Scuba Diving: Diving for first time in Roatan

[daffy]

Hi, this is my first time posting to this group. I'll be visiting the
island of Roatan in early August and am seriously interested in taking
a one-day beginner SCUBA course, and possibly a PADI open water
certification course if all goes well. Right now Native Sons on the
West End is looking like the best option. As I am a novice diver, I
was wondering if anyone here might have any tips to offer me, either
about diving outfits in Roatan or about SCUBA in general. I am a 35-
year old male in good health and am a decent swimmer.

Thanks,
-d-

[news.newsguy.com]

Are you talking about taking your whole course at Roatan? This is your
choice, of course, but if I were you I would get certified before you go on
vacation. You probably wouldn't want to spend your precious paid for
vacation time with your nose in a book. Get everything you can done ahead
of time, and then you can use your whole vacation time for diving. You'll
be able to master some basic skills--buoyancy, clearing your ears, gearing
up, etc.--before hand. I think it would probably help with your confidence
level, too. Some folks will do everything but their last check out dive,
and then arrange to do the check out dive with a dive master at the dive
resort. Good luck to you! Jane

[harvey]

Roatan can be pretty advanced diving. Suggest you take All the pool
and classroom work available to you in your local Before you go down
there.

Take a few weeks to do all this, so you have '"Sink In" time for all
the equipment handling / bouyancy control / Clearing / decompressin
theory.

Was at Anthonys Key resort in April. Excellent facility, great diving;
great food, great staff, great guests...

- but they do have a chamber there, as well as a medical staff,

and it's doubtless not just for decoration.

It's truly great diving down there, but go down there prepared.

resort courses are great, unless something goes terribly wrong.

Take all the pool / classroom work up here first.

~C~

[chilly]

Native Sons will treat you right. You might also consider Coconut Tree.

Where are you planning on staying?

West End is where it is at. You shouldn't have to worry about language
barriers. The majority of instructors are ex-pats. You don't have to lock
into anything before you get there.

The diving there is pretty good, economical and not anywhere near as
tough as many other places.

Best of luck with the weather at that time of year. I'm sure you know what
I mean by that.

Ask me anything and I'll do my best to answer. I've got a 100+ dives off of
Roatan, both in the water and in the dives Greg was referring to. :^)

[chilly]

Mark and Andrea at Native Sons for me if you do use them. Have a great
trip.

Mark is a very cool guy. You'll really enjoy your dives with him.

Happy to hear he is still with Native Sons.

What about Joanie? You don't happen to know what happened to her? I know
she left Luna Beach and went to, I think it was Bananarama, but perhaps
she's elsewhere now?

[chilly]

Mark and Andrea at Native Sons for me if you do use them. Have a great
trip.

Is Andrea a tall slim blonde woman? If so, also, can't go wrong there.
She's excellent.

[chilly]

"harvey" <chandler7600**********m> wrote in message
news:58f8d4b8-5705-4d9e-93b6-7353f3823bd8@s50g2000hsb.************.com...
>
> Roatan can be pretty advanced diving.

Really? Where were you doing all this "pretty advanced diving" off of
Roatan?


> - but they do have a chamber there, as well as a medical staff,
>
> and it's doubtless not just for decoration.

No, it isn't. It's for the lobster divers.

:^)


> It's truly great diving down there, but go down there prepared.
>
> resort courses are great, unless something goes terribly wrong.
>
> Take all the pool / classroom work up here first.

Normally, I recommend taking your diving course at home, and as you said (or
someone said) taking the time to let it all sink in (no pun intended).
Scuba is a safe activity if you take your training seriously.

That doesn't mean that if you intend to take a vacation to learn to dive,
that one can't learn to dive on vacation. Seems to me, that if that is a
person's intent, then Roatan is an excellent choice.

[harvey]

On Jul 17, 2:07*am, "chilly" <slar...@shaw.canada> wrote:
> "harvey" <chandler7...**********m> wrote in message
>
> news:58f8d4b8-5705-4d9e-93b6-7353f3823bd8@s50g2000hsb.************.com...
>
>
>
> > Roatan can be pretty advanced diving.
>
= Really? *Where were you doing all this "pretty advanced diving" off
of
= Roatan?

My Bad, totally forgot;
Roatan is all 22 feet deep,
flat, sandy bottom

no drift diving,
No currents
no overhead environments


>
>
>
> > - but they do have a chamber there, as well as a medical staff,
>
> > and it's doubtless not just for decoration.
>
> No, it isn't. *It's for the lobster divers.
>
> :^)

JUST ?
( No Comment )

>
> > It's truly great diving down there, but go down there prepared.
>
> > resort courses are great, unless something goes terribly wrong.
>
> > Take all the pool */ classroom work up here first.
>
> Normally, I recommend taking your diving course at home, and as you said (or
> someone said) taking the time to let it all sink in (no pun intended).
> Scuba is a safe activity if you take your training seriously.
>
> That doesn't mean that if you intend to take a vacation to learn to dive,
> that one can't learn to dive on vacation. *Seems to me, that if that is a
> person's intent, then Roatan is an excellent choice.

Old Diver
Bold Diver

- But not both

Diver Beware . .

[daffy]

On Jul 16, 5:38 pm, "chilly" <slar...@shaw.canada> wrote:
> "daffy" <daffy1...@excite.com> wrote in message
>
> news:40828d8f-1228-4d70-a1eb-aa5806e5bb43@a70g2000hsh.************.com...
>
> > Hi, this is my first time posting to this group. I'll be visiting the
> > island of Roatan in early August and am seriously interested in taking
> > a one-day beginner SCUBA course, and possibly a PADI open water
> > certification course if all goes well. Right now Native Sons on the
> > West End is looking like the best option. As I am a novice diver, I
> > was wondering if anyone here might have any tips to offer me, either
> > about diving outfits in Roatan or about SCUBA in general. I am a 35-
> > year old male in good health and am a decent swimmer.
>
> > Thanks,
> > -d-
>
> Native Sons will treat you right. You might also consider Coconut Tree.
>
> Where are you planning on staying?

Probably Chillies; a friend of mine stayed there recently and
recommended it highly. Plus they're run by Native Sons.

>
> Best of luck with the weather at that time of year. I'm sure you know what
> I mean by that.

I assume you're talking about hurricanes?

> Ask me anything and I'll do my best to answer. I've got a 100+ dives off of
> Roatan, both in the water and in the dives Greg was referring to. :^)

OK, here's probably the most important thing I need to know right now:
Having never even touched SCUBA equipment before, Is it realistic to
expect that I can learn the sport over the course of a four-day open
water certification course?

[RTB]

> chilly wrote:
>> "harvey" <chandler7600**********m> wrote in message
>> news:58f8d4b8-5705-4d9e-93b6-7353f3823bd8@s50g2000hsb.************.com...
>>
>>> Roatan can be pretty advanced diving.
>>
>>
>> Really? Where were you doing all this "pretty advanced diving" off of
>> Roatan?
>
> The best Roatan diving is from about 150' to about 220'. It's been a
> long time since I was there, and maybe access to trimix is better now.
> My hundred or so dives there were all on air.
>
> On the CocoView side, there is a shelf at about 200' that is really
> spectacular. On the Anthony's side there are fantastic lava flows that
> swoop down from about 100' to beyond 240', which is where we always
> turned around. It would be fun to follow them down another hundred feet
> or so, but that would be considered pretty advanced diving.
>
> esg

You turned at 240' ?
The lava flows were so incredible at 400' that I thought I was
hallucinating.