Eric Sedletzky
Contributor
This thread is a few years old but…
Yes I use a snorkel when I shore dive in Northern California. Historically, a snorkel was always used by California divers to surface swim and navigate kelp. Swimming on your back only invites your tank valve to get completely wrapped up in giant kelp, bull kelp, and feather boa kelp. Plus you cant easily see where you’re going, you have to constantly crane your neck to try and navigate many times swimming right into another patch of kelp. Many divers have had to remove their BC’s on the surface to unwind all the kelp and free themselves.
By surface swimming on your belly you can choose your path through the kelp and push it aside if needed. Some of our surface swims are lengthy so using tank air doesn’t make a lot of sense when you have free air with a snorkel.
I use a straight J tube style freediving snorkel with no purge valves or big bulbous things on the end. You get used to them being there just like any gear, you learn to manage it. I also don’t use a wrap around long hose because we don’t need to go single file out of caves, so a 40” primary under the right arm with a 90 degree swivel on the second stage works fine.
My buddy and I did a shore dive once and he forgot his snorkel. You talk about a miserable time. I had to unwind him from kelp several times. Finally he just surface swam face down and held his breath, turning his head once in a while to breathe. He swore he’d never do that again!
You will hear a lot of negativity about snorkels here, but those people are probably tech divers or are too cool to be seen with one and think they aren’t useful for anything, stupid, or they are just general a-holes who like to argue and put people down to make themselves feel superior to those who use snorkels. Yeah, whatever.
I can tell you they are very useful for the right circumstances, very very useful!
Don’t ever let anyone shame you into not considering one!, especially if the diving conditions warrant it’s use.
Yes I use a snorkel when I shore dive in Northern California. Historically, a snorkel was always used by California divers to surface swim and navigate kelp. Swimming on your back only invites your tank valve to get completely wrapped up in giant kelp, bull kelp, and feather boa kelp. Plus you cant easily see where you’re going, you have to constantly crane your neck to try and navigate many times swimming right into another patch of kelp. Many divers have had to remove their BC’s on the surface to unwind all the kelp and free themselves.
By surface swimming on your belly you can choose your path through the kelp and push it aside if needed. Some of our surface swims are lengthy so using tank air doesn’t make a lot of sense when you have free air with a snorkel.
I use a straight J tube style freediving snorkel with no purge valves or big bulbous things on the end. You get used to them being there just like any gear, you learn to manage it. I also don’t use a wrap around long hose because we don’t need to go single file out of caves, so a 40” primary under the right arm with a 90 degree swivel on the second stage works fine.
My buddy and I did a shore dive once and he forgot his snorkel. You talk about a miserable time. I had to unwind him from kelp several times. Finally he just surface swam face down and held his breath, turning his head once in a while to breathe. He swore he’d never do that again!
You will hear a lot of negativity about snorkels here, but those people are probably tech divers or are too cool to be seen with one and think they aren’t useful for anything, stupid, or they are just general a-holes who like to argue and put people down to make themselves feel superior to those who use snorkels. Yeah, whatever.
I can tell you they are very useful for the right circumstances, very very useful!
Don’t ever let anyone shame you into not considering one!, especially if the diving conditions warrant it’s use.
