Living Underwater Review

[Esox69LB]

I dove with Jeremy last February. my group chartered the boat for the week. Our diveshop instructor arranged the trip. He has been traveling 17 years, usually two trips per year. His comments were Jeremy is the safest DM he has ever dove with! We were all somewhat experienced divers and offered Devils Throat and a few surfaced with 300psi after very rigid safety stops.
I guess this sounds like a mixed review but thought I would throw it out there. I am diving with Fantasea out of Playa in May, but only because we are staying at a resort there.

 

[biggieb]

My wife and I were with MMM and Dave this week and had a wonderful time. Jeremy and his crew did a great job taking care of us. My wife did a refresher dive with Jeremy a couple of days before we went out and he was extremely patient and encouraging. I would agree that his safety level is very high and that is how I like it. We had some great dives and I would glady go straight back to Jeremy and his crew.

 

[lamont]

Hi Lamont,

I think you missed my point on the fills in Coz...it's not a case of the compressors not being able to reach 3500 psi versus being able to reach 2640 psi...the LP tanks were just as underfilled as the HP ones.....I think the issue is 'hot fills' that cool down to underfills and both the HP's and LP's are equally affected....my LP 95's ended up in the 2300-2400 psi range...my HP's ended up in the 3100-3300 psi range...Coz doesn't overfill tanks a bit to compensate for cool-downs.

okay... then about all i can think of are that LP tanks are cheaper than HP...

 

[yak]

LP120s have the largest water volume you're likely to find, so psi-per-psi you get more gas. Even with an LP120 filled to 2640 and an HP120 filled to 3000, you'll have more in the LP120. If its difficult to get 3500 psi HP fills on coz, then right there is your reason to go for the LP120 with the largest water volume.

Freaking big, though. Dive shop here used to have an LP120 and LP131 that were left around by a customer who never came back to pick them up. Huge tanks -- but still light compared to double-130s. The LP131 might be long enough that i'd start to kick the bottom of it, too..

I found them a bit cumbersome the first time hanging my butt over the edge of the boat, but then you forget they're there.

And I wouldn't do a deep dive like Devil's Throat with an AL80, I think that's asking for trouble.

When we dove with Jeremy, my Viper put me into deco while my buddies diving the same profile on their first dives did not. I like the idea of having a bigger gas reserve for situations like that.

 

[wfmiller]

I have not had a chance to write up my trip report on diving with LU the last week of Feb and the beginning of March this year due to being way to busy. My 2 cents are that they were without a doubt the most accomodating, curtious, professional outfit I have ever had the pleasure to dive with.

First off I wanted to get an early start so they picked me up at 7am most mornings at the Grands dock. I hooked up with another diver who was staying there also. He was diving the local operation and I was telling him about Jeremy and the extended bottom times and large tanks. After diving with LU Joe said that those dives were the best dives he has ever done in all the years that he has been diving.. We dove until our air was low period. I think I came up with an average of around 400 PSI and that's it. (My tanks were consistently filled to the max).

I had a list of dive sites that I wanted to go to which I pulled together from a lot of different sources (this was my first trip to Coz) and Jeremy made sure that we hit just about every one. The ones we did not hit were on the bottom of the list so big deal.

I wanted to see a splendid toad fish and Jeremey guided me right to one. He was amazing at finding critters for me to capture with my camera. Our trek to Devil's throat was a blast. The trips out were fast and comfortable even to the furthest southern points it seemed we were there in no time. The money I spent diving with LU I would have gladly paid lots more for the services rendered. Money well spent with a great dive op.

One guess who I will be diving with when I return to Coz !!!

One down side.... He needs a new CD to play on the boat!

More later but this thread went and got me a little hot. Some people are just never happy no matter what you do.


Wayne Miller

 

[rossandmaureen]

I have to chime in here as well and come to the defense of Jeremy and Living Underwater. Great dive operator, excellent Dive Master (as well as those who work with him) and more than accommodating. When I was there in November (and Kentmorrdave will remember this) Jeremy called each of us at our hotels early in the morning offering us dives to the north because the weather had changed and we could now get out there. Recommendations on this board as to great operators are pretty consistent and always include Living Underwater, Aldora, Liquid Blue, BlueXtsea among others. I agree that some people will never be pleased and it is good to know that I won't be running the risk of diving with this poster since he will not dive with Jeremy again...and I will. It should add that I have always been impressed with Christi's posts on this board. She doesn't use this forum to promote her own business and is more than willing to come to the defense of other dive ops when they are wrongfully attacked. I just returned from San Pedro, Belize and the local dive operators are not so cordial to each other.

 

[ggunn]

It seems to me that the best free advertising an op can get is for someone to post a negative review for them on ScubaBoard.

 

[Christi]

It should add that I have always been impressed with Christi's posts on this board. She doesn't use this forum to promote her own business and is more than willing to come to the defense of other dive ops when they are wrongfully attacked.

Only when they deserve it

 

[tomcat114]

Excuse my noobnes what is DIR ??

 

[ggunn]

Excuse my noobnes what is DIR ??

<bias warning>

It stands for "doing it right"; there's a subset of divers who have the idea that there's only one way to go about diving correctly, and they have published a set of rules governing equipment and practices. Many "DIR" divers I have met have been snooty insufferable bores about it, but to be fair, I haven't met that many of them. It could every well be that I have met more of them than I realize and they just didn't make such a point of being right about everything and all the rest of us, by distinction, being all wrong. It could also be that my viewpoint has been slanted by my exposure to a few unpleasant DIR divers and the majority are fine folks.