Where to go for 3-4 weeks of diving and AOW cert?

[victorzamora]

Quick note on gear rental:
1) if you do but your own gear, I know a lot of destinations will give you a discount for diving your own gear, and a further discount for doing tons of dives with them.
2) if you ARE renting, you can often get places to keep the same gear for you for all of your diving so you don't change any of it.

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[Lorenzoid]

I don't know about other places, but I can tell you how it worked for me when I spent that time on Utila. I had my own mask, but beyond that I used all rental gear. It was quite informal. Each day I'd walk into the equipment shed, pick out a suit on the rack in my size, fins, BC, reg set, and then take it out to the boat and set it up. When the boat returned, I'd disassemble it, rinse in the rinse tanks, and put it back in the shed. I can't say that it works this way at all dive ops, and this WAS a few years ago, but I liked the simplicity and informality of the system.

As for discounts, once I had completed my courses and been diving with them for a while, I got a really good rate on further dives. (It helped that a friend of mine was an instructor there.) I suspect that some people stayed for months and did a DM internship just so they could dive for cheap.

 

[SandyDiverCur]

There's an operation on Curacao that dives mainly on the west side of the island that can recommend less expensive apartments and offers pick up and drop off in their prices. Bas Harts Diving has great reviews and supplies all of the needed equipment as well as taking you to all of the best dive spots.

Maybe check with them and see what they have to say. BasHartsDiving.com

 

[Eva Dirks]

I Think that Indonesia is a good place to go, and the prices are usually quite affordable... Variety of good dive sites around Indonesia

 

[Bryan Cunningham]

Roatan, ABC islands, Grenada, Dominica, Belize. All of these are very affordable, meet your requirements and offer good diving.
Bahamas, Caymans, Turks are too expensive for what you are looking for.

 

[sup]

I'm finding Utila exceedingly hard to get to. I see that I can take a ferry to there from La Ceiba, but I'd rather just take a puddle jumper from SAP or RTB to Utila airstrip. I can't find any way to book this though, and I've heard they only run on certain days so I'd like to get the schedule down before booking my flights because I'd like to avoid spending time in San Pedro Sula, which sounds horribly dangerous.

I also found that I have plenty of frequent flyer miles to get a ticket to the carribean, so this whole mid life crisis just got a lot cheaper!

 

[navi_jen]

Thailand is incredibly cheap once you actually get there. Food is very cheap, and you can find cheap lodging if you look hard enough. And, you can use pubic transport to get around and try different locales if you'd like. I spent a month there last year and was never bored. Plus, the culture. And the food. Yum.

Phuket is by far the most touristy and expensive part of the country, save Bangkok. Get out of there, and you can get a lot more for your money. Look into Krabi, Laem Song, Koh Lipe, Ko Kradan, Ko Lanta, Koh Kradan or Koh Tao.

Also, see if you can pick up some used gear. Should pay for itself and then some if you are going to be diving alot.

 

[Lorenzoid]

I'm finding Utila exceedingly hard to get to. I see that I can take a ferry to there from La Ceiba, but I'd rather just take a puddle jumper from SAP or RTB to Utila airstrip. I can't find any way to book this though, and I've heard they only run on certain days so I'd like to get the schedule down before booking my flights because I'd like to avoid spending time in San Pedro Sula, which sounds horribly dangerous.

I also found that I have plenty of frequent flyer miles to get a ticket to the carribean, so this whole mid life crisis just got a lot cheaper!

Dive ops on Utila will have the latest info on the puddle jumpers. Contact the one you anticipating diving with. They will probably point you to a travel agent who handles the booking.

I spent the night in San Pedro Sula before taking the bus to La Ceiba. I left my hotel to have a look around and get some food, walked a couple of blocks, didn't feel safe, and went right back to my hotel and ate dinner there. And I've backpacked in some dodgy places. Avoid San Pedro Sula if you can.

 

[sup]

I've no idea which op I'm going to dive with. If I had to describe my taste in dive ops, I'd say ones that are too laid back will frighten me. I'm really looking for the Starbucks of dive ops, or the closest thing to it. Places with good customer service and a focus on safety. I've dived with DMs that are surly and seem to think of customers as something they have to tolerate during a dive, and I'd rather not do that again. Also a place that takes dive education seriously, as I'd like to get my AOW, EFR, and possibly rescue cert with them as well.

 

[Lorenzoid]

Utila Dive Center is my recommendation. There are some reviews or reports here on SB if you search. I did my AOW and EFR/Rescue with them, and I was almost persuaded to stay on and do DM, as some of my Rescue classmates did. UDC's forte is dive education, and I suspect they do as much of that as taking vacationing divers out. Some have disparagingly called ops like this "dive education mills." But in my humble opinion, UDC is just what you're looking for.