Looking for a dive buddy in Maui

cougar · Jun 29, 2003

I'll be in Maui July 13th -29th. Part of that time time my brother will be there...but for other times...I'd love to find another dive buddy. I am AOW and will be taking the Rescue Diver course with South Pacific Dive School the first few days I am there. I am a very competent 53 y/o female...gender of dive buddy is irrelevant as long as you are a competent diver and have a sense of humour. Let me know if you might be around during that time frame

Al Mialkovsky · Jul 6, 2003

First of all tell Billy from South Pacific Dive School hi from Al and Jill. I suggest you ask him about upgrading your AOW to include two boat dives. You won't regret them. He uses the boat out of B & B Scuba and they are my favorite, great people. You can do your deep dive on the backwall of Molokini and maybe get a wreck dive in on the same trip. If you you can do a boat dive certification.

As far as getting someone to dive with I found it fairly easy to just hit on a group at Ulua as so many people dive there. Billy will probably do a couple of your dives at that beach too. Airport beach at the west end also has lots of divers. Sometimes you can hit dive shops to look for partners.

I have dove solo there myself several times on areas that I know well. I know that's another can of worms, but I've done hundreds of solo dives.

Backtanner · Jul 12, 2003

I'm curious about South Pacific Dive School. Does he do any of the actual diving or instruction or does he pawn it off to B+B? My wife and I booked an outing with him in Dec and we never saw him. It was like using one of the activity desks where you have to do a timeshare presentation only no desk or presentation if that makes sense.
It might be worth your while to see much it is from B+B and just cut out the middle man.

Backtanner · Jul 12, 2003

Al Mialkovsky · Jul 12, 2003

Backtanner once bubbled...
I'm curious about South Pacific Dive School. Does he do any of the actual diving or instruction or does he pawn it off to B+B? My wife and I booked an outing with him in Dec and we never saw him. It was like using one of the activity desks where you have to do a timeshare presentation only no desk or presentation if that makes sense.
It might be worth your while to see much it is from B+B and just cut out the middle man.

South Pacific Dive School is now a one man operation where in the past Billy had other instructors working for him. But back in December I suspect he must have been either sick or out of the area. He is friends with Brad from B & B and does all his boat dives with them.

There would be nothing wrong with going with B&B in my book either. My wife did her OW and AOW with South Pacific and she did her boat dives on B&B's boat. On her wreck dive certification Billy wasn't there so Brad signed her off.

Where you happy with that B&B did for you? I suspect you were.

Molelisa · Jul 13, 2003

In planning for my trip in two weeks, I was about to schedule with South Pacific Dive School. Before I committed, I did a search on the outfit to get background info (reputation, etc.) and this is what I found:

William Digbey, the owner, has not been a PADI member since January, 2003, and is not allowed to certify divers, though they still advertise for it on their website.

You can find the official information at:

www.padi.com/english/common/courses/qm/report.asp

and

www.hawaii.bbb.org/commonreport.html?compid=52000239

Good luck and see ya in Maui!

Al Mialkovsky · Jul 13, 2003

Interresting Molelisa since my wife just did AOW with SPDS back in May and just received her PADI card.

Wonder what's up with that?

Al Mialkovsky · Jul 13, 2003

I remember Billy telling me that he's having trouble with PADI because he went and purchased the rights to padihawaii.com and if you click on this http://www.padihawaii.com/ you will see that it leads directly to his website.

I clicked on the better business link you provided and see that in his 8 years of business he has 8 complaints. He isn't a member of the BBB and doesn't have to respond. The reason they gave him a thumbs down is because he didn't respond to customers complaints, to them.

Anyway I can see you've done your homework. So who have you decided on?

Molelisa · Jul 14, 2003

I'm staying in Kihei, so I'd like to stay in that area for the class. Which beach does B & B use? Several people have recommended B & B, and I've heard them mentioned in trip reports as well, so I'm leaning toward them. I just don't want to travel up to Lahaina every day.

I've never been to Maui and the wait is excruciating!!! The last few days have been so slow-- the next 12 days are going to
draaaagggggggg

Li

Al Mialkovsky · Jul 14, 2003

I believe they use Ulua. A very easy access type beach, sandy entrance and the second reef is nice. Vis won't be so great this time of the year, but that isn't really a big deal.

The great thing about B&B is quite often, to make it easy on themselves, they will have you do a couple of your dives off the boat instead of off the shore. This is a heck of a deal.

We love those people. Brad and Blesi are fantastic. In fact on their boats they have more divemasters than most. Usually it's no more than 3 divers per leader. I've been on boats where it's way more than that.

Since they know us most of the time my wife and I dove alone. So that meant even fewer divers per leader.

I'm sure you'll love Maui and diving there. We really miss it.

Looking for a dive buddy in Maui

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