GBR LOB diving as a beginner

[happy-diver]

Supportive, mate we're so supportive I'm even using Brazilian timber

to convert my swinging gates to sliding

Do you like my levitating tools

You have a perfect trip

Magnificent!

 

[Muriloth]

Yeah ! Haha Are you australian? That wood has traveled a long way there.
Thank you!

Do you like my levitating tools

You have a perfect trip

Magnificent!

 

[Muriloth]

Well we are inexperienced at some point, but glad to know I will be welcome there just by trying to improve my skills.
Thank you

Not at all true. Liveaboards are for more serious divers that want to spend most of their time diving. That much said I've seen lots of inexperienced divers on numerous liveaboard trips including 2 on the GBR who can barely control their buoyancy and destroy the bottom substrate with their poor techniques.

You're probably better than 50% of the divers right out of the box.

 

[Aquapro Dive Services]

Cairns local and dive pro here. There's a lot of options suitable for all levels of diver. See here

Most leave daily or have transfer vessels and visit the Outer Reef. Variety of sites, great experiences and suitable all levels. Gear etc all included.

Trips like Mile Ball and Spirit of Frredon have twice a week departures and have a low level flight one way due to the distance the travel. For more experienced divers but no problem if your Open Water but you would need to take your Advanced on board or at the very least Deep Adventure Dive as most sites tend to be deeper than 18m.

Mile Ball and SOF visit the far north and Ribbon Reefs for 4 or 5 night trips. Expensive but fabulous diving. Book out months in advance so don't leave it too late.

Feel free to drop me a DM if you need any local advice. Doesn't have to be dive related

 

[Muriloth]

Do you think it's bette rto tke AOW before going or onboard? I recognize I wont be advanced by having the advanced tittle and few dives in.

Cairns local and dive pro here. There's a lot of options suitable for all levels of diver. See here

Most leave daily or have transfer vessels and visit the Outer Reef. Variety of sites, great experiences and suitable all levels. Gear etc all included.

Trips like Mile Ball and Spirit of Frredon have twice a week departures and have a low level flight one way due to the distance the travel. For more experienced divers but no problem if your Open Water but you would need to take your Advanced on board or at the very least Deep Adventure Dive as most sites tend to be deeper than 18m.

Mile Ball and SOF visit the far north and Ribbon Reefs for 4 or 5 night trips. Expensive but fabulous diving. Book out months in advance so don't leave it too late.

Feel free to drop me a DM if you need any local advice. Doesn't have to be dive related

 

[nadwidny]

Do you think it's bette rto tke AOW before going or onboard? I recognize I wont be advanced by having the advanced tittle and few dives in.

The more dives you do beforehand the better your experience will be.

 

[Aquapro Dive Services]

Do you think it's bette rto tke AOW before going or onboard? I recognize I wont be advanced by having the advanced tittle and few dives in.

If you want to get more dives logged then as nadwidney says it's good to get your experience up.
However, it's fine to do it onboard because at least there's 5 dives with an instructor as a guide and its around AUD$250 extra on an Outer Reef trips or $405 on Spirit of Freedom. You certainly won't miss out if you plan to take it onboard

 

[happy-diver]

Doing a course on a trip is like going overseas to sit in a bar

 

[boulderjohn]

I am going to agree that doing AOW on a vacation is not a problem, especially if you can do the academic part ahead of time. You are doing dives you would have been doing anyway, and you may well be doing them in a better location.

Here is Colorado, AOW is a problem because the few normal dive sites we have do not include anything deep enough for the deep dive. The sites used also have very poor visibility, which effectively eliminates some of the dive choices, like photography and fish ID (unless you count seeing scads of crawdads). It is extremely common for people to do AOW on vacation. I was one of them. I did mine in Cozumel, and I think it was a very good experience for me.

People laugh at Fish ID as a choice, but I thought it was great. Studies show that being able to attach a name to what you are seeing has a great impact on your ability to understand and remember what you are seeing.