It just doesnt matter…

This month’s blog is all about the continual discussions in diving about the merits of quarries versus sea and courses versus dives for experience. I have split the two parts up but I know that many of the arguments for and against will apply equally but I will start and finish with this point…

‘It just doesn’t matter!!’ You should do the diving YOU want to do – be that courses, general diving, sea or quarry diving….GO OUT and JUST GET WET!!!

Part 1 – quarries versus sea

Ever since divers found that jumping in any kind watery wet hole meant they got to feel the underwater sensations that can only come from SCUBA, then that’s what they have done…For the people out there that described this as just not ‘proper diving’ I have to say why? Just what exactly is proper diving? Yes it is a different type of diving, yes you may need to have a different skill set – but surely diving in the tropical waters with gin clear visibility needs a different skill set to diving in the low visibility cooler waters of the UK. The physics of diving don’t change just the personal psychology of the diver. (And the attitude of the divers around them!!)

I know that there are various arguments for why someone should dive in the sea…such as the massive abundance of life in the waters in the sea and the chance to challenge yourself to adapting to new skills and experiences (such as the not so rocking of a boat when trying to kit up) but at the end of the day, do what you enjoy not what someone who supposedly knows better (after all as individuals we all have our own opinions – this is just mine) has to say on the matter…….

Part 2 – courses versus dives

Imagine those days when someone whom just got in the water with kit they just picked up..(And yes I know that those people still exist)..to the days when the training came from the ex-military divers wanting to show how real divers dive…to now the days when you have a course for pretty much any kind of diving (and some you hadn’t even thought of) with lots of different agencies to choose from.

As I stated in the clip yes I run a business that depends on people learning to dive and then continuing with their own diving careers (and I don’t mean that in a course sense – since my business is also about equipment sales, hire, servicing and generally anything to do with diving!) I offer opportunities for people to get wet for the first time and then get qualified so the can actually get out and dive.

For all the divers that know me I have always said that the ideal place to get to is PADI rescue diver (yes every agency has its own level as equivalency) that way you at least have the skill set to not only to hopefully sort yourself out but at least the basics on what to do if your dive buddy (or another person) gets themselves into difficulty. We as a dive centre, offer opportunities for people to get wet, for some they want to do courses, for others they just want to get qualified so they can go out diving – we do not set the level that is down to them.

I’m going to end with how I started which is to say….

‘It just doesn’t matter!!’ You should do the diving you want to do – be that courses, general diving, sea or quarry diving….go out and just get wet!!!