Hi Kaaralex:
Thanks for the info. There is a video on YouTube about Long Jing and it shows the pygmy sea horses, which is something I definitely interested in seeing. What is the average depth of diving sites there?
Can you tell my what kind of wet suit you wear? Do you need to wear gloves? I am planning to go in July-August and is a 3mm full wet suit provides enough thermal protection?
By the way, did you rent your scuba equipments there or you bringing your own? I am considering bringing my own but it is not really fun to drag them across US.....
Thank you.
I hope Kaaralex will answer these questions for himself or herself, but I'll also chime in with my $0.02:
The depth of shore diving sites is usually 0 - 18 meters. Only a few get much deeper (e.g., there's the skeleton of a small wreck at Hejie at 32m - 34m depending upon the tide). Boat diving sites get deeper if you want (I usually go down at 26 or 28m to check out the gorgonians etc. for a short while), or you can stay shallower at many of them. Ask your divemaster for a thorough briefing before you dive any site, though, and then plan your dive and stick to your plan.
In July - August a full 3mm wetsuit should be fine, with water temperatures of 27-28 degrees C (low 80s F). Gloves are a very good idea -- not to touch the corals, of course, but because there are a lot of stinging hydroids, sharp rocks, etc., and you might need to use your hands to keep yourself safe in surge or current on shore dives.
I would expect Long Jing to provide good, reliable rental kit, but it's always better to have your own equipment if feasible. I always bring my own equipment wherever I dive, even though I have to carry the heavy stuff around and maybe pay the airline an excess-baggage fee. Long Jing is a PADI Instructor Development Center so their rental gear should be safe enough, but with your own kit you have the "muscle memory" of knowing exactly where your dump valves are, how quickly the BC inflates, etc. Up to you, but I'd bring my own kit.
You mentioned a google map: Long Jing's website has a map of dive sites here:
Welcome to LongJing Diving Resort As you can see from the map, most of Kenting's dive sites are shore diving sites. I suggest you do at least one day of shore diving, for 2 reasons: (1) if you've never done shore dives before, then getting some experience doing shore diving will make you a better, more well-rounded diver, and (2) some of Kenting's best dive sites are shore diving sites. Boat diving sites usually offer better visibility, but don't necessarily offer the same interesting marine life.
For boat diving sites, try Da and Xiao Lao Gu (Big and Small Old something-or-other), Dulijao (Independence Rock), and a couple others (although I'm not that fond of Maobitou (loosely translated as Cat's Whiskers or Cat Rock)).
One of the better shore diving sites you should ask to see is Hou Hua Yuan (the Flower Garden) -- it has a lot of beautiful soft corals. In New Jersey and Cozumel you've never seen soft corals, and the Flower Garden has the most and best of them in Kenting. The visibility there is never great, and in the summer you must be careful of the jet-skis overhead, but it often has a lot of great marine life: cuttlefish, mantis shrimps, pipefish, razorfish (I mean Aeoliscus strigatus, not Iniistus sp. or the other wrasses), banded sea kraits, etc. For the bigger unicornfish and the bigger parrotfish and schooling yellowtail barracudas, go to Qu Shui Kou (near the electrical power plant's Water Outlet); although the viz is never very good there, the marine life is often good. On the west coast, I like Shan Hai a lot. If you follow the ropes out to the far-away rock, it's very small but it has an amazing array of cleaner shrimps and Durban dancing shrimps, juvenile emperor angelfish, morays, many species of nudibranchs, and lots else. Off in the sand you can often find Kuhl's blue-spotted rays, or maybe garden eels. Lots of crabs and maybe some lobsters on the way back in; maybe a seahorse or a frogfish if you look very carefully. Other good west coast sites are Hejie and Wanlitong (not the little harbor in Wanlitong village, but the site further north). Both Hejie and Wanlitong are difficult getting in and out of the water, though, so if you want easy diving then don't dive them.
Hope that helps.
Cheers,
M