BrandonTL
Registered
TLDR: Skip to the last paragraph
My girlfriend (and dive buddy) are planning a liveaboard trip for March (2024). But our naivety is causing us to have to pivot from our original plan and figure out what else we can do. We have never been on a liveaboard before, but out plan was to book a liveaboard trip in Galapagos. We found several that looked great after figuring out budget and itinerary and all of the things, were just about to pull the trigger on the plan and realized that we are nowhere near experienced enough for the requirements. Again, we should have known better but in our naivety/inexperience it didn't even occur to use that there would be a minimum logged dives requirement.
My girlfriend and I have done all of our dives and certs together so we are both at exactly the same level of experience. We are Padi AOW, which means we have the right certification for these liveaboard, but we only have 14 logged dives (I know, that is not very many at all, we would be doing more dive on this one trip than we have already logged). Our dives have ranged from warm clear visibility saltwater dives in the Caribbean, to deep cold freshwater dives in Lake Michigan. So we have some variety of experience just not the volume of experience.
All of the liveaboards that I could find (that actually had diving, vs just the snorkeling | Adventure ones) in the Galapagos had a requirement of 50 minimum logged dives. After a bit more research, it seems that this is specific to the Galapagos and due to the more challenging diving conditions there. I am not upset about the requirements at all. I am glad that they are not putting people's lives at risk by having people diving beyond their capabilities. I also recognize that a certification is no substitute for experience and we are just noobies. We will put our Galapagos trip on hold for now and due it in the future after we have more experience. So... Now we just need to figure out where we are going in March!
Ok... sorry about all that background, now I will get to my point, and my biggest fear. All of the trips that we were looking at in the Galapagos had plenty of land excursions along with ~20 dives. That mix really appealed to us. Since we wont be able to make the Galapagos work for now, we are looking for other locations (somewhere in the Americas due to time constraints, so mostly looking in the Caribbean, and Pacific areas near Central America). We are finding a lot of trips that would work with our timeline and budget, but the one thing we are not finding are any that have any real time on land. Most have some fun thing to do on land on the second to last day (my assumption is that it is for getting time without diving before flying). Most of these trips are Saturday to Saturday and as far as I can tell, we would be on the boat with no land activities from Sunday through Friday Evening. My biggest fear about being on a boat in the open ocean, for days... Is being bored.
I know we would have a ton of fun and adventure on any of these trips. And with 20+ dives, a lot of our time would be occupied just with diving and recovering from dives. Then there are meals and just "taking it all in". But how else would we occupy our time beyond that? Last thing I want is to be floating out in the middle of the ocean, bored out of my mind, wondering why we are there? A day or two like this doesn't scare me too much, but by day 5 or 6... Would we be going nuts?
So I am looking for advice in two ways... Do you know of any liveaboards in warm tropical Western Hemisphere locations that do not require more than 14 logged dives, that still offer lots of diving daily, that also have a decent amount of land excursions, like the trips I found in the Galapagos? Or if that is too much to hope for... What have been your experiences with liveaboards where you don't get to land for several days? Do you go crazy? How do you occupy yourselves? Sorry for posting the novel here, and thank you so much for any thoughts or advice you may be able to offer.
My girlfriend (and dive buddy) are planning a liveaboard trip for March (2024). But our naivety is causing us to have to pivot from our original plan and figure out what else we can do. We have never been on a liveaboard before, but out plan was to book a liveaboard trip in Galapagos. We found several that looked great after figuring out budget and itinerary and all of the things, were just about to pull the trigger on the plan and realized that we are nowhere near experienced enough for the requirements. Again, we should have known better but in our naivety/inexperience it didn't even occur to use that there would be a minimum logged dives requirement.
My girlfriend and I have done all of our dives and certs together so we are both at exactly the same level of experience. We are Padi AOW, which means we have the right certification for these liveaboard, but we only have 14 logged dives (I know, that is not very many at all, we would be doing more dive on this one trip than we have already logged). Our dives have ranged from warm clear visibility saltwater dives in the Caribbean, to deep cold freshwater dives in Lake Michigan. So we have some variety of experience just not the volume of experience.
All of the liveaboards that I could find (that actually had diving, vs just the snorkeling | Adventure ones) in the Galapagos had a requirement of 50 minimum logged dives. After a bit more research, it seems that this is specific to the Galapagos and due to the more challenging diving conditions there. I am not upset about the requirements at all. I am glad that they are not putting people's lives at risk by having people diving beyond their capabilities. I also recognize that a certification is no substitute for experience and we are just noobies. We will put our Galapagos trip on hold for now and due it in the future after we have more experience. So... Now we just need to figure out where we are going in March!
Ok... sorry about all that background, now I will get to my point, and my biggest fear. All of the trips that we were looking at in the Galapagos had plenty of land excursions along with ~20 dives. That mix really appealed to us. Since we wont be able to make the Galapagos work for now, we are looking for other locations (somewhere in the Americas due to time constraints, so mostly looking in the Caribbean, and Pacific areas near Central America). We are finding a lot of trips that would work with our timeline and budget, but the one thing we are not finding are any that have any real time on land. Most have some fun thing to do on land on the second to last day (my assumption is that it is for getting time without diving before flying). Most of these trips are Saturday to Saturday and as far as I can tell, we would be on the boat with no land activities from Sunday through Friday Evening. My biggest fear about being on a boat in the open ocean, for days... Is being bored.
I know we would have a ton of fun and adventure on any of these trips. And with 20+ dives, a lot of our time would be occupied just with diving and recovering from dives. Then there are meals and just "taking it all in". But how else would we occupy our time beyond that? Last thing I want is to be floating out in the middle of the ocean, bored out of my mind, wondering why we are there? A day or two like this doesn't scare me too much, but by day 5 or 6... Would we be going nuts?
So I am looking for advice in two ways... Do you know of any liveaboards in warm tropical Western Hemisphere locations that do not require more than 14 logged dives, that still offer lots of diving daily, that also have a decent amount of land excursions, like the trips I found in the Galapagos? Or if that is too much to hope for... What have been your experiences with liveaboards where you don't get to land for several days? Do you go crazy? How do you occupy yourselves? Sorry for posting the novel here, and thank you so much for any thoughts or advice you may be able to offer.
