How you met scuba diving

[deesjuh]

I have 2x been on holiday with a friend of mine. when we went to look at how expensive it was diving and request information. we 1x dived both the holiday and since then we dive together

 

[LarryHinDC]

I grew up watching Sea Hunt with Lloyd Bridges and I always wanted to learn. I never had the chance (or money) to try growing up, but when I went to grad school at UConn, one of the first signs I saw was an advertisement for the Scuba Club, which was offering lessons. I signed up and was able to finally do it. Of course, being a poor grad student, I couldn't afford to dive much until I joined the real world, but that's another story!

 

[ssidiv3r]

I started reading Clive Cussler novels when I was 10 and that's what interested me in the sport...lifeguard training courses

Same here, I started reading some Cussler books we had and then found my father's 1968 edition of "The New Science of Skin and Scuba Diving" dive manual; from that point on I wanted to get in the water so badly (partly encouraged by the underwater scenes from "Thunderball") that my parents got me OW lessons for my 15th birthday. It just so happens that I ended up working as a lifeguard for and later earned my assistant instructor cert through the same shop that I did my OW with. It's too bad I never knew about "Sea Hunt" or "The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau" (or Jacqueline Bisset ) until long after I got certified, and I think I only ever visited the aquarium two or three times in my entire life.

 

[k_im]

I grew up watching Sea Hunt with Lloyd Bridges and I always wanted to learn. I never had the chance (or money) to try growing up

It's interesting that Lloyd Bridges seems to have had at least as much influence as Jaques Cousteau. In the days when a kid's imagination did not require 3D graphics my cousin and I played "Mike and Larry" on the living room floor for hours. It took me half a century to persue my childhood dream, a discover scuba class at the old Koloa landing in Kauai confirmed what I had always suspected.

 

[Latitude 59]

Living in S. CA, being born part fish I wanted to dive so bad it hurt but parents refused for fear I'd get hurt or die. My dad got caught in killer rip current and had to be rescued by lifeguard. Scared him so bad he never set foot in ocean again. Couldn't convince them Jaws wouldn't eat me. I skin dove for years, stayed out till so blue and cold I couldn't walk hardly. Would go and talk to divers taking OW classes at beach, so jealous could hardly stand it. I researched libraries for underwater photography photo books and would sit mesmerized for hours pouring over all the creatures. Watched every movie about underwater possible. Unable to pursue diving till 40, descended in HI during OW check-out dives and started grinning so much reg about fell out of my mouth. The pages had come to life! I can still be found underwater, motionless, transfixed by some creature or scene and grinning ear to ear. Am still in awe of the masters who capture the underwater world so well it feels as though you are there with them, breathing in and out and grinning.

 

[OtherHalf]

Wife and I decided we wanted to do a full on honeymoon to Turks and Caicos for our honeymoon. I decided if we were going to the Caribbean for our honeymoon I'd want to go diving. We decided to get certified before we got married so that we could focus on having fun on our honeymoon. We had a blast down on Salt Cay and a used gear purchase here, and a used gear purchase there... well, We both enjoy it!!!

 

[Divegoose]

Like many others I used to watch all the Cousteau documentaries. Was fascinated by what lied under the surface, be it ocean or lake or river. In the late 70's I was studying fisheries management, and thought it may be beneficial to be able to get under the water and see first hand what was going on, so decided to get certified. Unfortunately jobs in fisheries management were few and far between, but I have maintained my passion for diving.

In the late 80's I discovered the west coast, and the great diving opportunities it presented. Made numerous trips from Alberta with our local dive shop to the west coast and fell in love with the area. Now many years later I live on the west coast and have the opportunity to dive whenever I want (once or twice per week).

In 2009 I discovered Cozumel . Have been there 4 times now (5th trip is in the planning stages) and absolutely love it. Best part of the trips to Cozumel are the great people I meet, and the friends that I make.

Divegoose

 

[RobinG]

I was deployed with the military to Panama during the unrest of 1989 (before the dust-up) and my boss, an Army officer, "ordered" me to take a certification class so I could join the scuba group and replace a guy who was leaving. I told him that was not a legal order and he laughed and said, so what. When we weren't confined to base, we worked in the OW dives and then dived every chance we got. We're still friends!

Bonus: I was scuba diving in Egypt a few years later and--still happily single--met a guy who became my best dive buddy and later husband.

 

[lionfish-eater]

Nelson and Cousteau were late comers, as well as ranger rick on flipper. It was the summer of '61, Bay of pigs, East Germany erects the Berlin wall, USSR detonates the largest hydrogen bomb ever, and there are only 2000 "advisors" in Vietnam. IN other words, the end of the post war boom and the end of the "innocence" of the 1950's. But I digress. I was three years old when mom and dad brought home the new television set. There were three or four stations to choose from, and very little in the way of children's programming. Then he appeared. Larger than life. Before we even thought about space travel or missions to the moon. Diver Dan. I was hooked. Nelson, Cousteau, and Bond fanned the embers for over forty years. About a dozen years ago, my young son and I were at an AI resort in Playa del Carmen. The first day we hung at the resort, but were both bored with sitting by the pool and waiting for the next meal. Too young to get wasted and piss at the swim up pool bar, we set out for other adventures. We went to ruins, we went to xel-ha, anything to be active. Then on our fourth day it happened. An instructor was opening the dive hut as we were taking an after breakfast walk on the beach. We said hello and he responded with "free lesson in pool senior?" We did discover dives for the next two days and went back to Minneapolis and got certified immediately after the ice was off the lake, 54F. I don't get to dive as often as I would like, but I think about it everyday.

Over 100 episodes on youtube:

 

[amoney]

South Florida, around the water all the time. When I was about 13 tagged along with family friends that were taking their boat for the day to dive on the reef offshore about 35'. I was going to just snorkel from above. It was pretty neat to watch them on the bottom. I free dived a few times to the bottom, one diver "Jimbo" took notice and surfaced and offered to take me down on his octo. Hell yeah! He reviewed the need to knows and down we went, we had a good hold of each other especially as I also had no weights. Spent 5-10 min. I thought it was cool breathing from a regulator. I didn't get certification immediately, as snorkeling off the beach on the 10-20' reef with another family friend for spear fishing was good enough. I thought I would save wreck diving for later. Got certified a few years later, as did many friends.

Had a great instructor while in central Florida, was a college credited coarse for the semester, so our basic open water coarse I felt was reviewed in detail due to the large amount of class and pool time. To this day comparatively we reviewed more then what you generally hear in the crash coarses. Granted they get done what they can in the allotted time, and while I am a fish to water I appreciated all the time in the pool, we got to practice out of air situations such as our buddy shutting off the tank valve. Our open water dive had to be fresh water due to bad weather in the Gulf, but its not like we were going to see much in the Gulf, we actually had a better time in the fresh water spring dive. We performed emergency ascent (without using a regulator) from 40'. Also at that location had a great cavern, and having gauged our group he offered to those that wanted to take us on a guided tour. Totally bitching, you feel me. Ha!

First year certified did other "basic dives", like 120' dive, did my first night dive in the keys for lobster, all the other dive buddy's helped psychedme up, not that I needed assistance but for example to see the demonstration of planning, my dive light failed, so we returned to the dive anchor where a jumbo Pelican light was attached as a marker/backup spare. I took that and felt like Han Solo waving the massive beam of light that seem to nearly illuminate the entire sea floor (compared to my tiny dive light before). Seeing the bio-luminescence.. Night diving is so much fun. Just been doing the standard Reef and Wreck's. Been to the Great Barrier Reef, Saint Lucia, lots of other dive stories and great experiences. I am just fortunate to live in a location that is just about on par with other great sites. Unfortunately I have seen our reefs in more and more distress. Once what was... its a shame. Dont get to dive as much, Buddy's all spread out, lack of time due to "life". Trying to make more time, seems like a lot has changed in the Dive industry, or the fact that Im just getting old (just seems like more staff are less knowledgeable, seems like that across the board for many industries), sucks walking into a store and knowing more than, and unable to have a discussion. I am a gear head, love tech, seems like less and less stores have tech savvy people, perhaps that is the result of the tropical resort scene, I imagine more hard core dive locations are better -quality over quantity of shops I guess. Have a friend that captains luxury yachts to and from the Bahamas, the stuff he shows me blows my mind, all the lesser known/visited spots, Im sure some on the board can attest to. I hope to eventually get to travel more, and get to at least experience a re-breather dive, it would make some local 150-200' wreck dives much more accessible/enjoyable.