Things to do at the safety/deco stops...

[MNScuba]

I saw one of those underwater 'torpedos' at Wal Mart that you can toss back and forth underwater. I thought I would get one, but don't know how well it would work. Does anyone use anything to pass the time on the longer stops you have to make?

 

[dkerr]

Does doing business in your wetsuit count?
Seriously, I am just helocoptering (is that a word?)around to catch a last glimpse of that sea life/monster that I came down to see in the first place.

 

[MNScuba]

Now that you mention it, I am kind of curious what sort of marine life lies below the waters of these 10,000 lakes of ours!

 

[O-ring]

I read somewhere that Sheck Exley liked to read novels during deco stops....wonder how he pulled that off (ziploc bag, laminated pages?).

 

[Rick Murchison]

First of all, I don't recommend the "Toypedo" as something to play with at a safety stop - having played with these things extensively, I can guarantee that it'd screw up your "stop" as you'd be going up and down to catch the thing. (They are great fun at depth, where you can go up and down a few feet).
For safety stops, there is usually enough sea life around in the planktonic soup to keep one amused for three to five minutes - you just have to bring your view in nice and close and pay attention.
For deco stops it's not a bad idea to have something to read. Depending on how fast you read, tear out enough pages from a paperback to cover your stop and take 'em along. As you read just tear off the pages and stuff 'em back in your pouch, and throw 'em away after the dive. Don't take too many pages, 'cause once they're wet it's read 'em underwater or trash 'em unread after the dive.
Rick

 

[MNScuba]

Whew! Glad I didn't waste the $5.98 on one of those then! Thanks for the input.

 

[ckharlan66]

Murdock325,

While they aren't great for safety stops they are great fun in quarries and in the pool (especially if you are just tagging along to get wet while there is a class going on, they love to watch the idiots playing catch underwater)

Chad

 

[TexasMike]

If you're hanging with a buddy, you could do tic-tac-toe or the "dots" game on your slate.

Even better would have the buddy team learn sign language so you can have a conversation.

 

[CincyBengalsFan]

Hopefully there will be enough marine life around to keep you occupied. You could always start to log out your dive on a dive slate for future placement in your log book. Don't be suprised if you see games start to pop into dive computers just like cell phones.

 

[tombiowami]

A friend of mine has a plastic Yahtzee game that is six dice set into a piece of plastic that allows them to roll around. Not terribly interesting, but provides enough of a distraction/tasking to make hovering more challenging.

Tommy