DivemasterDennis
ScubaBoard Supporter

I just read the latest thread discussing logging dives. There is a new one almost every week. Some people don't log dives at all. My good friend Steve, who has been a dive pro as long as I have and a diver even longer than I have been diving, doesn't log dives. Others I know are content to retain the data their computer records, like my sometimes dive buddy Pete. Many others, like me, actually log every dive in a log book that has actual pages. I have logged every dive I have ever been on that

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I've been reading comments lately about helpful dive masters, pain in the neck dive masters, overbearing and restrictive dive masters, and dive masters who are barely present. I have encountered all of these, both as a recreational diver and as a dive professional. Diving with a good dive master, as I am about to define that term, can make the difference between a bad dive experience and a good one, whether you are brand new to our sport or a seasoned expert with thousands of dives.

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In reviewing some recent threads on gear purchases, the issue of buying new or used, from a local shop or line, have emerged. Let me first confess that I mostly buy new gear from my local shop. I have bought some things on line, but they are accessory-type items: lights, floats, gear bags, etc. I have bought some used gear, including a few regulators, but never on line. When I have bought used equipment, it is from people I know, who can accurately report the use history of the equipment and

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My wife/co-author/divebuddy Debbie and I have dove together at a number of locations where we were told that there could be a tourist submarine in the area. You know the vessel, usually called the Atlantis submarine. It holds about two dozen people, sitting back to back down the center of the craft, each looking out their own porthole. Until last month we never saw one while we were diving, but off Maui on a clear February day boat dive on the intentionally sunk Carthaginian, it finally happened.

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So how many of you would rather not use a buoy and dive flag when diving from shore? I see by the show of hands that the nearly all of us would rather not bother with this piece of equipment. I know I feel that way. However, Debbie and I got a lesson in why it is a good thing to use a dive flag this past week while shore diving in Maui. A few days before our arrival, a large catamaran had been blown aground near a favorite Maui shore diving site, Black Rock.
We planned to dive the site

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