Why are there no snorkeling sites/forums?

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David,
Thanks for the taking the time for writing a detailed response to this post. As an avid snorkeler who also takes uw photos and doesn't scuba dive, I was intending to respond in detail to this post. You have done this for me, and expressed my sentiments completely. I knew exactly what the original poster was expressing when he first made the post. I look at Scubaboard a lot, but I usually don't find the "snorkeling/freediving" subforum to be much help. As you say, it's dominated by freedivers discussing techniques for achieving their "personal best". In my opinion, snorkeling and freediving share so little in common that they should be divided into two separate subforums. I wish more people would post about their snorkeling experiences, and I'm not sure why they don't. Perhaps having a separate subforum on Scubaboard just for snorkeling would encourage more posts, and a web community of snorkelers would develop. Because I snorkel only at warm-weather destinations, I am able to glean some useful info from looking at posts from the various travel subforums on Scubaboard, and this is mostly how I use Scubaboard. Again, similar to the original poster, I have long been perplexed why there don't seem to be any good snorkeling forums or bulletin boards on the web. I know there is plenty of interest in snorkeling by many people. I also frequent the TripAdvisor site quite a bit to do research on my future trips (they have hundreds of forums for travel destinations), and people are always asking questions about snorkeling. They may not be as avid snorkelers as you and I appear to be, but for many, snorkeling is a major focus of their vacations.

Regarding the snorkel website that BDAfreediver mentions, the guy that runs that site (I believe he is from Ontario, Canada), contacted me over a year ago to ask if he could use some of my snorkeling photos from Culebra Island, Puerto Rico. I said fine, but have yet to see any of my photos posted there. It appears to me that he was trying to run the site as a semi-commercial venture, and either lost interest, wasn't making any money, or (probably) both. I think we can write this off as another dead-end site. For a successful snorkeling forum, I think the site would need a very dedicated person as the web moderator who ran the site as a labor of love and who "rounded-up" and encouraged people to post.
 
Dave:

Thank you for that reflective piece. It's good to know there are like-minded folks out there. Your message and jan390's original posting have served to precipitate a number of issues that have been in my mind for many years when it comes to snorkelling.

I'm a big fan of ScubaBoard, although I don't choose to scuba-dive. My other "home" on the Board is the vintage equipment diving forum, as I started snorkelling back in the 1960s and still prefer the gear used in those days. It's good to be able to "chew the cud" with people who remember the ways things were done in the early years and, like me, still want to preserve a little bit of that now historical world in their lives alongside the computer technologies we all take for granted in the twenty-first century. The problem with the vintage forum, however, is its frequent tendency to focus on air tanks and regulators. Other, stand-alone, vintage diving communities tend to do likewise. It's an understandable, but for me at least, exclusive trend. I know the members of those forums would be urging me to post more threads of my own, focusing on suits, fins, masks, snorkels, vintage-friendly snorkel venues, vintage snorkelling strategies, but such threads don't attract many messages and then everybody else soon resumes their conversations about the double-hose regulators they've just picked up on eBay.

It's a similar story here on the snorkelling / freediving forum, but I do get the impression sometimes when I'm here that the forum, unlike the vintage ones, lacks a critical mass of loyal and knowledgeable snorkellers able and willing to dispense advice, exchange ideas, report on snorkelling trips on a regular basis and speak out loudly and authoritatively, for example, when snorkellers' rights to snorkel are constrained by health and safety regulations, overzealous lifeguards, swimming pools that won't let adult snorkellers use their facilities to snorkel indoors during the winter months.

Having done a little online research, I don't think a lack of snorkelling forums is the root of the issue. On another thread, I've listed the forums I've found and the problem appears to be the dearth of messages on the forums. Usually, on a new forum, a snorkeller will post a message to get things started and that message will lie unanswered for months if not years. If there aren't enough subscribers to a snorkelling forum, or if the vast majority of the subscribers choose to lurk rather than post something, then the few subscribers who do post wonder whether it's worth coming back to the forum at all, let alone make another posting.

ScubaBoard is a busy meeting place and where there are lots of people, particularly people with strong opinions but open minds, there's always hope. I'm certainly sympathetic to the idea of splitting the forum we're on into a freediving and a snorkelling one. Personally, I'm not interested in freediving. My passion is for snorkelling. I'm not convinced, however, that creating separate sub-forums is going to solve the problem of the lack of snorkelling threads. That will only be solved once a critical mass of dedicated snorkellers populates our forum. I think the first seeds of this have been sown, however. First, we've agreed there's a problem and second, we're beginning to encourage each other that things can change.

Over the next few weeks, I'm going to start a few more threads of my own. This morning, I went snorkelling off a sandy beach in the North East coast of England, something I do most weekends. Now that I'm retired, I have a little more time to write up my experiences. I'd like to start a thread or two as well about snorkelling gear - the kind I use - that's still made the way it used to be in more than a dozen countries, from the USA in the West to Japan in the Far East. I don't know whether anybody else is interested in such matters, but I'd like to write it up for my own benefit, even if nobody else wants to know. Let's not wait for somebody else to direct our efforts. A forum is a place where everybody has a voice and a right to be heard. So let's get posting!
 
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David C, when were you on Culebra? Took my kids there in '05 for their first trip after certifying OW. Between dives we had a ball snorkeling several spots on Culebra, including Melones (sp?) and Flamingo Beach, while my gf was snorkeling every day of the trip! Some great snorkeling on Culebra, more so than diving, which was ok. Don't remember all the names of the different beaches where we snorkeled, after we decided to rent a jeep and explore, but Culebra certainly had plenty of good snorkeling spots.

My gf and I were back in PR last year for another scuba trip that didn't pan out because of the weather, when I remembered Melones, which would lie in the lee of that weather, so we hopped the ferry over to Culebra for the day.We spent our last day there snorkeling, and we had a fantastic last day in PR, because of that last minute trip! Lots of shallow protected reef, and very few poeple. Only @ a 15-20 min. walk over the hill from the port, and very few tourists find the place, as they jump the taxis or buses to Flamingo as soon as they arrive.
 
Gypsyjim,
I was in Culebra for 10 days in 2008 and really enjoyed it. It's a great place for snorkeling. The extremely calm and protected condtions there allowed me to get what are probably my best snorkeling photos. I remember Melones was particularly good. What struck me about Culebra was how easy the snorkeling was. You drive to a beach, park, walk a few feet, and enter very calm and current-free water, with only one or two other people around. In case you are interested, here are my photos:
Culebra & Vieques Puerto Rico underwater 2008 Photo Gallery by Dave_Clausen at pbase.com
There are few photos at the end from Vieques, which wasn't as good for snorkeling.
Above water pics are here:
Culebra & Vieques Puerto Rico above water 2008 Photo Gallery by Dave_Clausen at pbase.com
 
I've been snorkeling, (skin diving), since the 60's. Mostly in the cooler Southern California waters, but every year in the Hawaiian Islands and the Philippines. I can skin dive for hours in the warm waters and do have a good mask, snorkel, fins (several styles), booties, gloves, hood & shortie for the cold waters, small light, and dive knife. Added a weight belt this year to get & stay a bit deeper for those close up shots, (disposable underwater camera). It is so enjoyable to do. I take newbees every year to places like Laguna Beach or La Jolla as I have many extra sets of gear and they just love it to. Anyway, just my 2 psi.
Last year in the Philippines I led a group of about 10 skin divers, (new snorkelers) around a shallow 2-3 meter reef and they just were so excited after the "dive" that they talked well into the night about their experiences.
 
Gypsyjim,
I was in Culebra for 10 days in 2008 and really enjoyed it. It's a great place for snorkeling. The extremely calm and protected condtions there allowed me to get what are probably my best snorkeling photos. I remember Melones was particularly good. What struck me about Culebra was how easy the snorkeling was. You drive to a beach, park, walk a few feet, and enter very calm and current-free water, with only one or two other people around. In case you are interested, here are my photos:
Culebra & Vieques Puerto Rico underwater 2008 Photo Gallery by Dave_Clausen at pbase.com
There are few photos at the end from Vieques, which wasn't as good for snorkeling.
Above water pics are here:
Culebra & Vieques Puerto Rico above water 2008 Photo Gallery by Dave_Clausen at pbase.com

Thank you, Dave. Those are really awesome photos. I got quite a few nice shots, especially at Melones, but they just don't compare with your photos!

You are right, it is that sheltered quality that drew me back to Culebra for one good day of snorkeling last year, when almost all of our diving was blown out by rough weather around the big island. Haven't made it to Vieques yet as Culebra sounded like better snorkeling, and had a lot fewer people to deal with.
 
Very nice work...great framing.. focus... and well there is something to be said about using natural light...

Keep posting images like that and you might just get more snorkelers to post...



Gypsyjim,
I was in Culebra for 10 days in 2008 and really enjoyed it. It's a great place for snorkeling. The extremely calm and protected condtions there allowed me to get what are probably my best snorkeling photos. I remember Melones was particularly good. What struck me about Culebra was how easy the snorkeling was. You drive to a beach, park, walk a few feet, and enter very calm and current-free water, with only one or two other people around. In case you are interested, here are my photos:
Culebra & Vieques Puerto Rico underwater 2008 Photo Gallery by Dave_Clausen at pbase.com
There are few photos at the end from Vieques, which wasn't as good for snorkeling.
Above water pics are here:
Culebra & Vieques Puerto Rico above water 2008 Photo Gallery by Dave_Clausen at pbase.com
 

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