AOW as an experienced diver

[TMHeimer]

AOW was OK. I learned some stuff. Costs a bit, but it has been pointed out before that you'd perhaps pay close to the same for just diving a couple of charters and not have an instructor to teach you stuff. Once you get it just think of all the other courses you can pay for....Well hey, you don't even need it, or any dives beyond your 4 checkout dives anymore to do Rescue Diver.

 

[fjpatrum]

Since I upgraded all my gear the past 2 years and can't go to NC this year I pulled the trigger and started a PADI AOW class Tuesday. We went over the course and expected dives. I can’t believe I’m spending money for this just so I can do a charter once in a while. As I read the Adventures in diving manual something about it was familiar but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Later it came to me …the Boy Scouts! It’s like earning merit badges. Take this, this, this and that and become a master diver! Turns out I’ve been diving longer and have more logged dives than the instructor and the Divemaster in training combined!
The Nav and Search and Recovery dives sound boring. The cove where we’re going to do the skills is a mud / sand bottom. It’s probably easier to find an object, but not much to see.
The Night and Drift dives might be fun depending where we go.
The upside is ALL the dives are from a BOAT! I like diving from a boat!

So what is it you're expecting to get out of this class? I mean, with the experience you have, why take it in the first place? I'm curious.

EDIT: Disregard, I missed that in fhe OP. Do you have a log book you can show? Every op I've talked to said if I could show "deep" dives within the last 6 months or year then they'd allow me to do whatever dive I wanted, even at my level of experience. Have you double-checked with the charters you are intending to use to maybe get around the issue with a "checkout dive" or a log-book check?

 

[Lorenzoid]

Have you actually asked a charter whether they would waive the AOW requirement if you showed them your logbook with 1000+ dives, or are you just assuming they won't? It seems idiotic to require AOW in your circumstances. What a waste of money.

EDITED: Oops--I see the post directly preceding mine asked the same thing!

 

[BVickery]

I have but not every one I'd like to go on. Damn slip and fall lawyers.

Umm, how can you blame a lawyer for it when they have to be hired by the family? It is sad but it's the reality we face these days.

 

[Tigerman]

Yeah, I would think serious ops would look at the log and say "screw AOW", but then again, in the US people ARE fond of calling their lawyer, so it might be harder there than other countries.
I have seen people with no certifications whatsoever be allowed to do whatever dives they want based on experience (that said, there probably WAS no certifications when they started diving)

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

So what is it you're expecting to get out of this class? I mean, with the experience you have, why take it in the first place? I'm curious.

EDIT: Disregard, I missed that in fhe OP. Do you have a log book you can show? Every op I've talked to said if I could show "deep" dives within the last 6 months or year then they'd allow me to do whatever dive I wanted, even at my level of experience. Have you double-checked with the charters you are intending to use to maybe get around the issue with a "checkout dive" or a log-book check?

They won't always accept a logbook ...



... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[waterpirate]

Thank you Bob,
I was going to bring that back and you beat me to it.
Eric

 

[TSandM]

Honestly, from being at just about a thousand dives, I can't magine having to go back through the standard AOW class, as I originally took it. But there's one dive in Bob's AOW class that still gives me the willies.

I would guess that, in the universe of divers, the people who make it to a thousand dives are a fraction of a single percent of the people who get certified. Classes just aren't designed for people like them.

Have fun with your boat dives. A day in the water is better than a day at the office, right?

 

[Tigerman]

Well said TS&M, both on the activity of divers and the part about the office..

 

[AfterDark]

Thanks for al the replies, advise and suggestions. This board and the pepople that post here are one of the most valuable resouce next to DAN!

I forgot to mention that I am taking NITROX also so at least it's something I haven't done yet. The NITROX is $30.00 off the usual cost.
Bob is correct not every charter will take a log book or even a shops phone call. Love that video! A vist and endorsment from JC himself probably wouldn't work.
Slip and fall lawyers are not always called by the family often times they find a way to contact them and put visions of big$$$ in their heads.
Which promotes families of others to call in search of a big payoff. Even if none of this is correct it is what the some charters claim when telling you they don't want your business. One charter of that mind set is the one and only for that area of New England.

I'm doing 5 fives boat dives from the instructors charter boat. He is one of the charter that WILL accept a log book. Those 5 dives would cost me $350.00 as charters, assuming 2 dives per charter. For $50.00 more I'll be walking away with the much asked for AOW cert and a NITROX cert. So I'm guessing it's worth it.

As far as challenges, I've had my share. From a blow and go from 70' to being stuck more than a mle from shore in an out going tide, to buddy breathing old school style on a required deco stop. My challenge is to continue diving with arthritis in various parts of my body. Believe me when I start walking down to the water with my gear on my knees are screaming WTF are you doing!!! Or when I reach over to vent my drysuit and my right shoulder is bitching that it can't streach that far! Challenges? I've got plenty. Thanks again everyone. I'll keep ya'll posted. the 1st 2 dives are Sunday 5-6.