Welcome here, I hope you’ll find it as much of and diverse, pool of info as I have.
I’m going to begin with a disclaimer – mainly I’m not desiring to bash you – heck of an intro, huh? But I’m thinking you may have well added to your title “I just did a trust me dive trip…before, ‘Should I have been more afraid?’
Before anyone gets all riled up, I may not have all the info or have read it right and I’m not an experienced travel diver, I’m just voicing the way it looks to me.
It looks like you intended to dive in GC by getting certified prior to, and had some dives under your belt before arriving. But did not arrange with an operator before arriving, and went out with whoever had room for you at short notice. It looks like you just trusted you could go diving somewhere appropriate to your skill level.
There certainly could be a lot in the story left out. It sounds like you did do your best to present yourself fairly but I wonder if there was some, ‘they didn’t ask and I didn’t offer.’
Is it possible when setting up that first dive, you didn’t make a big deal of how uncertain you were about your ability to cope with a more open water environment? If so, I’m thinking perhaps you didn’t even know yourself – and you may have conveyed a higher new diver cmfort level than it turned out to be. Bringing your own gear strikes me as indicating a person is comfortable enough with diving in general to invest money in the sport.
Did you ask pointed questions such as how deep will I be going, what is the buddy arrangement or how do you set up the group diving? It looks like you trusted the dives would be within your comfort level and conducted as you thought they ought to be.
You imply you trusted ‘they’ would take care of you. And by such, either you needed taking care of, or your judgment of competency to do the dive.
Again I’m no expert but I’d think getting a buoyancy check first (1st in the water) would have been a better option – from my experience when new. But possibly there was only 1 DM and they felt more comfortable being right there with you.
I still don’t like being the last in off a boat myself, I feel rushed to catch up and uncomfortable when people are waiting for me. I’m afraid I have something to be afraid of, in haste I’ll screw something up and it triggers a sort of a pre-panic or anxiety response. Not saying that happened to you, just why I’d have preferred to do the check first.
I hate to think it but I wonder if the DM just figured he’d weight the halibut outta you quickly and be done with it. Hopefully you did know how to check and get your weight right on your own and didn’t trust someone else to given that abyss below.
I can’t make sense of I was rocked by the surface trying to descend. Did you have trouble descending? Was the wave action popping you up faster than you sank? Any hoo, there you are in a completely new environment, possibly all by your lonesome. It sounds like the deep blue aspect was pretty unnerving.
Ok, I’ve been there, I was uncomfortable. Sounds like you replayed what you were taught and considered calling the dive, aware anxiety and submerged is not a good combination.
Sounds like you chose to calm yourself down and continue the dive.
It’s unclear quite how a free descent and locating everyone ahead of you happened from such a distance. But well, I’m impressed. Being that new, in such a different place with nobody holding your hand, trusting you knew what you were doing was right and pulling it off.
But since you knew you had to arrive at 100’, you must have known before, that was how deep where you were expected to arrive. Somewhere you trusted that was a good thing or not worth missing out on.
So buddy was gone and you were at the tail end, you continued to trust something made it ok and continued. I just can’t find fault really with it since you chose to be there. Unless you think you had no responsibility for your situation, which I feel is an error.
So things got better, better enough you stuck with it and had an enjoyable 2nd dive and 2nd day. I get the feeling the whole thing was actually pretty exciting in a rising to the challenge sort of way. Your title – Should I have been more afraid?
Personally I don’t agree going to GC first was a bad thing to do. There were shallower, perhaps more suited to your experience dive options. But investigating before hand would be a good idea. With my experience, if I showed up at say a cave site unaware it was an overhead and went in any way because, well, I just did, it was all there was. I wouldn’t feel it appropriate to report I did it – blaming someone else for letting me do what I wanted to. I realize the proactive expectancy or watch out for everyone else prominent in diving, please avoid racing off on that, it’s just an example of taking some responsibility for what you get into.
As far as the buddy thing, did the buddy agree to follow your outlined plan, or just seem to have a different one than you expected or trusted he would? Did you just assume this plan discussion was going to occur at 100’ then he was gone before you got around to it?
In all it really sounds like you have come away with good memories and a number of eye opening experiences. But frankly I think you could open those eyes a bit more still. Your last paragraphs still ring of ‘I gotta find a way to get taken care of better’ and less of I am responsible for myself.
I don’t really agree you were ‘lucky’. Luck implies to me you had nothing to do with the outcome. There you were, on your own or away from the learning support and guidance. You were rational and wise enough to get the training and equipment to practice, to successfully do what new divers are strongly dissuaded to do because sometimes all does not go well.
I don’t think your trip was all that bad. I read a lot of excitement. The kind of excitement I too felt, and continue to feel, when sticking that big toe out in the unknown. And, the feeling of pride from testing ones self, I read a subtle; I knew better, I thought I could and I did!
We are taught (it appears to me) we are idiots and not to be trusted to do anything right because the consequences are dire. I fully agree with the dire consequences part. I don’t agree we all have no ability pay attention and do what we’re supposed to (not die.)
I also get the feeling you did not wonder if anything was really wrong until you told people about it. Those people (perhaps you’re trusting are right) think this was terribly wrong and you were lucky to have escaped the body bag accommodation trip home.
Well, yes there were some ‘wrong’ things per standards set as guidelines to keep the majority of divers from killing themselves as quickly as possible.
Make no mistake; I’m not advocating those standards be changed, I’m all for anybody choosing to follow them. However I also feel, quite strongly, following them is a choice. If we choose not to, it’s not somebody else’s fault.
As for the finding out about what you’re sticking that toe into, you’re off to a very good start. ScubaBoard is rife with people from everywhere, doing everything there is to do with scuba diving and just love talking about it. And, nothing I read made me think you weren’t going to have the time of your life, for a long time, underwater.
