French Polynesia May - June 2017 - bucket list trip

[Suebee]

Starting with Suebee - TopDive are the cattleboat cruise ship providers. ...

By all means, if you like a bigger chain style op, they offer that cheap inter island pass then they may suit you. ... I don't really want to do a hatchet job on any dive op, that was 4 years ago, things may have changed for the better.

To Schwaeble - French Polynesia follows French water sport/industry practice. PADI etc are not recognised/ considered to be of a lower standard of education.

A lot of French overseas territories like Reunion and Mayotte are CMAS but ar starting to recognise PADI...but again, at a lower standard

Thanks @Wingy , I will have a look at the other ops as a comparison and dig deeper for some more reviews of TopDive.
(We will be equivalent to CMAS 2 when we arrive (we are getting our PADI rescue diver this month) and have lots of drift experience so have been told by TopDive we will get to do the Tuamotos so should be okay on that front...)

 

[Suebee]

OMG. I rarely plan dive trips, but next year, My wife and I are considering a trip to Rangiroa and Fakarava. How long - probably about a month or so. We are not in a rush and would like to experience diving over an extended period. What are the limitations for us given the CMAS vibe. My wife is a PADI Rescue diver and I am a PADI instructor. best, cmr...

Fantastic! - we are there for 20 nights but some will be non diving
You should be able to dive the Tuamotos
Here is an equivalency chart:

Equivalent Diving Qualifications: BSAC, PADI, CMAS, NAUI, etc - SCUBA Travel

I may ask PADI if they can assist with providing a CMAS equivalency cert card .Someone posted that SEI was able to provide this. I will let you know what I find out.

 

[Wingy]

Wouldn't it be easier to contact CMAS? I would imagine contacting an agency and asking them to issue with a card for another agency would be better directed at the agency who will be issuing your card and taking your payment than the other way around.

Charlier are you TDI also?

 

[Edward3c]

Wouldn't it be easier to contact CMAS? I would imagine contacting an agency and asking them to issue with a card for another agency would be better directed at the agency who will be issuing your card and taking your payment than the other way around.

Charlier are you TDI also?

No agency will issue a diving qualification without completion of their course. Try asking PADI for a Rescue Diver or Divemaster card without doing the respective course. Its to prevent people from switching between agencies and increasing their grade without instruction or assessment. Agencies do accept qualifications from other agencies to enroll on their higher courses. For example, a PADI Divemaster is acceptable to commence the BSAC Advanced Diver course.

 

[Boiler_81]

Fantastic! - we are there for 20 nights but some will be non diving
You should be able to dive the Tuamotos
Here is an equivalency chart:

Equivalent Diving Qualifications: BSAC, PADI, CMAS, NAUI, etc - SCUBA Travel

I may ask PADI if they can assist with providing a CMAS equivalency cert card .Someone posted that SEI was able to provide this. I will let you know what I find out.

SEI is the only agency which can issue a CMAS card in the US (no idea about Canada) SEI Diving
I'm sure you would have to take a course through them in order to get a card.

SEI was created by former YMCA instructors when the YMCA stopped their SCUBA program. YMCA could also issue CMAS cards and it was carried over to SEI.

When I was looking to increase my skill level prior to a trip to Chuuk, the YMCA Silver Advanced certification was recommended on this board. I did the course right before the transition from YMCA to SEI.

When I returned from FP after being denied the deeper dives into the canyon at Rangiroa, I contacted SEI and was issued an SEI card and a CMAS 3 Star card. As I stated in my original trip report the problem was with the operators not recognizing the YMCA card for what it is. Silver Advanced is a higher standard than the PADI AOW. All the operators saw was an American certification which had the word Advanced and equated it to the PADI AOW.

I do like the course materials and the quality of the training with SEI/CMAS. The problem with SEI is finding an instructor. There is no listing of instructors on the SEI site. You have to contact them and get a list of instructors near you.

When my son wanted to get certified, I contacted SEI for a list of instructors in my area. There just wasn't an instructor near me. The guy who I trained with for the YMCA certification had crossed over the PADI rather than go with SEI. As a result, my son was certified through PADI. When he does an advanced course we will once again attempt to find an SEI instructor.

 

[Wingy]

Perhaps you misconstrued my intent Edward3c - of course you don't ring CMAS and say hey I'm Padi XYZ heres a cheque can I have a card!!!.

My CMAS Instructor is in Thailand - I fly up there. I was going to get a CMAS instructor recommendation for Charlier in Singapore. I know SUF had a very good CMAS instructor in Singapore at Seahounds (From memory) - I also know Charlier spends some time in Thailand.

For Suebee that is exactly what I was getting at - it is not in their business interest to assist her in finding a CMAS centre so why ring Padi? I didn't say you didn't have to do the course - it would be nice if it worked that way as AFAIK there are no CMAS instructors within 5000km of me...I fly up and do the course under my instructor, the more in depth style suits me and More importantly- the Instructor suits me.

 

[Butch Fries]

FWIW, we just returned from Fakarava. Our trip was marred somewhat by a severe tropical storm that decided to hang on for several days (and that blew the roof off our of bungalow at 3 a.m.), but we would definitely go back. We used Tetamanu divers at the South Pass; since there's a weight limit on Air Tahiti (not to be confused with Air Tahiti Nui) we used rental equipment and were impressed with the quality. There aren't a huge number of dive sites but we never got tired of the ones we saw. We are both PADI divemasters and our certification was accepted without question.

 

[Suebee]

The discussion has helped inform me tremendously. Thank you all! I will check my area for SEI or CMAS instruction and certification but I have only ever seen PADI. I hope our Logs and PADI AOW +Rescue ( we are getting the latter in part based on @Boiler_81 trip report), will get us to the sites we like to dive.

FWIW, we just returned from Fakarava. Our trip was marred somewhat by a severe tropical storm that decided to hang on for several days (and that blew the roof off our of bungalow at 3 a.m.), but we would definitely go back. We used Tetamanu divers at the South Pass; since there's a weight limit on Air Tahiti (not to be confused with Air Tahiti Nui) we used rental equipment and were impressed with the quality. There aren't a huge number of dive sites but we never got tired of the ones we saw. We are both PADI divemasters and our certification was accepted without question.

WOW! Quite an adventure. We are staying at Raimiti in the south - I hope we have a roof! on our bungalow! Thanks for the op recommendation and experience. Did you use any dive op in the north?

 

[Suebee]

Anyone have any insight into water temp May -June? Shorty? Full 3mm? I am sure I can research somewhere or ask the ops but you all have been there...

 

[Butch Fries]

We stayed at Raimiti - it's an incredible place. If you're staying on the lagoon side the bathroom floors are crushed coral, so do take a pair of flip-flops.. (The floors are wood on the ocean side, and the bungalows are larger.) Also remember that there's electricity only from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. You will also appreciate the place if you're an animal lover.
The North Pass is about 2 hours by boat from Raimiti, realistically too far; all our diving was with Tetamanu divers at the South Pass. Raimiti has some kind of relationship with Tetamanu and will take you there; if you use Top Dive, Top Dive will pick you up at Raimiti.
The temperature gauge on my computer showed 88 degrees at the surface and stayed around 84 even at 95 feet. I just wore a skin (shorty) and was completely comfortable.