How to go about diving

[cg733]

Hello, New to the thread, I am an 18 year old male living in the UK and really want to go diving, I have never been proper diving before but i do love swimming and enjoy being in the water but I feel to get the best benefit (plus its cheaper) I would like to get my certifications abroad, I am looking to get as many dives and certs as possible while still getting the knowledge, so I know that means not doing the pay for 2 months zero to hero sorta courses, but i have looked into doing a divemaster internship and for 5-6 months and a budget of £7,000 I could get all my qualifications, at least 180 dives and experience working for a shop, but I know in a lot of ways it wouldnt be that beneficial as it would all be the same dive spots, so does anyone know a way to do the same sorta thing but travel around but still keep it at that sorta budget? thanks for taking the time to read and hope it was easy to understand ^^

 

[cephasiii]

Have you looked at Yorkshire Divers DB? They have some really good instructors in your area. If you want to get your cert abroad, then just decide on a location(s) and then search good for the dive shop and them research the dive shop on YD or SB for reviews. I will say that I went to Thailand for my IDC and they had a great shop in Phuket that you could look into called Sea Fun Divers.


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[261311]

I'd recommend before sinking any money into this, take a little introduction to scuba course to see if you like it. I'm sure while looking around at prices of cool gear you can get you've noticed that it's not necessarily cheap. I'd also say that from what I've learned in my short months diving, don't look to knock down as many dives and certs as possible. Look at it in reverse and go for quality over quantity, diving is fun but if what your learning in 300 dives isn't qualitative, you may become over confident with what you feel you've learned and try more dangerous things you're not skilled enough to do (certifications in diving I've learned do not account for skills learned, it means you passed the skill at the appropriate time. That doesn't mean you've mastered it).

With that said however, what do you want to end up achieving long term as a diver? Where do you want to dive?

 

[Johanan]

i have looked into doing a divemaster internship and for 5-6 months and a budget of £7,000 I could get all my qualifications, at least 180 dives and experience working for a shop, but I know in a lot of ways it wouldnt be that beneficial as it would all be the same dive spots, so does anyone know a way to do the same sorta thing but travel around but still keep it at that sorta budget? thanks for taking the time to read and hope it was easy to understand ^^

My English is self taugt and I'm not sure if I understood you correctly, but recently I read a comment about becoming a dive professional that seemed meaningful to me:

"I made a decision years ago that trying to make a living doing something I loved to do for fun was a great way to take the fun out of doing it -- and in addition, things that are fun are pretty popular, so it's not easy to make any kind of good living doing them, because there's somebody standing next to you who will do it for less than you will. I chose to develop a professional career that allows me the money to do the things I love to do for fun . . . and do them for FUN.

 

[Quero]

cg, have you ever dived? I mean, did you ever do a try-dive just to see whether you like it? Because you're something of a 'water baby', it seems likely that you'll enjoy scuba, but there are people who simply don't find it as thrilling as others, and also there are people who have physiological reasons for not diving, so my advice is to take it slow, find out whether this is something you really want to invest that much time and money on, and go on from there. With the amount of money you are budgeting, you wouldn't really need to spend it all on course fees. Instead you could dedicate the money you'd spend to do courses on just plain diving. That way you're not tied down to any particular place--you can pick up and go when you feel like it. There are a number of places you could go for cheap diving and living, but certainly SE Asia offers a very large area taking in thousands and thousands of islands, and you could just hop from one to the next for a few months. Thailand has been mentioned, but also the Philippines and Indonesia both offer great diving for not much money.

 

[nimoh]

cg, have you ever dived? I mean, did you ever do a try-dive just to see whether you like it? Because you're something of a 'water baby', it seems likely that you'll enjoy scuba, but there are people who simply don't find it as thrilling as others, and also there are people who have physiological reasons for not diving, so my advice is to take it slow, find out whether this is something you really want to invest that much time and money on, and go on from there. With the amount of money you are budgeting, you wouldn't really need to spend it all on course fees. Instead you could dedicate the money you'd spend to do courses on just plain diving. That way you're not tied down to any particular place--you can pick up and go when you feel like it. There are a number of places you could go for cheap diving and living, but certainly SE Asia offers a very large area taking in thousands and thousands of islands, and you could just hop from one to the next for a few months. Thailand has been mentioned, but also the Philippines and Indonesia both offer great diving for not much money.

For example, I have a friend that does not dive because he physically cannot breathe through his mouth without also breathing through his nose. Exhaling caused a slight leak in the mask, and inhaling caused him to get the little bit of water in his mask up his nose.

 

[cocoajoe]

You want to be a DM before you've even got a OW cert, why? How do you know if diving is for you? There are garages full of dive gear here in Florida that hadn't been used in years. Why? Because these people just knew they wanted to dive. Get certified and dive for a couple of years then decide if going pro is right for you.

 

[cg733]

thanks for the replies guys, I thought this would be the type of replies I would recieve, the reason for wanting to do the divemaster is because I figured doing the internship would be cheaper overall, and I wouldnt want to spend a lot of money on going back and forth from the uk and felt that if I was gonna do it then do the full bundle and that way I have more available to me after as well, but i think yeah, the best option then is to try it first then go from there, do you think i should try it in the UK firstly? or go to a tropical place?

 

[Johanan]

Why don't you start with an Open Water course? In a way the OWD is the most important course you will make in your diver's career. This is where you master the basic skills - the foundation upon which you will build everything else. Therefore it is especially important to find a good instructor and good conditions for that course. If I were you, I would find a Dive Center with good reputation as close to my place as possible. In fact, this is what I did. It is good to have good contacts with a DC close to my home. I take part in their dive tours, they service my gear and I rent from them tanks and some gear for good rates. If I can't come during their business hours, they leave the stuff for me outside, and I pay later. All that I have in 10 minutes from my home. Later you can take other courses somewhere else. I think, however, it is not such a great idea to travel to the worlds top dive sites to take courses. During a course you concentrate on your drills and excercises. Jolly fish will only distract you. One more aspect - there is a saying in my country: "Hard in the bootcamp, easy in the battle." After making courses in our cold, dark and murky waters, I find diving in tropical places even more enjoyable and relaxing.

 

[cg733]

that last point does sound like a very good point johanan