Questions - first time diving the Galapagos

[Dan]

I went there in December 2016. I got few tips from other SB members & post my trip report here: How is diving in Galapagos in December?

Just to add a few more tips:
1. Practice negative entry.
2. Practice to launch DSMB.
3. Have inner layer to add after 3 days of diving.

My rules of thumb on wetsuit (for me) is to add 1lb lead for 1mm thicker thickness:
1mm for > 80F water with 10lb lead
3mm for 75-80F water with 12lb lead
5mm for 70-75F water with 14lb lead
7mm with 2mm hood for 65-70F water with 16lb lead.

You may be more cold tolerance since you live in Canada.

 

[Dan]

Just came back from Channel Islands, another cold-water diving sites, needing 7mm full wetsuit with 2mm hood. The reason I post this comment here is because the similarity of water temperature, especially when you go to Wolf down to 100' deep to see the red-lip batfish. The thermocline dropped the temperature down to 59F (15C).

A new 7mm wetsuit user (with similar body built like me, 5'9", 155lbs, wearing 12lb lead in warm-water diving with 3mm wetsuit) complained about not being able to sink with 16lb lead. He ended up adding 8lbs to a total of 24lbs lead. I forgot to mention to him about the need to do negative entry to wet the wetsuit, to get rid of the air trapped in the wetsuit and to compress any remaining bubbles in the wetsuit. Once you pass that first checkout dive hurdle, the rest of the dives would be fine.

Diving with overweight gears is just inefficient. You will consume more air. Having a lot of air in BCD to balance the overweight would mess up your buoyancy where you have to inflate & deflate your BCD constantly, ending up with a yo-yo diving. So, spend time in the checkout dive to get your dive weight at the right amount. That right amount means you will sink very slowly with completely wet wetsuit with no air in BCD & stay neutrally buoyant at safety stop with no air in BCD & 500psi air left in your AL80 tank.

Having the neutrally buoyant gears you will be more relax in the water and hence consume less air. I monitor my air consumption from the early day of my diving experience to date. It went down from 0.9 cfm 13 years ago to 0.4 cfm today. What limit my dive time before was the air consumption. Now it is my NDL. Most of my dives I'll end up with 800-1200 psig left in my AL80 tank by the time I reach NDL.

Have fun in Galapagos!