Advice for traveling without dive buddy

[sixt3denied]

I'm sorry, but I have to take issue with this. Yes, a good dive professional can manage almost any kind of buddy. Even a good, experienced non-professional diver can do this; I have done it myself, as I like to take new divers out, and try to offer to buddy up with people who are visiting Seattle and looking for someone with whom to dive. BUT those dives are not dives for fun, for the professional or the experienced buddy. They are "working" dives, where the pro or guide's focus is the safety and enjoyment of the buddy.

Personally, when I spend the money for a charter boat trip, that's not what I want to do in the water. In my bad experience, I had two buddies who, despite my increasingly urgent signals to both of them, casually separated from one another and were completely unconcerned about it. At the point where I could no longer keep both of them in sight, I realized that neither of them cared a whit about whether they could see ME, either; the rest of my dive was spent watching the one buddy I could see, and staying close to him, at the cost of giving up on trying to scout critters or enjoy my own dive. (BTW, I would handle that dive differently today, but I've done some "solo diving" as a DM since. I had never done a solo dive on that day, and didn't want to.)

What someone CAN handle, and what they WANT to handle, are two very different things. It's simply unfair to suggest that a casual recreational diver cheerfully accept the obligations of a professional guide.

EXACTLY!!!

I am not going on vacation with a "tether" along with me to connect to my insta-buddy. Completely absurd. I am not an Instructor or DM. I go diving for the joy of the dive - NOT to hold an incompetent certified divers hand. I have no problem helping a fellow diver and buddy out with any issues that may come up in the course of the dive. My post was in regards to the CERTIFIED DIVER" that does NOT have his basic skills down - yet somehow got CERTIFIED and is buddied up with me and has in the past ruined or distracted from my dive. There are countless other posts on THIS BOARD of divers getting tired of dealing with poor insta-buddies.

Hey, if i'm on a boat and there is a newly certified diver and he has no buddy and we talk, i would be HAPPY to take him under my wing for the dive, and help him in EVERY WAY I can. But this is not usually the case. In my experience it has been a diver that has around the same or more dives under his belt than me. Many times they have had an AOW cert when I only have the OW cert. This diver should be able to control his buoyancy, equalize his mask, set up his gear properly, etc. If he has a problem, if he needs help with any of the above - just ask! I will help! But when they claim to not need help, and then the majority of my dive is spent babysitting them, chasing them up & down, dealing with their gear issues underwater etc- then I get annoyed because it is cutting into my dive.

I get to go away on vacation about 3 times a year to dive. I want the focus of those dives to be on the amazing underwater world. Not on an incompetent insta-buddy. If some of you don't understand that - so be it.

This is my last post on this thread. Thanks all for the advice. Hope to see you all under-water soon...

 

[motorref]

Do not push the GF into it.

I got a 19 cf pony, reg, and sling. It's a lot of work & money, and not the same as a good buddy, but still a good idea.

DD - how do you fly with that? The airlines I've looked at do not allow tanks, empty or full.

KL

 

[TMHeimer]

I've often read on SB that most airline allow tanks if the valve is removed. I guess not the ones you use.

 

[motorref]

I've often read on SB that most airline allow tanks if the valve is removed. I guess not the ones you use.

I think I read it on the TSA website under "Restricted/Prohibited Items" - guess I'll have to go back and read it more carefully.

Thx,
KL

 

[diverdorr68]

I brought a 120 cf LP steel tank out of the local airport here in Jacksonville, NC. a couple years ago on route to an international flight with the valve removed, no problems. Also, my sister brought over my 13 cf pony bottle in her carry on bags on a flight out of Charlotte to Manila last year, again valve removed. It was easier to bring the pony in the carry on bags as opposed to checked bags because it will be looked at, over and over. In your carry on, just a quick explanation will do. Do not know if there have been changes since then.

 

[flots am]

I think I read it on the TSA website under "Restricted/Prohibited Items" - guess I'll have to go back and read it more carefully.

Thx,
KL

The TSA is fine with it. The airlines (at least the airlines I've flown with) are not.

TSA: Compressed Gas Cylinders

flots.

 

[Nemrod]

I just flew with two tanks. The valves were removed and I put them in a suitcase. Do not ask why, it it to long of a story and kinda dumb.

N

 

[Tigerman]

Well.. Now I HAVE to ask haha

 

[Kharon]

I'll reiterate from my previous post - blaming insta-buddies is just an excuse by bad divers.

Hogwash and BUSHWAH!!!!! Seriously arrogant and pedantic, dude. How about if your insta-buddy and you are at 130' on a wall ready to ascend and he drops his camera and instantly shoots down after it - keeps going even though the camera is unreachable. I'm supposed to follow him down to 200' because he's a moron? Don't think so. How about an insta-buddy that screws up big time and makes an immediate and totally uncontrolled ascent from 80'. Race after him and get bent? Ef that. I'll make a safe ascent and see if I can help on the surface, sure. There are a lot of things, large and small that I can't help an insta-buddy with during a dive - no matter how much experience or how many dives I have. Perhaps you should rethink your overconfident attitude. Even you can't handle every situation. If you think you can you are dangerous.

 

[TSandM]

I actually agree with Andy, with everything he has written. The VAST majority of problems with instabuddies can be managed by someone with strong skills and good awareness -- but where he and I disagree is how much of that management one should be expected to do. All of the very nice advice he has written about being patient and helping someone else is entirely pertinent, if you have agreed to do a mentoring dive. If I've paid for a $100 or more charter boat trip to a nice site, I didn't do it to mentor somebody. (If I agreed to do the day of diving as a mentor, I think THEY would be paying for my charter! )

I have a friend who dives, and he is not a very skillful diver. As a result of technique issues, he creates a lot of silt and blows through his gas. He has dived with me and with my husband, so he KNOWS what better technique looks like, and his wife has actually taken some good classes to acquire better skills. But he is happy with his diving skills as they are (he has stated this) and doesn't intend to change. I wouldn't want to have him as a buddy off a charter boat, if I wanted to see anything on the dive . . .

I am very lucky in that I either travel with my built-in dive buddy (my husband) or I reach out into the community of which I am a part, and arrange a buddy in advance that I know will be a delight to be in the water with. But I really empathize with people who travel alone. My husband has made a couple of trips to Maui by himself, to see his father, and has gone out on charters and had instabuddies. None of his experiences have been horrible, but the quality of the "buddy" he gets is pretty variable.