Need some vacation suggestions.

[pieter3d]

Sup everyone! I love diving, but haven't had the opportunity to for about 4 years now. I have 40-ish dives, most from training weekends and a few from a boat charter, and am SSI & PADI advanced certified + several specialties (DPV, deep, night, wreck, boat, navi, search). All my diving has been non-tropical, mostly off the Oregon and Dutch coast. 7mm wetsuits, 45deg water etc.... I've done a few dry suit dives too.

My co-workers have been telling me I am retarded for not taking my paid vacation days, so I have decided to take this opportunity to get back into diving, especially after I saw my sister's Australian SCUBA trip pictures (so jealous). Problem is I don't know anyone locally to go diving with, and I live in the damn Arizona desert.

So I was thinking I should go on some kind of group trip/package/charter deal. Meet some new people. I'd like to go somewhere tropical, but I don't really know where, or much about the good spots or deals, with high visibility and not too crowded with tourists and such. Caribbean? Hawaii? Guam? The Barrier Reef is probably a little pricey when you count the airfare.

Suggestions welcome!

 

[tomboyy]

I know this great place to go .. but only I and some hirtsue indians know where it is .. you'll have to pay all my expenses

 

[don Francisco]

Without knowing your budget in time and money, it's hard to narrow your choices even after eliminating the western Pacific. There are many great destinations in the Caribbean, Baja California & Hawaii. If you want to get in the most diving possible, think about a live aboard, or Bonaire, where the great shore diving keeps the cost way down. For some of the most beautiful diving, consider Dominica. For great and varied drift diving consider Cozumel.

While everyone has their favorites, this is your vacation and you need to figure out what you're looking for; just diving, good after diving amenities, night life, food, on land activities, etc. Do you prefer all-inclusive resorts, or do you like to get out and explore?

Without knowing more specifics, I'll make a general recommendation of Cozumel, as having a great balance of great, fairly economical diving, good after diving life, large selection of hotels from deluxe all-inclusives, to comfortable in town hotels and B&Bs, excellent air service from the USA and fairly low air fares. There's an added bonus in that it's just off the Yucatan, with great cenote (cavern) diving, and the Mayan ruins to explore.

That's just a few possibilities, it's time to start collecting travel brochures.

 

[RICHinNC]

Two places I would recommend. One is Bonaire....it is a pure diver's paradise. Lots of shore diving so you can save a good bit on boats. We will be there 19- 26 Sept...come on join us.

Another place is Barbados. The diving there is not as good as Bonaire...but good....and there is tons of stuff to do above the water as well.

 

[Rick Inman]

...Problem is I don't know anyone locally to go diving with, and I live in the damn Arizona desert.

So I was thinking I should go on some kind of group trip/package/charter deal. Meet some new people. ....

Have you checked your local shops? Most have group trips they put together where you can sometimes get good package deals and meet local divers while on vacation, and you can then dive with locally when you get back.

 

[mjh]

As others have said it depends on time and budget. Check out our site we have been to some of the areas mentioned above and have trip reports, galleries and slideshows. If you go solo don't worry as long as you are fairly social you will meet people no problem.

 

[NorthWoodsDiver]

Cozumel is great, I enjoyed it and it wasn't very expensive.

There are numerous places though, Florida has great diving and you dont have to travel outside the states for "tropical" weather and good diving.

 

[diversteve]

Now that it's warmer, several local ops - El Mar, Scuba Specialties and others run long weekend trips to San Carlos, MX (near Guaymas) It's warm water diving in the Sea of Cortez. Scuba Sciences is running regular trips out to SoCal. All of them also have regularly scheduled trips to the Caribbean.

Several of us are going to Invade the Keys this July. It's a long weekend trip sponsored by Scubaboard.

There are also several meet/greet possibilities locally. El Mar, Scuba Magic, Scuba Sciences, NDepth Scuba and Scuba Shop all have monthly meet/greets or other events.

Join AZScuba, we'll probably do something next Spring to the Caribbean. We have done so the past 3 years to the BVI's, Curacao and Roatan - this year is an exception due to our regular groups schedules. Please attend a couple of our meetings to get to know us first. A small group of us meet monthly after work, our next meeting will be one day next week. Details are still being worked out today so contact me this weekend if you're interested.

Hawaii's another option, airfares are really reasonable currently. I think Maui is some of the best diving I've done. A single diver has no problem there, I've buddied up with others on the boats and they also put a DM or two in the water on every dive.

From Phoenix, Roatan or Curacao are reachable by early afternoon on Continental through Houston leaving here the same morning. I've done both. Two weeks ago we left here at 5am and were on Roatan at noon.

Also CallesCafe, our local Arizona board guide has been hosting a meet/greet at least monthly, it's a good place to meet local divers. The next one is: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/so...17th-6-30pm-meet-greet-tempe-marketplace.html

If you want to local dive, there's a group that dives regularly at Lake Pleasant. There's a thread about it here.

There's also the Southwest Sandsharks forum - a lot of local divers post there.

contact me if you have any questions,

And welcome to Scubaboard...

 

[dkktsunami]

Awesome visibility, 6,000' wall straight down, and very few people - Little Cayman Beach Resort.

 

[Hoomi]

Okay; you're in the Phoenix Metro. You have several dive shops up there, with regular dive trips offered through each. About an hour and a half away, you've got us down here in Tucson, where we have two more dive shops that also offer regular trips.

Just a few hours of driving south of here, we have some of the resort areas on the Sea of Cortez. San Carlos has some incredible diving, and starting in spring through the fall, the water temperatures rival those of the tropics. A short ways north of San Carlos in Himalaya Bay, where we did our cert dives back in October. The temperature at the bottom that weekend was 85. I took a 3mm wetsuit, and never used it. The lycra skin was perfect. We plan on heading back this spring, and probably this fall as well.

The Scuba Shop in Mesa seemed like a very friendly and helpful shop when we visited there.

The Dive Shop down here in Tucson is the one we've been working through, and while their web page could use a bit of updating, they have quite a few trips scheduled. Himalaya is a good one for a relatively inexpensive weekend of diving, but the caveat is that the bay is 15 miles off the paved roads. My 2WD Toyota Tacoma had no problem getting down the road to the bay, but I would not have wanted to try and get a standard family sedan down it. Himalaya is strictly camping, but the shop has a trailer with flush toilets and a shower they provide for Dive Shop patrons. Their trips are also unlimited shore dives, and they have a compressor there on the beach. They have a number of tanks there, and the practice is to lay your empty down on one tarp, and grab a filled tank from the other. They also run Zodiacs out to more distant dive spots, and have a couple of kayaks available for the free use of patrons.