statistics

[carebear]

Statisitics can be manipulated. I would say there are quite a bit more snorkelers than divers, considering the expense of diving and it's relatively new accessibility to the general public. Almost everyone I know has been snorkeling at one time or another, but I know only a handful of divers.

 

[FreeFloat]

Zagnut once bubbled...
..before I started scuba diving. Now it's not nearly as fun. Anymore when I snorkel, it seems like at least once on each outing, I'll get into the underwater stuff, get distracted and then try for a hit of air off my snorkel and end up at the surface coughing my lungs up.

I was talking to a scuba diving friend of mine just today who said very nearly the exact thing. He said during a shallow snorkel, he'd be underwater, taking his time, looking at stuff, and suddenly realize that he's more or less run out of air and commence the mad scramble to get to the surface and breathe! I thought it was funny and told him he has to keep straight when he's on scuba and when he's not. He replied that it's not that he really "forgets" (like trying to inhale off a snorkel) it's just that it seems so natural now to take a long time underwater that he doesn't immediately clue in that he's not wearing a tank