My intro to our anticipated dive opt in roatan

Hey guys. We leave for our first dive vacation in less than a month. I planned the flights to and from. My gf planned the hotel stays, inter island travel, and rain forest hike. Now i'm planning meals, topside adventures, dive opts and basic intra day activities.

Below is an email I typed out to the dive opt that we are thinking of using for the last half of our trip.

I offer posting it here in hopes that you'll review it and either offer advice yourself or lending guidance towards it's legitimacy. Here in chicago people are live mostly to themselves. I thought i'd reach out a bit and offer our experience and questions ahead of time thinking that maybe it would be beneficial and rewarding. What do you guys think? Stupid or worthwhile? Informative or lame? Anything that I should've included? Should I send this email to other opts and weigh the feedback (their level of openess and communication) when making a decision?

I'll let you guys decide. Thanks for your time.

Hi,

We are coming to your island on April 16th and would like to establish communication w/ a dive opt before our departure.

My girlfriend, Heather, took me snorkeling a year ago off the florida keys and I fell in love w/ the experience. We came home and signed up for scuba certification.

Our only ow experience is 3 certification dives (the 3rd being an amazing shark dive) in the bahamas last august, but or fun ended there as we had to return to the miserable chicago tundra and the agonizing torture of mind altering inter and intra office politics.

We are incredibly excited about our 9 day vacation to the tropics. like everyone we want to re-live the meditative like experience of buoyancy surrounded by the surreal tropical reefs of Roatan., but w/ age comes wisdom as we already have signed up for a refresher course at a local shop.

I thought it would make sense describing our comfort level and our awareness of our inexperience and desire for safety so the dive opt that we choose will have a better feel for what may and may not be our safe diving parameters.

Heather is a strong swimmer who swam competitively as a child. Not as strong as heather, I spent my summers at the local pool and in the lakes up in Wisconsin and feel comfortable in the open water. We both felt comfortable w/ the equipment during padi pool instruction and similarly comfortable in the ow. ( Our ow experiences were amazing. The experience of obtaining neutral buoyancy w/ controlled breathing was breathtaking) Yet were mindful that we needed a professional close by incase something went wrong. We both take a cautious approach towards this recreation and are very careful to stay together, move slowly and enjoy the beautiful scenery.

We want to be strictly respectful to the reefs, the fish, and other more experienced divers, understanding that although we try to know what we are doing, sometimes we won't because this is new to us. We understand basic etiquette towards the reef and others, but would be open to guidance when needed.

We feel we can be trusted to follow instructions for our safety and others. We feel we are quick learners and hope we can be new to this recreation while learning and learn from you and others.

Our trip starts our w/ a 2 night stay at Sandy Beach. We will get reacquainted w/ scuba here and do about 6 dives. Then we head to Utila for 3 nights. Again we'll be diving, hopefully w/ a few whale sharks. Our return will be to Foster's on west bay for four nights. At this point we'll have about 10 dives under our belts. We'd like to do 4 dives a day for the next 3 days, this includes possibly a shark dive.

We've decided against another dive in close proximity to fosters b/c of cost. We've read online from other visitors that your costs are more inline w/ Native Sons. We have read many many positive reviews about visitors' experiences and are trying to follow their guidance.

Could you please help us out w/ the following questions?

1. Your rates for 10 dive package
2. rates for rental equipment per dive
3. Your guidance on nitrox. Do you supply nitrox tanks? Is it worth diving nitrox in roatan? I've read that compared to other dive destinations the benefits of diving nitrox in roatan are minimal. Should we consider nitrox certification and do you certify for nitrox?
4. We only have fins and masks. We would like to slowly invest in equipment over the next coming years. For this trip would you recommend any specific equipment? We've read all opts are a bit different and are unsure if a computer would be beneficial. Are we expected to follow a dm and stay w/ the group throughout all of our dives, or will we have freedom to explore a bit on our own if our comfort and safety permit? are our bottom times restricted to the dm or our air and our computer?
5. Neither of us have a wet suit. We are both comfortable in 70'ish F water w/o one. Should be plan on getting one prior to departing? we've read about the possibility of sea lice.

6. Is there anything that we should realize or consider as new divers that we probably haven't already that would help you, our dive opt and us in making this a safe and life long memory?

Thanks for your time. i hope I haven't bored you. We want to learn, laugh, dive, have fun, and be safe and sometimes the best way to do so when you are new at anything is to let the people who are going to help you and make sure you are safe get to know you a little before you don the bc and take the plunge.

Sincerely,
Andrew Carava

Shrew:

Below is an email I typed out to the dive opt that we are thinking of using for the last half of our trip.

I offer posting it here in hopes that you'll review it and either offer advice yourself or lending guidance towards it's legitimacy. Here in chicago people are live mostly to themselves. I thought i'd reach out a bit and offer our experience and questions ahead of time thinking that maybe it would be beneficial and rewarding. What do you guys think? Stupid or worthwhile? Informative or lame? Anything that I should've included? Should I send this email to other opts and weigh the feedback (their level of openess and communication) when making a decision?

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You must live in a different Chicago than the one I inhabit.

Your note is indeed heartfelt, sincere, and plaintive while seeking reassurance.

Consider your own words: "Stupid or worthwhile? Informative or lame?" These are not opposites. You have legitimate concerns and questions. Everyone does in your situation. Your letter speaks well of your understanding of a diver's responsibility to others and the reef. When you mention a local refresher course in Chicago, I assume this means that your 3 OW dives and "amazing shark dive" were some time ago in the past. Refreshers being fine, aside, the trick would be to refamiliarize yourself with your own BC and Regs. You can pretty well do your own refresher in a pool by going through mask clearing with a snorkel. Relearning skills on equipment in Chicago that will be different than your tropical rentals would seem to be of limited worth. Maybe not.

The most important of all skills, you seem to be amazingly aware of for a third dive of a lifetime diver. Buoyancy. Good for you!

First and foremost, know this: If someone in Roatan (or most any other island) reads this, consider who they are. The are living the dream on an island, English might not be their best language, they may have limited written communication skills, their internet connection speed is limited, their computer is probably outdated, they have 15 other e-mails to respond to, they will be flummoxed by the number of questions, they are trying to find time in their busy day to respond to a maybe/potential customer who may or may not do business with them or even show up on the island.

In short? In their quick read and perception of your note, they have better things to occupy their time.

To the specifics of your inquiry, you ask many questions that are best asked of a local Chicago instructor (or on this board in another section) that would help clarify things like Nitrox, etc. If you are comfortable with no wetsuit in "70 ish" water, I'd like to meet you.

My suggestion? Since you seem to have all of the needed mental skills: A) You know what you don't know to a great extent, B) You know that you must continue to learn, follow DM instructions and listen, and C) Your desire to communicate is highly developed, I believe that you are overthinking all of this.

You need to find a place to rent you gear. I would encourage you to do this in Chicago. Buy some kind of thermal protection, basically you can't really rent any suits made of rubber worth whale poop in Roatan. If you are really that comfortable in cold water (I am, too), I would suggest a 2/3 or at least a Polarfleece, if nothing else for skin protection.

The shark dive on Roatan is done from small boats and the current can be intimidating for a new diver. 1/2 mph doesn't sound like much, but boy, will your eyes be open wide!

Go, relax, enjoy. Tell your DM of any fears and needs long before you get into the boat. Do not meter your pre-dive confidence upon their reaction and solicitous response. Watch their reaction as you suit up, board the boat, give the pre-dive breifing, handle the dive, the egress, etc. Then decide if you want to deal with the DM or this op ever again, or just move on.

You're embarking on a learning process. It is obvious that you know when and how to speak up with questions. I would say to you, go to Roatan, look, listen and absorb... then ask questions. Ask all of them before you get underwater. Other than that, shut up and dive.

The key to diving is communication, which is obviously quite limited when you have rubber in your mouth. Seems like you have that basic foundation all figured out.

Go and have fun. Let us know if you see any Whale Sharks.

I agree with Roatan Man, no one will have time or patience to read that letter. Therefore, you will probably not get the response you requested.

Having taken numerous communication courses and 15 years mgt experience, I would suggest the following...

o Bullet points work best.
o Short and concise.
o Skip the wordy background.
o Give your experience in one or two lines.
o Ask a FEW questions.

Guaranteed you will get a better response.

thanks for the responses guys. I will heed your suggestions.

You could hold off on the non-professionalism form. I know I'm a poor writer for which I'm ashamed.

Seriously, if I post an email like this then I better be able to take it. I'll be back to check in later.

I promise our trip report will be well scripted for easy enjoyable reading.

Andy

Shrew:

know I'm a poor writer for which I'm ashamed.

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Not a poor writer at all, just a long writer. I'm sure your girlfriend or certain other people would be delighted to get a long letter. Just doesn't work as well for a business.

Damselfish:

Not a poor writer at all, just a long writer. I'm sure your girlfriend or certain other people would be delighted to get a long letter. Just doesn't work as well for a business.

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Like Damelfish said... nothing wrong with a long letter as long as long is it's addressed to someone you care about.

come on guys, this isn't a business letter. I took a few liberties that I think are okay considering the audience and it's purpose. If we headed to a dive shop and got cattle hearded on a boat w/ 20 others, w/o much if any communication w/ the dive opts, and as new divers then we'd prolly leave our trip w/ the typical impersonal experiences that life typically provides. We're going to roatan to get away from such typical life experiences. I extended myself by offering some history and adding our enthusiasm so the dive opt understands our genuine interest and gets a feel for our comfort level. Even though we are new divers, we want to be taken seriously and treated as fairly as experienced divers. If this letter conveys certain sentiments and it falls into the right person's hands at the right dive shop, then we will probably get a very nice response back. A like response will guide us to the right dive opt.

Sure a dive opt is a business, but I have 4 minutes to read an email at my employment. I choose to extend myself continuously, making the brokers that I service feel comfortable and making their time w/ me beneficial and productive. I always extend myself and go the extra mile. It's beneficial for me, my company, and my brokers. I don't have to work so hard. I do it cuz I care and choose to live my life that way. Similarly, that's the kind of dive opt that we would like to spend our time with. We don't want to feel like it's a business, we want to feel like they love what they do and want to take us diving.

Well, that's my angle. I'll post their response so you guys can see if it was effective or not.

Thanks again. Andy

Shrew:

If this letter conveys certain sentiments and it falls into the right person's hands at the right dive shop, then we will probably get a very nice response back. A like response will guide us to the right dive opt.

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Possibly, then, a good test indeed. Let us know if anyone measures up to the task! You do run the risk, however, of missing "the best" dive op on any given island because that op doesn't have the means (for whatever reason) to respond, not the least of which is: they may be out diving with customers.

I say again, Roatan is just part of life's adventure. Go, enjoy, and don't over-think the whole thing.

So you're in the Chicago trading markets? Do you know "Jon" from SCUBA-TV?

Thankfully, I am speechless.

Shrew,

While I can sympathize with the passion of a newbie (me too) I have to agree with the two 'senior' guys. Have been planning 3 family trips last 6 months (including an upcoming one to Utila and Roatan) and they are soooo right. I can only offer you this:

1. Only half of what you want understood will be absorbed due to time constraints of the diveshop. Its frustrating to get an email back with half the info you requested.

2. The last half of your proposed email is absolutely perfect. Just tighten it up a bit. Do your own research on Nitrox-anyone that can plan a trip like you have is very resourceful. Check out the course offerings-maybe take a course when you're there.

3. Dive ops can answer number for number, it simplifies things for everyone, including you when you want to compare apples to apples. Email makes us lazy readers. And quite frankly numbers are fun.

4. The first few paragraphs from what I read could be condensed. Your swimming abilities are assumed-Just state the facts that you are relatively new divers and will be visiting the area having approximately 10 dives under your belt.

5. You will find that you might hear from 2 out of every 5 you write to so keep the odds of choice in your favor, keep it short and sweet. Am speaking from recent, current and ongoing experience.

6. Keep your passion and have lots of fun getting wet. Let me know how Utila went!