Please, please, please do yourself a huge favor and learn how to dive at home and then practice diving at home.
You live in a great place for diving, IF you actually dive there.
Alas, many of your neighbors are "divers," but they don't really dive. They learned on vacation to some tropical land and only dive next year when they again have a tropical vacation. Everything they learned the year before they've forgotten and have to re-learn. Year after year.
Why don't the dive at home? "OOH! It's too cold! AACCKK!! The water's not clear so there's nothing to see! UGGHH!! I can't wear that thick wetsuit and hood, not to mention that weightbelt!"
But. With the proper exposure protection, you'll be warm during your dives. With the proper training and technique, you'll be able to control your buoyancy, even with all that lead and neoprene. You'll also discovery that life is everywhere in your local waters. It's usually not the bright look-at-me brightly colored tropical look, but it's very diverse, bizarre and other-worldly.
Then, we you DO go on that tropical vacation, you'll have excellent skills and a deep appreciation for those neon, flashly creatures, as well an eye for seeing the more subtle tropical critters.
Welcome to our obsession.
