the boat ride and the "ritual" of gearing up and down, chatting with your fellow divers, getting to know your buddy if you don't already, chatting with the captain up on the flying bridge, sightseeing the seashore from the boat, and just being out there on the blue water. Not to mention the underwater beauty of gliding along the reefs on a drift dive, with the sea turtles and lemon sharks..

And if you make diving part of a mini-vacation in an interesting place like West Palm or Jupiter, your diving ain't costing much more than a nice dinner for two.

A liveaboard can give you lots of dives, so your per-dive cost is lower, and meals and "hotel" included. I did that early on, it gave me the time and experience and confidence to dive "on my own" later on.

And as others have pointed out, once you have your gear, you can shore-dive for the cost of a tank rental.

If you love it, it's not expensive. And the beauty, the kick (even after a couple hundred dives for me) of being weightless, and the cool-factor of being in an environment where humans aren't "supposed" to be, are worth it for me. Plus you can sound brave at cocktail parties when other people are talking about lawn care or arthritis ;-)

 

[ScubaMikeM]

Yeah, I figured as much. I was hoping it would be less than skiing used to be when I lived up north. But with that I was always able to get good discounts
on skiing and lodging, which allowed weekly skiing which in turn improved my ability.
I was hoping to find a similar situation with diving. Shore diving seems to be the lowest cost way but it seems all the shore diving is on the east coast.
Ironic that I live 15 minutes from the Gulf. We live about 2 hours or more from most east coast locations.
I should have married rich.

 

[Saniflush]

Join some clubs, frequent some shops, and I bet you will find some more economical ways to dive.

 

[DogDiver]

Lots of “shore” diving in the North Florida Springs.

 

[kelemvor]

Yeah, I figured as much. I was hoping it would be less than skiing used to be when I lived up north. But with that I was always able to get good discounts
on skiing and lodging, which allowed weekly skiing which in turn improved my ability.
I was hoping to find a similar situation with diving. Shore diving seems to be the lowest cost way but it seems all the shore diving is on the east coast.
Ironic that I live 15 minutes from the Gulf. We live about 2 hours or more from most east coast locations.
I should have married rich.

Where exactly are you in southwest FL?

There's some shore dives in the Bradenton area off of Anna Maria Island, Holmes Beach, Bradenton Beach. They're not world class sites but it's free diving (if you own gear). There are dive shops in that area that could probably rent you a tank if needed.

A little further south off of Venice Beach is "the boneyard" which is a fairly shallow (20 feet or less) area with generally poor visibility. It's an excellent place to search for fossilized Megalodon and other shark teeth. It's a large area, there are at least three charter boats that will take you further offshore. The offshore area is probably less picked over, but every time I've gone I've found some teeth (no megs yet for me but at least 20 teeth on every dive). Several times, I've been with a group that found one or more Meg teeth - even from the shore entry.

Further south you will find "Gasparilla State Park" off of Boca Grande. I've never dove this, I'm told it's tide critical to avoid strong currents.

There's loads of great boat dives off the west coast. My personal favorite is the USS Mohawk CGC Veterans Memorial Reef (artificial ref) that is off Sanibel Island. That wreck was loaded with car sized Goliath grouper last time I was there. It's an incredible dive.

Check out this site: Scuba Earth by DiveBuddy.com | DiveBuddy.com It's a fantastic way to locate dive sites across the state of Florida. The site isn't only for Florida, but the user submitted data seems to be a lot more complete here. The site's operation is a little hoakey; remember to left click on the map after centering it on the area you're curious about.