What is the best environment to learn to dive in?

[siikik]

I suppose it was different when I got certified... we "learned" in a [heated] pool. Which was great until the heater broke one week during the winter. Did first OW dives in a spring and the last two dives in the ocean... still dive both.



Ken

 

[Blackwood]

I agree with previous sentiments that diving education is best done in the environment where most of your diving will take place.

 

[DiverLS]

OW &AOW at Lake Tahoe, NV The surface intervals were fantastic, diving - Boring - my instructor found a piece of orange tape from a construction stake for my "memento". We were supposed to do our Checkout dives at Monterey. Yea - a bunch of starving college students.

Now I dive all over the world. I don't do warm much - too crowded. I still think having the Pacific ocean about 5 hours away is fantastic with the kelp dives.

Oh- did Rescue at Lake Tahoe also. Real easy to find stripped gear.

 

[TSandM]

I'm going to phrase it slightly differently: Train where diving is the most available to you, because the only thing that will make you a good diver is diving a lot. If you're in the UK and your available local diving is dark and cold, train there, and dive there. Your tropical vacation trips will be ridiculously easy for you, and you'll be acclimatized to your local diving (and hopefully enamored of it) so that you don't go long stretches without getting in the water.

If you live somewhere where there really ISN'T any locally available diving (and that's hard to imagine -- there's SOME water almost everywhere) then train where your vacation trips will go.

 

[ligersandtions]

I learned to dive in Cozumel, where the water is warm and clear. I figured I'd be a vacation diver....but when we were diving there, I realized I loved it and didn't want to do it only once a year. So when we got back home in socal, we went diving in the 55 degree water that had a surf entry and 5-10 feet of visibility. For some reason, I never had any issue transitioning from the tropical, clear water of Cozumel, to the murky, cold water of socal....

I understand the sentiment in training in the conditions you plan to dive in, but I didn't have any issue transitioning from great conditions to okay conditions. But at the same time, I would NEVER think it's okay for me to go from where I am to ice diving without getting proper training.

 

[askdjasd]

So, firstly I thought I'd ask where did people learn to dive and did they think the environment was a particularly good one to learn in?

For instance, did you learn in crystal clear, warm water whilst pottering around on a reef? Or was a local frozen gravel pit with 1m vis and a rumour that there was a fish in there?

Did the enviroment help or hinder your enjoyment? Was it a challenge that you think helped you learn?

Dive cold waters was fantastic for me. learn to deal with poor vis (if we get 20' vis here.. we're super happy!), cold, dry suits.
so when i hit the tropics, i wont have to wear as much, my bouyancy will be perfect (no dry suit) and i'll be ultra happy with spectacular vis and wont complain if it's only 30'

 

[msg]

Most of my diving is done in the quarries. I did my OW and AOW dives in the quarry and visibility can vary quite a bit. It is cold but it won't prepare for currents. But as stated earlier, train where you plan to do the most diving.

 

[Hank658]

Just curious but how does an instructor certify you in just 1ft of vis? I recall having to do skills and crap. Plus, a student could just bolt for the surface and the instructor wouldn't know it for some time. Sounds like a pain for both student and teacher.

Come on up to NY and let's dive in the Long Island Sound. On a great day about 8-10' viz. On a not so good day, about 1-3'. Cert dives can be done. One student (maybe two...) per Instructor. The nav swim is really fun- if you can make it back to where you started from then you really understand the idea of navigation.
Divers who get used to this kind of diving usually find it real easy to dive in warm, clear water.

 

[farsidefan1]

I live in the desert, oh, and where the winter olympics were held. Screw diving where you have access! I'm a vacation diver to warm places with lots of interesting things to see. Of course I go on about 5 vacations a yr.

 

[seaducer]

So, firstly I thought I'd ask where did people learn to dive and did they think the environment was a particularly good one to learn in?

For instance, did you learn in crystal clear, warm water whilst pottering around on a reef? Or was a local frozen gravel pit with 1m vis and a rumour that there was a fish in there?

Did the enviroment help or hinder your enjoyment? Was it a challenge that you think helped you learn?

I learned in cool dark waters in the Northeast of the US. My checkout dives were in 50ish degree water, and vis was about 10 feet when we entered, and considerably less shortly after, IIRC. My next 30 dives or so were in the same waters, though they warmed up to the mid to high 70's.

I think it is a fine place to learn, challenging but not so hard as to be impossible, they make you a better diver IMO. It seriously added to my enjoyment, as these are my local waters and I fantasized for decades what was under the surface. I was not dissapointed in the least.