Thailand diving for newbies

[Zippsy]

You can take the course and, as noted, you will have an Advanced Open Water certificate at the end of the class. Just don't think that you are really an advanced diver. That takes BOTH education and experience so don't race off right after class expecting to do drift dives at night in a 40m deep wreck just because you have the card. Does that make sense? Also, some operators may allow you to do a night dive but many others would not. Some may insist that you at least do the night adventure dive portion of the APW course. I hope this helps.

 

[stevenl]

Agree with Zippsy.

Also, opinions vary on whether to do the Advanced course straight after the open water course, or build some more experience first.

Personally I think the advanced course an excellent way to build more experience under supervision of an instructor, who will give lots of tips to improve your diving. Preferably a new instructor with a new view, just don't expect to be an advanced diver after finishing the course.

 

[Worldwide Dive and Sail]

Hi Lora,
You can perfectly do an advanced course if you don’t have much diving experience. The course will mainly give the possibility to dive deeper and do night dives. In fact, many people take both courses at the same time.
If you want to dive in Thailand, I highly recommend you The Junk Liveaboard – it does 6 night dive trips around the Similan and Surin Island. It’s a restored teak wood Chinese merchant vessel that has been used for several Hollywood movies! So the experience on board will be unique. www.thejunk.com

 

[stevenl]

Hi Lora,
You can perfectly do an advanced course if you don’t have much diving experience. The course will mainly give the possibility to dive deeper and do night dives. In fact, many people take both courses at the same time.
If you want to dive in Thailand, I highly recommend you The Junk Liveaboard – it does 6 night dive trips around the Similan and Surin Island. It’s a restored teak wood Chinese merchant vessel that has been used for several Hollywood movies! So the experience on board will be unique. www.thejunk.com

As operator of The Junk it would IMO be correct if you would mention that in your post.

 

[Scuba Cat Diving]

Do you think it would be ok to take advanced course when we have virtually no dive experience? I feel so far from advanced. Would there be many dives on the liveaboard we could not do with just OW? Could we still do a night dive as an OW?

Thanks for your help with these questions!

Hi Lora,
Yes the advanced course can be taken directly after the open water one. During this you will learn more about different techniques of diving. So you did the hard bit in learning to dive already, now you take what you know and apply it to a different type of diving. So how to dive at night, in a current, dive deeper, navigate better etc etc.
It does not mean you are an advanced diver who can do anything, it means you have training above that of the entry level and know the theory of what to do and how to put this in practice. Which is why it is an ideal way to do the course on a liveaboard as you have the instructor with you for the rest of the trip. They will know your diving level through the course and can advise you for the rest of the trip on ow to improve and make the most of what you have learnt to get the best out of the dives.
The main thing about doing the advanced course is it gives you a certification to 30m or 100ft. Many dive companies including us do not allow open water divers past their 18m certification level. There are many reasons for this, experience level, training and insurance reasons. If you are paying money to join a liveaboard to do some great diving, why restrict yourself in depth to 18m when some of the dive sites have some great marine life and features deeper.
Yes you can do a night dive as an open water diver, BUT do you know the techniques of how to do this?

 

[maat1976]

I learned to dive in Thailand, near Phuket. It was a great place to learn, and I was really lucky with my instructor. If I was you two, I'd do some day trips out of Phuket, and hire a divemaster to keep and eye on you and help you gain experience. I did not do my advanced right away - I just wanted to practice and see some fish. It was much more enjoyable this way. I would recommend Aussie Divers, which is owned by a guy named Darren. If you contact him with what you want to get out of your diving, it's likely he can assist.

For what it's worth, I was glad I did not do a live aboard at that point because there was a day or two that I needed a break - the experience was very exciting, but I was getting a bit peaked. If I was on a live aboard I probably would have felt I should do every dive possible.

I went on to do my AOW in Grenada with another amazing dive shop, and that's when I felt the diving REALLY started for me, especially with all the wrecks I got to experience. I started in Sept 2013, and considering I've only been on 3 holidays (3rd being incredible Bali), I'm pretty pleased with my progress and my awareness of my limits. If I could give one piece of advise, don't let ANYONE push you into something you aren't ready for. I'm very lucky because my husband is a DM, and cool as a cucumber under the water - he doesn't give me any grief if we have to call a dive or skip one I'm not ready for. We're off to Bonaire in 2 weeks, so we'll see how calm I can be when it's just us, all the time.

Best of luck and get some massages in between dives!

 

[Worldwide Dive and Sail]

You are completely right, Stevenl !