Discovery/Resort Dive in the Keys

[NoVaScuba]

My partner and I are heading to the Keys for Thanksgiving week and I'm looking for a good dive op for a discovery dive for him. I did one some years ago with the one in Pennekamp State Park and had a great experience and went on to get certified. Now I'd like him to have a great experience as well so he will want to continue to dive. He's adventurous, just nervous about the whole breathing underwater thing.

I'm thinking Key Largo is the best area with lots of good shallow reefs. Looe Key is another possibility. I'd appreciate any recommendations for dive ops that will give him good training and a good dive experience.

 

[iluvtheocean]

I liked Looe Key when i dove there - the reef is shallow with tons of fish to see and i saw my first nurse shark there. The boat is a cattle mix of snorkelers and divers but basically the briefing besides the norm was "we got here at X time - be back with an hour and have fun!" for the experienced divers. they did a pool refresher for my in-law that he said was good. since there were no students among the divers - the DM that was on the boat focused her attention on the snorkelers. a plus for them too is the onboard food after the dive - turkey hot dogs or sloppy joes i believe at the time (no free but worth it or can bring own food)
some selling points for me on Looe was the onsite lodging & tiki bar with a really good restaurant almost right across the road. and then it's only 1/2 hr from key west. so after the day of diving - went back to our room, got cleaned up and hit duval street