Favorite type of diving

[redhotqt54]

I recently just got my c-card and noticed that there were many other kinds of diving courses that are offered. I was particularly interested in night diving and cave diving. Any suggestions for which type to do, which ones are your favorites, etc etc. I also heard about the advanced diving course and was wondering if that's a good idea.

Thanks much

 

[H2Andy]

night diving is certainly possible with a minimum of training

cave diving, on the other hand, is a long process, involving four classes over time (generally cavern, cave 1 (intro), cave 2 (apprentice), and cave 3 (full cave).
you're also talking about several thousand dollars in gear.

as far as recreational diving, the progression usualy is Open Water, Advanced Open Water, and Rescue

Advanced Open Water is somewhat of a misnomer, as it's not really advanced. it's more like Open Water Part Two. in it, you will do five specialities, such as deep diving,
night diving, peak performance bouyancy, etc. i would take this class before i
hit 30 dives or so. otherwise, you'll be wasting its benefits (if you wait too long, it
becomes redundant).

Rescue is an excellent class to take, and it works on your awareness and self-rescue
ability, plus CPR and first aid are covered as well (as a pre-requisite).

once you do those, you should get about 100 dives in to cement your skills before
thinking of technical diving (such as cave diving).

a great introduction of some tech skills and concepts is DIR-Fundamentals, offered by GUE. i would recommend taking that class either for itself or as a great
stepping point to tech training (DIR-F is a recreational class, but it does
touch on some concepts and skills that will make future tech training much
easier).

hope this helps

 

[redhotqt54]

ahh thanks. definitely helps. the more i read in the forum the more i realize how clueless i am about everything dive related. well, all i can do is learn and get better from this point i guess.

 

[H2Andy]

this site is a tremendous resource. it literally changed my diving when i first found it,
back in 2004

awesome place

 

[Jason Ooi]

After OW you can go Advanced Open Water Course and specialty courses.

 

[paolov]

since you are interested into cave diving... check out

Hogarthian diving (do research)
http://www.wkpp.org/articles/Gear/newgeorge.html
http://www.gue.com/Equipment/Evolution/index.html

then you may want to take up DIR-F





.

 

[Quarrior]

AOW is basically a sampler of different specialties. It's well worth the time to do. I recommend the night diving, DPV (just a huge giggle to do), and Nav portions.

As for the rest of the specialties, you really don't need them. They really for those that have a specific interest or just want the card. Mostly they are to allow the agency to get more of your money.

I to highly encourage Rescue Diver training.

 

[TSandM]

Hey, the diving world is in front of you! I was clueless at the beginning as to what the various possibilities were for diving. I think the only image I had of diving was floating around Caribbean reefs. It was an eye-opener to me to discover deep wreck diving, cave diving, drift diving, shark-cage diving . . . there are SO many facets of diving you can decide to explore. Or you can decide that you're perfectly happy diving your local waters and learning everything they have to offer. One of our LDS instructors has over 3000 dives . . . in the Pacific Northwest. He's dived every site and taken pictures, and he knows all the marine animals and what their life cycle is, what they eat, where they live, and what they do. He teaches a fabulous class on it.

You've got the basic skills to head in all kinds of directions.

My personal advice is to get whatever training you can to improve your buoyancy and stability in the water. Whether that is additional classes like Peak Performance Buoyancy or mentoring from someone who's got it down, until you can be stable and quiet in the water, diving is going to have some frustrating and unsatisfying times.