New...Again...From Texas

[aprilmaas]

I was new to diving when I certified in 2001. I took one amazing trip, but haven't been diving since. I'm sure things have changed. Ready to get back to diving!

More of a vacation diver. Would love some diving vacation suggestions.
Need equipment suggestions for beginning, again, for women.

Excited!

 

[diversteve]

Where are you in relation to Houston? You can get to a lot of excellent Caribbean dive locations from there easily. I often connect thru Houston.

Places to look at:

Turks & Caicos
Grand and Little Cayman
Roatan
Utila
Bonaire
Curacao
the BVI's
Cozumel

Any/all would have shallow good dives. You might get a little experience before Cozumel as it's typically deeper drift diving. Turks and the Caymans will be more expensive. The BVI's can be also depending on where you stay. Bonaire and Curacao both have excellent shore diving - so does Grand Cayman. The others are better from a boat.

Scubatoys.com is a good starting point for gear. It's mail order but they ship fast and all their gear has full mfr's warranties. Also they're in Dallas so probably overnight to you. They have an excellent return policy also. Or will exchange pieces as needed since things like BC's that need to fit now are often modular. A lot has changed since 2001.

Caradonna.com is one option for dive-focused vacations. There's many others also.

 

[Coconut Divers]

Welcome to Scubaboard,
we are in Cancun Mexico so lets go diving !

Check us out !

 

[driftwood]

Hi April,

I guess the first thing you need to do is have a refresher course. I don't think there is a shop in either Round Rock or Hutto. There are four shops in Austin that are equally inconvenient for you. My first choice would be Oak Hill Scuba in southwest Austin. Second on my list would be Tom's in north central Austin. Third, is Scubaland on Anderson Lane near Lamar. Last on the list is Dive World on 620 past 183.

Hold off on getting any gear. Generally in either August or September Tom's has a big used gear sale where you can get most of what you need.

If you want to dive locally to keep in practice, your best shot is with Robert at Welcome to Lake Travis Scuba Great guy who will take care of you (also an excellent choice for an instructor to get you back up to speed).

Welcome back to scuba and welcome to Scubaboard.

 

[chrpai]

What does a vacation diver need a local dive shop for?

 

[driftwood]

April said that she hadn't been diving in about 12 years. Having Robert give her a refresher course either in the pool or off the Giant Stride would seem to be in order.

For my money I would prefer to spend the time in a refresher course at home rather than spend vacation time getting up to speed. In addition, she said she was looking for gear. Less expensive to get it here, where you know who can service it, than paying island prices.

Off topic, but the last thing I heard is that they will be restarting the Diving for Science class in September.