Key Largo Diving

[goprodive]

Here is a bit of travel advice for anyone looking to dive in Key Largo. Stay away from Paradise Charters. I used them for a recent trip to the keys, and found that the owner, who calls himself Capt. Bob, and his team run a poor operation. It would be obvious to an experience diver that they are more interested in money than customer satisfaction. My wife who is not an experienced diver related to me that if it wasn't for the fact that I work in the dive industry, and she knows there are good operations available, would never dive again. They look to get you in and out of the water as fast as possible, and really do not take safety as a prime concern. I was told by the divemaster on the boat that because we were doing shallow dives, safety stops were not necessary. There two tank dive is on shallow reefs, come out move boat 100 feet, change tank, dive again. No surface time necessary between dives because they are shallow. In addition to poor diving practice, there personal courtesy is lacking. So divers beware, and do not give your hard earned money to this dive outfit.

 

[NEWreckDiver]

Here is a bit of travel advice for anyone looking to dive in Key Largo. Stay away from Paradise Charters. I used them for a recent trip to the keys, and found that the owner, who calls himself Capt. Bob, and his team run a poor operation. It would be obvious to an experience diver that they are more interested in money than customer satisfaction. My wife who is not an experienced diver related to me that if it wasn't for the fact that I work in the dive industry, and she knows there are good operations available, would never dive again. They look to get you in and out of the water as fast as possible, and really do not take safety as a prime concern. I was told by the divemaster on the boat that because we were doing shallow dives, safety stops were not necessary. There two tank dive is on shallow reefs, come out move boat 100 feet, change tank, dive again. No surface time necessary between dives because they are shallow. In addition to poor diving practice, there personal courtesy is lacking. So divers beware, and do not give your hard earned money to this dive outfit.

Thanks for the info, I was heading down there and now I will find another operation. Thanks again and good luck to you.

 

[Charlie99]

You don't seem to be describing the same operation that I dove with last October. I found them to be a safe operator that I'd recommend to a new diver without any reservation.

Dive times were indeed limited by time rather than air, but runtimes of 63 minutes and 64 minutes aren't that unreasonable. The surface interval of 17 minutes was indeed short, but not unreasonable for the shallow dives we did that morning.

My logbook notes from 10/6/03: Booked dive at 7:30A while driving north from Big Pine. Woodies and Lucky 13 balls of French reef. 84F water, mid 80's and humid topside. AL80 3000-1300, 50' max 63 minute, Oceanic Dataplus 7 N2 bars out of 11. SI 17 minutes. 2nd dive --- 3200-1500, 39' max, 64 minutes. DataPlus 8 N2 bars out of 11, still 1 bar into the green.

Lots of room on the boat with 11 passengers, 2 DM, Capt and mate. My insta-buddy for the day hoovered through his air, but the DM swung by the boat, dropped him off at the boat and we continued.

I can't swear for sure, but I also have vague memories of the other DM having the people without computers, and that group going in 2nd, coming out 1st in order to keep people within table limits.

The only negative comments in my logbook: detailed briefings on "how to dive", and a note that the boat and ladder beat up a couple divers as the boat yawed about 30 degrees around the mooring ball, and stern was moving up and down about 4'. The boat was pretty lively considering that the swells were only about 3'.

http://www.paradisecharters.net/

 

[billtodive]

I dove the Eagle with Conch Republic Divers on the 24th; swells 3-4 feet
Capt. encouraged us to get in the water quickly, due to increasing winds.
He was also helpfull catching us as we got on board, as winds had picked up.
Will post more once I dive with other ops in that area.