Just returned from Cozumel and PDC where I did my first dives after OW cert. In some ways the experience seemed a bit "off" and I wanted to see what people thought. I'd been reading the forums a bit but I really had no idea of what to expect.
I got certified with my 10 yo daughter just before our trip to Mexico. I was a bit uncertain about how it would go for my daughter because some things take a fair bit of coordination and strength, and the classes are somewhat technical. But she did great on all the skills and the written exam. 3 days after our OW certification dives we were off to Mexico.
We were diving with Eagle Ray Divers. It looked like they were oriented towards families and new divers and dive/snorkel combos and we thought initially that a couple of our family would snorkel while we two dived. We later gave up the snorkeling idea so it was just the two us diving. In my emails to Chellie I of course told her that we were newly certified and my daughter had a 40 ft depth limit because she was Junior OW. Most reviews of this dive op mentioned how good Antonio and Chellie were and I totally got the impression that one of them would be on our dives. Note that this was our first dive on from a boat and I had NO idea what to expect and made many wrong assumptions.
We showed up at the appointed time at the dock. Also on the boat were another couple and their 13 yo daughter. I asked them if their daughter observed the 40 ft Junior diver limit (Junior is <= 15 years) and they laughed and said no. Their daughter routinely dove deeper and she said her record was 125 ft! I was surprised but thought that maybe this was normal in the scuba world that I knew nothing of? The DM said we'd be diving to 60 ft, and I didn't oppose it. Before, I was fully prepared to assert the limit for my daughter but after hearing about the other girl on our dive I remained silent as I didn't want to seem paranoid. This was probably my first mistake. Antonio appeared briefly to say hello and drove off to bring gear for me and my daughter. Even though we told them we needed BC, regs and wetsuit, they did not have them ready on the boat. My daughter's wetsuit was ripped in a couple of places but otherwise the gear was serviceable though worn. No sign of Chellie or Antonio after this.
Other things that were weird - At no point did anyone ask to see our certification. No one asked about our dive history, experience or time since last dive. I had told them in emails that we were newly certified but that was it. Maybe the crew already knew this, but it sure didn't seem like it. The DM asked what weights we needed and I said I wasn't sure, because we'd never dived in saltwater with wetsuits. I figured 12 # for me and my daughter figured 6# based on our limited experience. They give us belts with these weights. Belts were also new for us since we had only trained in classes with integrated systems. They did not ask us if we'd ever used belts before and we got no instruction in their use. We also did not have to sign any liability forms. The two other ops we dived with in Mexico made us sign a form, so I know it's not unusual.
Okay, so we set off on our first ever boat dive, first ever dive with wetsuits, second ever ocean dive (we'd done one 25 ft dive in Chankanaab Park the day before which was cool), second dive ever after our OW checkout dives, and this was a drift dive in Cozumel about which I had read many conflicting stories!
The DM said the time limit for our first dive was 55 minutes, or till the first person hit the limit of 700 psi. We all expected this would be the two us, so he briefly went over how he would surface with us using a SMB, then go back down. This seemed acceptable to me, though I imagined that the pre-dive briefing would be more extensive. Again, since I had no idea what was normal on such dives, I didn't say much. I assumed that part of all DM guided dives including this one would be a rigorous weight check once we were in the water, especially given our background, but there was no such thing. We got in, we were expected to descend. Another big mistake I made - I did not check our eRDP BEFORE this dive. At the time I did not realize that 55 min was the NDL for a 60 ft dive (I remembered from our 30 ft checkout dives that the NDL was 200+ min, so I was oblivious of the implications).
Chellie said in her emails that we would do a Giant stride entry from the boat (which we'd practiced in classes), but the DM said we'd be doing back roll entries. Again, I had a bit of anxiety regarding this new procedure for me and my daughter, but this turned out be the least of our problems. At bottom (60 ft) the DM inflated my BC a bit. I guess he thought I needed that. The dive itself was amazing - great viz and lots of life, so this part of the experience was awesome. I was the air hog and got to my limit first, so we signaled and started ascending. DM came up with us till we began our safety stop, then descended back to the others who were still at the bottom. I'm not exactly sure what happened with the SMB. The DM did use one, but somehow the captain got it back on the boat while the DM descended and we came up. My daughter and I had nothing to do with the surface buoy. We completed the 3 min safety stop and surfaced on our own and waited. Our time from descent till surface was about 40 min by my watch. The other 3 divers + DM surfaced a few minutes after we were back on the boat. My daughter and I had a SI of 1:24 on the boat, the others had less. We then prepared for dive 2. I was getting seasick by this time. They said when I went back underwater it would pass. I asked if the time limit for dive 2 would be the same, 55 min, and DM said yes. My mistake (4th or 5th by this point) was that I did not check our eRDP after dive 1. I completely went along with the DM, not realizing that given our times and depth, the NDL for dive 2 was 41 min! Why then did the DM say 55 min would be the limit? No idea. I'm sure, unlike us, the DM knows these limits really well. Do they not matter? I can't believe that can be true.
For dive 2 there was some issue with currents and DM said we had to descend immediately upon entering. We all entered around the same time and descended to 60 ft. True enough, my nauseous feeling from the seasickness went away and we had another good dive. This time my daughter reached her air limit first and I motioned to the DM that we wanted to ascend. He'd told us earlier that this time he would give me the SMB (which I had no experience using) to hold onto and that we would ascend on our own. Although not completely comfortable with this, I went along. This ascent was far from ideal. I dumped all air as I began my ascent, but for some reason, even though I had the same weights and more air left in my tank than in dive 1, I absolutely could not hold the safety stop and blew past to the surface. My daughter was perplexed at this but she came along with me. I was holding the SMB this time - maybe it had too much air and it pulled me up? Remember I'd never used one before. Anyway, we floated on the surface to get picked up. As soon as we reached the boat I felt badly seasick and nauseous and was dry heaving. I also had a few seconds of tingling/numbness in my hands. I was concerned this might be a case of mild DCS. The nausea lasted till much later that evening but since I was also definitely seasick, I wasn't sure what to make of it.
Dive 2 bottom time for my daughter and I was about 41 min, which was almost exactly the NDL given our earlier dive and SI. I didn't have a computer, only a watch, so I could be off by a few minutes here and there, but still. It shocked me when I realized this when I was completing our logs much later and went through the calculation on the eRDP. As far as I can tell, my daughter and I hit our NDL on dive 2, so it's all the more nerve racking that I wasn't able to hold our safety stop. But what of the other divers? They had a shorter SI, and one of them surfaced about 15 min after my daughter and I on dive 2. Even assuming an 8 min safety stop, she would have been clearly exceeding the NDL. I'm pretty sure she wasn't using nitrox. Do experienced divers routinely ignore limits? I was somewhat shaken, especially considering I had my 10 yo daughter with me. Fortunately, she did great on both dives, no seasickness or nausea or any other signs of anything bad, so I got the worst of it.
To summarize the main things that seemed off that day were 1. No cert check, 2. No check of our dive experience, 3. Exceeding the Junior OW limit for my daughter, 4. No weight/buoyancy checks, 6. Surface on our own using SMB without ability to maintain safety stop. I realize much of this is my responsibility, but I wonder about some of the others.
A few days later we did another 2 tank dive in PDC. Had to sign forms, show certs, asked about dive history, DM insisted on everyone sticking together and descending and ascending with her. This time both my daughter and I increased our weights by 2 lbs each and had no trouble holding our safety stops on both dives. But although the dives were good, we had to spend the first 10 minutes of our bottom time waiting at the bottom (on both dives) for another couple do skills for their OW cert, which I did not appreciate. This was done without informing us in advance. Is this type of thing normal? It cut about 20-25% of our bottom time.
I got certified with my 10 yo daughter just before our trip to Mexico. I was a bit uncertain about how it would go for my daughter because some things take a fair bit of coordination and strength, and the classes are somewhat technical. But she did great on all the skills and the written exam. 3 days after our OW certification dives we were off to Mexico.
We were diving with Eagle Ray Divers. It looked like they were oriented towards families and new divers and dive/snorkel combos and we thought initially that a couple of our family would snorkel while we two dived. We later gave up the snorkeling idea so it was just the two us diving. In my emails to Chellie I of course told her that we were newly certified and my daughter had a 40 ft depth limit because she was Junior OW. Most reviews of this dive op mentioned how good Antonio and Chellie were and I totally got the impression that one of them would be on our dives. Note that this was our first dive on from a boat and I had NO idea what to expect and made many wrong assumptions.
We showed up at the appointed time at the dock. Also on the boat were another couple and their 13 yo daughter. I asked them if their daughter observed the 40 ft Junior diver limit (Junior is <= 15 years) and they laughed and said no. Their daughter routinely dove deeper and she said her record was 125 ft! I was surprised but thought that maybe this was normal in the scuba world that I knew nothing of? The DM said we'd be diving to 60 ft, and I didn't oppose it. Before, I was fully prepared to assert the limit for my daughter but after hearing about the other girl on our dive I remained silent as I didn't want to seem paranoid. This was probably my first mistake. Antonio appeared briefly to say hello and drove off to bring gear for me and my daughter. Even though we told them we needed BC, regs and wetsuit, they did not have them ready on the boat. My daughter's wetsuit was ripped in a couple of places but otherwise the gear was serviceable though worn. No sign of Chellie or Antonio after this.
Other things that were weird - At no point did anyone ask to see our certification. No one asked about our dive history, experience or time since last dive. I had told them in emails that we were newly certified but that was it. Maybe the crew already knew this, but it sure didn't seem like it. The DM asked what weights we needed and I said I wasn't sure, because we'd never dived in saltwater with wetsuits. I figured 12 # for me and my daughter figured 6# based on our limited experience. They give us belts with these weights. Belts were also new for us since we had only trained in classes with integrated systems. They did not ask us if we'd ever used belts before and we got no instruction in their use. We also did not have to sign any liability forms. The two other ops we dived with in Mexico made us sign a form, so I know it's not unusual.
Okay, so we set off on our first ever boat dive, first ever dive with wetsuits, second ever ocean dive (we'd done one 25 ft dive in Chankanaab Park the day before which was cool), second dive ever after our OW checkout dives, and this was a drift dive in Cozumel about which I had read many conflicting stories!
The DM said the time limit for our first dive was 55 minutes, or till the first person hit the limit of 700 psi. We all expected this would be the two us, so he briefly went over how he would surface with us using a SMB, then go back down. This seemed acceptable to me, though I imagined that the pre-dive briefing would be more extensive. Again, since I had no idea what was normal on such dives, I didn't say much. I assumed that part of all DM guided dives including this one would be a rigorous weight check once we were in the water, especially given our background, but there was no such thing. We got in, we were expected to descend. Another big mistake I made - I did not check our eRDP BEFORE this dive. At the time I did not realize that 55 min was the NDL for a 60 ft dive (I remembered from our 30 ft checkout dives that the NDL was 200+ min, so I was oblivious of the implications).
Chellie said in her emails that we would do a Giant stride entry from the boat (which we'd practiced in classes), but the DM said we'd be doing back roll entries. Again, I had a bit of anxiety regarding this new procedure for me and my daughter, but this turned out be the least of our problems. At bottom (60 ft) the DM inflated my BC a bit. I guess he thought I needed that. The dive itself was amazing - great viz and lots of life, so this part of the experience was awesome. I was the air hog and got to my limit first, so we signaled and started ascending. DM came up with us till we began our safety stop, then descended back to the others who were still at the bottom. I'm not exactly sure what happened with the SMB. The DM did use one, but somehow the captain got it back on the boat while the DM descended and we came up. My daughter and I had nothing to do with the surface buoy. We completed the 3 min safety stop and surfaced on our own and waited. Our time from descent till surface was about 40 min by my watch. The other 3 divers + DM surfaced a few minutes after we were back on the boat. My daughter and I had a SI of 1:24 on the boat, the others had less. We then prepared for dive 2. I was getting seasick by this time. They said when I went back underwater it would pass. I asked if the time limit for dive 2 would be the same, 55 min, and DM said yes. My mistake (4th or 5th by this point) was that I did not check our eRDP after dive 1. I completely went along with the DM, not realizing that given our times and depth, the NDL for dive 2 was 41 min! Why then did the DM say 55 min would be the limit? No idea. I'm sure, unlike us, the DM knows these limits really well. Do they not matter? I can't believe that can be true.
For dive 2 there was some issue with currents and DM said we had to descend immediately upon entering. We all entered around the same time and descended to 60 ft. True enough, my nauseous feeling from the seasickness went away and we had another good dive. This time my daughter reached her air limit first and I motioned to the DM that we wanted to ascend. He'd told us earlier that this time he would give me the SMB (which I had no experience using) to hold onto and that we would ascend on our own. Although not completely comfortable with this, I went along. This ascent was far from ideal. I dumped all air as I began my ascent, but for some reason, even though I had the same weights and more air left in my tank than in dive 1, I absolutely could not hold the safety stop and blew past to the surface. My daughter was perplexed at this but she came along with me. I was holding the SMB this time - maybe it had too much air and it pulled me up? Remember I'd never used one before. Anyway, we floated on the surface to get picked up. As soon as we reached the boat I felt badly seasick and nauseous and was dry heaving. I also had a few seconds of tingling/numbness in my hands. I was concerned this might be a case of mild DCS. The nausea lasted till much later that evening but since I was also definitely seasick, I wasn't sure what to make of it.
Dive 2 bottom time for my daughter and I was about 41 min, which was almost exactly the NDL given our earlier dive and SI. I didn't have a computer, only a watch, so I could be off by a few minutes here and there, but still. It shocked me when I realized this when I was completing our logs much later and went through the calculation on the eRDP. As far as I can tell, my daughter and I hit our NDL on dive 2, so it's all the more nerve racking that I wasn't able to hold our safety stop. But what of the other divers? They had a shorter SI, and one of them surfaced about 15 min after my daughter and I on dive 2. Even assuming an 8 min safety stop, she would have been clearly exceeding the NDL. I'm pretty sure she wasn't using nitrox. Do experienced divers routinely ignore limits? I was somewhat shaken, especially considering I had my 10 yo daughter with me. Fortunately, she did great on both dives, no seasickness or nausea or any other signs of anything bad, so I got the worst of it.
To summarize the main things that seemed off that day were 1. No cert check, 2. No check of our dive experience, 3. Exceeding the Junior OW limit for my daughter, 4. No weight/buoyancy checks, 6. Surface on our own using SMB without ability to maintain safety stop. I realize much of this is my responsibility, but I wonder about some of the others.
A few days later we did another 2 tank dive in PDC. Had to sign forms, show certs, asked about dive history, DM insisted on everyone sticking together and descending and ascending with her. This time both my daughter and I increased our weights by 2 lbs each and had no trouble holding our safety stops on both dives. But although the dives were good, we had to spend the first 10 minutes of our bottom time waiting at the bottom (on both dives) for another couple do skills for their OW cert, which I did not appreciate. This was done without informing us in advance. Is this type of thing normal? It cut about 20-25% of our bottom time.
You need to determine your personal criteria and then look for a dive operator that matches it. We all have different ideas of what makes a dive op "the best" and what makes a great day of diving. 
