Precision Diving

One area of scuba diving education that seems to get little attention is how to pack your gear. My very first scuba diving vacation was when my wife and I got married in Hawaii and did our honeymoon in Tahiti. I toted a full sized, scuba suitcase from Chicago to Maui to Honolulu to Papeete to Bora Bora to Moorea, then back to Honolulu and finally Chicago. Each leg of the journey, I had to pay extra for the weight (and extra bag) of scuba gear. I carried way too much unneeded stuff. In today’s economy, the airlines are looking for any reason to bend you over and nail you in the keester with luggage fees. So planning how you pack, can save you some money in the future. (more…)

People always tell me how lucky I am when I tell them I have my own compressor to fill my scuba tanks. When I hear this, I roll my eyes. Little do people realize just how much work goes into owning a high pressure air compressor. It’s almost like raising a child. Many times you have to handle it with kid gloves and other times, you need to get more forceful. Just like with children, when it starts to act up, it will cause you quite a bit of frustration. Don’t be surprised if you make a lot of new leaches “friends” when people find out you can fill scuba tanks. (more…)

Many people have asked me if all I do is go scuba diving. While the activity of scuba diving is something that I cherish and love to do, there are other activities in my life that I enjoy doing that are not diving related. While scuba diving is at the top of the list of activities that I prefer to do, I decided to let everyone know of other activities that I enjoy. In the past, I have learned that when I focus all of my recreational time to only doing one activity, I quickly get tired of it. When that activity requires a lot of political BS (like the scuba diving “business”) it becomes extremely frustrating. So here is a short list of the activities that help keep me sane, mostly sane that is. (more…)

After reading through materials on diving and just recently diving with some folks from Europe (not counting the numerous work related experiences I’ve had with people in Europe), it is my impression that the two existing systems, Metric and Imperial creates an as sharp division in the diving community as it does in all other aspects of life. My own dive education has almost exclusively been in Imperial to date. (more…)