Nitrox Cert on Grand Cayman?

[shocked]

Thanks for the input. We will hold off on the CCR for now ;-).

Maladryne: Can you give me your thoughts on Cobalt Coast? We found it from a "Sport Diver Magazine" ad. How would you say the place is?

Thanks

 

[Damselfish]

Cobalt Coast is a very good place to stay, more of a small European inn not chain hotel like. Well kept, great owner. Nice suites, pleasant pool and bar area to hang out stones throw or less from dive shop, food's pretty good. It's a rocky shore, no beach there which may bother some people!


DiveTech "rebreather experience" is a very introductory thing, pretty much the rebreather equivalent of Discover Scuba. So while I don't know whether it's appropriate for you or not, it's not like actual rebreather training where it's suggested you have lots of experience first.

(We actually scheduled this once but didn't get to do it as they messed up and the person who does it had something else to do that day or something. But they did say at the time, they did the "experience" on a SCR and not CCR, and wouldn't do something like that on CCR. I don't know if that is the case now.)

 

[DandyDon]

Hello,

My gf and I are going to Grand Cayman in mid November.. We are staying at Cobalt Coast and will be diving with DiveTech. We have about 25 dives each and feel comfortable diving (we would dive much more, but we are warm weather divers and we live in the Pacific Northwest).

I'm probly older than your dads and loved Puget diving. Saw sights there one can't see anywhere else. But I did already own a 7 mil jumpsuit, heavy booties, heavy gloves, etc for a 62 degree spring we practice in here. Maybe you're not ready for all that? Well, whatever you enjoy...

Anyway, we would like to get our nitrox certification. I went in to our local dive shop (where we got our ow) and they said to just get it (nitrox cert) down at the resort. The thing is, we are going on vacation.. I do not really want to spend my vacation taking classes.. my local dive shop said it was just a couple of hours, and if I took the classes here (local) I would end up paying twice.

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

Thank you

Is there a problem with that shop, or were you talking to a part-time employee who maybe has no idea what he's saying? What is this: "...if I took the classes here (local) I would end up paying twice."

It's now a one evening course = certified! Nothing to repeat there. That makes no sense.

I don't understand why others here want you to do it there, either? I'd rather have it done in advance, and have a local shop to contact if something went wrong with the registration of the certification. I'm sure you could do it after you arrived, but I usually have better uses for every hour of my trips.

Have you checked with AQUATICSPORTS - PORTLAND, OR -

Any dive shop should over a complete Nitrox course - one evening of class & done! I don't think Nitrox is that commonly used up there so there could be some scheduling challenges in getting a class together, but you should be able to do it at any LDS.

Rebreather diving may well not be in your near future, but Advance Open Water classes would be a good idea there. I doubt you'd have any classroom to do and you'll be doing the dives anyway. Do 5 with an Instructor and get the card that is sometimes required.

I see your from portland also. I have been looking into the same thing for a trip to Thailand me and my wife are making in september.

There seems to be a lot of confusion about the PADI nitrox class and I coudn't get the same answer from multiple shops.

But like you ....it is my vacation I don't want to spend any time taking some test .

I found a shop in Vancouver Wa that offers the course monthly. Seven Seas Scuba - Home Page

This is from their website:

Class price is $125 and includes diver manual, enriched air tables, DVD, and PADI certification!! Dives are no longer required for this specialty so certification can be completed in 1 evening with temporary certification issued at the end of the evening! Start diving Nitrox NOW!

Hope that helps and I am curious where you got your OW at?

Jim

Vancouver is only 10 miles from Portland? Cool, and sounds fine. When I got my card I had to dive 50 miles for the classroom, then 200 miles on a weekend for the dives, and it wasn't that long ago. Glad they have stopped requiring the dives; that was silly.

 

[tvictory]

Cobalt Coast is a nice place and DiveTech is a good operator at all levels. One good thing about DiveTech is that they will loan you a dive computer at no charge. So if you don't already have a nitrox computer you can use one of theirs. Of course you still need to know the nitrox tables to pass the certification wherever you take the course.

 

[Maladryne]

Maladryne: Can you give me your thoughts on Cobalt Coast?

Awesome. We stayed a week last year, and enjoyed it so much that we went back this time for two.

The owner, Arie, lives on site and makes you feel like you're an old friend coming to stay with him for a while. Great food, great hotel staff, clean comfortable rooms. You're off the beaten path, so either rent a car or just chill at the resort and dive, dive, dive. There's not much else to do there; if you're interested in doing something other than diving and/or chilling, you'll be going for a little drive.

DiveTech are top-notch, and I have no reservations about recommending them. My wife and I almost looked forward to our afternoon shore dives more than the morning boat dives... the reef out in front of Cobalt Coast is that good. I was an instructor/boat skipper in GC in the late 80s/early 90s; when going back now as dive travelers, we wouldn't want to stay anywhere else. In the interest of full disclosure, though, we used to live right in the near vicinity of where the hotel is now, so we're pretty biased towards West Bay.