For those who own their own dive gear

[Orcrone]

What gear do you bring with you on a cruise?

[Tarkus]

i also own three cylinders - but i leave those behinds with the weights. otherwise, it's not THAT much more difficult to pack my bcd and regulators/computer - and i feel safer diving with gear i know inside-and-out.

[mikeymars]

Regulator (I know it's been properly serviced, who knows about rentals), BC (I'm small and scuba firms never have decent small BCs available), mask and snorkel (Dacor tri-view, they don't make 'em anymore). I used to bring my finds, but they take up a ton of packing space, and the ones the dive firms have work just as well.

[10X]

Everything but tanks and weights.

[girasol]

Why would anyone NOT take their own equipment (excluding tanks and weights)?

 

If you have your own gear and have spent hundreds or thousands on it, why woud you let it sit at home and rent sub-par equipment? It's not like there are luggage restrictions on the ships.

[bruce-r]

And who would even consider bringing their own weights? I like my soft weights, but they stay home with the steel tanks when I fly to dive. If I drive to dive, I take my own tanks and weights. Actually, it is expected that you bring your own when you dive here in the Pacific Northwest.

[w&k]

We have done it both ways, but for more than one dive, we haul gear.

 

I'm able to make do with anything, but DH is a very large man, and is difficult to fit in masks as well, so we pretty much have to bring his stuff. By the time we have to lug one set, we might as well bring two sets.

 

We also have side-vent regulators (Oceanic omega) and to us, regular ones are annoying.

 

One great tip for everyone! Use a rolling gear bag. We had bought a couple of cheapo ones to sacrifice to the saltwater gods, but lucked out and won a real rolling dive bag at a dive social just before our last trip. I packed the regular gear in that one, and put the regs and camera in another rolling Wal-Mart cheapie.

 

Great diving to all!

 

Wendy

next up

Splendour of the Seas April 23

[Latitude 20]

We bring everything but tanks and weights (sort of) also. We're just too scared to trust others' life support systems (regulators and bc's) and too picky about everything else. Kathi brings a pair of 1.5 lb. ankle weights (hard to find at a rental place) to compensate for my favorite fins which are positively bouyant and we both need our prescription masks. And we bring our snorkels for impromptu snorkle opportunities or dives that require surface swims.

 

We just consider it a puzzle and always manage to fit both sets of gear into one oversize backpack/roller bag we got through our local dive shop.

 

Kathi & Leo

[Spudd]

We're wrestling with this problem right now. We're planning a trip on the MSC Opera, and we have an oceanview (not balcony) cabin. The bathroom was described in one review as "a model of efficiency" which I take to mean that it's really, really small. :) Last time we cruised, we had a balcony, so we just hung the wetsuits/BCD's/fins out on the balcony to dry. Any tips on dealing with gear in a non-balcony stateroom?

 

We're thinking of bringing everything but the BCD's, wetsuits, and fins. But DH really loves his BCD and fins, and I am quite fond of my wetsuit!

[karen2cruz]

Spudd - If you had to choose one -bring the BCD's and rent the wetsuits and fins. We dove 4 out of 5 ports this past week and Some of the dive shops had problems with BCD's and regulators- mouthpieces and leaks, etc. We took everything but the tanks and weights and were glad we did.

[turtlegirl2]

We're like spudd, not sure what to take and not to take. I love my BC and we are used to diving with our computers, so I think we'll take those for sure, along with mask, fins, snorkel. We are going back and forth on the wet suits.

 

I bought a Henderson Hyperstretch last November and love the ease of putting it on. We'll be diving in July in the Bahamas and Key West, so we could probably wear shorties. What do you all wear while diving, full-length suits or shorties?

[karen2cruz]

Turtlegirl2-

I was surprised with the locals on our diving excursions. I guess coming from Utah, any caribbean water is warm, but to the locals it wasn't. Most of the divemasters wore 3mm full suits or shorties. I have a great 1 mm diveskin & hood I got from divegoddess.com and was fine. My husband wished he had brought his shortie, not just his diveskin. The water temp varied from 80 degrees in the very south (St Lucia, Barbados) to 78 degrees in St Thomas. Since you will be diving farther north I recommend bringing both your hyperstretch and your shortie.

[turtlegirl2]

Thanks for the tip, Karen. I've seen dive videos of people diving in just their swimsuits in the Bahamas! I don't think I'm that warm-blooded :eek: - I may check into a dive skin for this trip. The Henderson is very bulky and will take up a lot of room. The shortie is fine, but I kinda want to be fully covered if we do a shark dive. Don't want a shark mistaking my leg for dinner! :D Thanks! Jacque

[Latitude 20]

I may check into a dive skin for this trip. The Henderson is very bulky and will take up a lot of room. The shortie is fine, but I kinda want to be fully covered if we do a shark dive.

 

Turtlegirl,

 

We use lycra dive skins for our Latitude 20 diving and love them! As you point out, even a 1mm wetsuit is bulky but you can wad up a diveskin and shove it into any little corner of your suitcase. They also dry in the sun in about 20 minutes versus half a day for a wetsuit (which is a big consideration in a cruise cabin).

 

But dive skins may not offer enough thermal protection for the most cold-blooded. We're very warm-blooded (we dive wet in Puget Sound) and our dive skins are black so they absorb lots of sun while we're on the surface. It ends up being a matter of what your body is used to.

 

You're smart to want full-body coverage however. Not so much for the sharks but for rock scrapes, accidental fire coral contact and sun exposure on the surface. We'd suggest a pair of lycra gloves to go with your dive skin.

 

Leo & Kathi

[turtlegirl2]

Great advice, Latitude20! I think our room is the size of a postage stamp, so the lycra might be the best way to go! ;)

[Hilary]

Turtlegirl2, we dove in Key Largo last July and the water was 84 degrees. I wore only my bathing suit under my BC and was never cold. My husband wore his 3mm Hyperstretch for a couple of the dives (we had just bought them!), and he said he was fine either with or without. We don't have skins, so it wasn't an option.

 

If you have skins, that's really the way to go, you won't need more than that.

[turtlegirl2]

Good advice, Hilary. How was Key Largo? We are staying in Miami for a conference before our cruise and I was thinking about a quick trip to Key Largo. Who did you dive with when you were there? TIA! :)

[Hilary]

Key Largo was fabulous diving. Mostly shallow reefs with extended bottom times, only limited by the boat schedule. There are some really good shops down there, but we dove with Paradise Charters since they put a dive guide in the water free. At first we had wanted to dive by ourselves, but we found the dive guide showed us all the cool swim throughs, and pointed out lots of marine life that we might have missed, and since viz was excellent, we could simply keep him in our line of sight and not miss things without playing follow the leader.

 

I definitely recommend that you dive while in Miami. The Keys have excellent diving, though you might consider going a little further south than Key Largo and check out Islamorada. I hear that's the best place to dive, but I don't think you'll go wrong if you dive Key Largo either.

[augie]

If you don't feel like taking the time to drive all of the way down to the Keys, I'll let you in on one of my Floridian "secrets".

 

Tucked away between the mammoth dive destinations of Ft. Lauderdale and West Palm Beach are some of the healthiest, prettiest reefs, with a lot of varied sea life in Boynton Beach.

 

That's where I do 95% of my non cruise diving, even though it's a two hour drive south of where I live.

 

Most of the diving done here is drift diving, on reefs that range from 60' onthe inside to 80'-90' on the outside.

 

My favorite operator is Dive Charters International, run by captain Leo Sand.

 

Each small buddy group carries a flag/float, and as long as there are always at least two divers down, individuals can surface alone, staying by the ball, if they run out of air, get cold, etc - so it's not a "least common denominator" dive. The boat will come and pick up the divers as they surface.

 

If you're interested call Leo at (888)340-DIVE.

[sea-jay]

I agree with Augie - Boynton Beach on south to Pompano is great diving. I live in Orlando and most of our dive shops/instructors do their checkout dives along this stretch of ocean. The vis is great, current mild, temp is average for Fl (seldom need more than 3mm) I dive with only a shorty and that is primarily to avoid any chafing or rubbing of my equipment not because of temp.

 

As for taking equipment, since I live in Florida and drive to the departure ports when I cruise, I take everything I own (no tanks) including weights. Depending on where I will plan to dive, I will either bring a small (3" blade) dive knife or dive shears with me.

 

I dove Key Largo last June (8 dives over three days) including the Speigal Grove in 70'-130'. Unfortunately, the Grove dive wasn't the best. Current was fairly strong there and we were required to follow the leader down the anchor line. Since we had a lot of divers going down, we used up a lot of air as one of the slowest went down first. Bottom time was pretty limited that way. The vis was also down to about 25-30 feet so you couldn't see a lot of the ship at one time.

 

For info-the Grove is the largest artifical reef ship sunk to date. It sits on a sandy bottom, on its side. Bottom is 130' while the upper rail is at 70'. However, I do have the T-shirt ("I dove the Grove") to prove I was there.:D

 

As for the other dives, they were all within the John Pennecamp underwater marine preserve and were great diving. The dive masters pull anyone out that messes with the environment and that ends their diving for the day.

[Orcrone]

I'll chime in about Florida diving. My mother used to live in Del Ray Beach and now lives in Boynton Beach. On one of my trips down there I went to Pennekamp near Key Largo. On my next trip down there I called a local dive shop (don't remember why) and mentioned heading to the keys. There response was that there was some very nice diving locally. I figured I'd give it a try.

 

I don't remember any of the details, just that we dove some very nice reefs with no more than a 15 minute ride on the boat. On one of the dives there were four of us aside from the crew; two experienced divemasters, a newbie and myself. The two divemasters were not working, they were out for their own recreational diving. The newbie was a fairly large guy, so between his size and inexperience, the divemasters figured he'd go through his air quickly. We went for a couple of drift dives that day. The DMs kept close watch on the newbie and when he was getting low on air one actually went up, did a safety stop with him, made sure that he got on board safely and then descended to join us while we waited on the bottom. I thought this was extremely nice, especially considering they were out there for their own enjoyment.

 

I guess I got OT, but just wanted to add that people should not dismiss those areas off the east coast of Florida. I'm returning from my next cruise on Saturday, April 2. If I weren't flying out the next evening I would probably do another dive down there myself.

[w&k]

Augie-

 

It's not a Floridian secret anymore if you tell everyone!

 

We found Boynton over a dozen years ago as part of a two-week Jupiter to Ramrod Key diving odyssey (Looe Key NMS). When we're going on land-based dive trips, we have not gone ANYWHERE else since we found it. Why question the best reefs and boats on the East Coast?

 

Unfortunately, the area is really starting to get popular and upscale, which attracts entirely the wrong sort of crowd. I miss the days of cheap beer, chickee huts, really fresh seafood, and dive boats next to fishermen, not fancy yachts.

 

Great diving to you!

 

Wendy

next up

Splendour of the Seas 4/23/05

[Latitude 20]

We'd suggest a pair of lycra gloves to go with your dive skin.

 

A quick update--we just returned from Grand Cayman where we discovered it's now illegal to wear gloves while diving. They really don't want anyone touching anything!

 

Kathi & Leo

[Babs66]

It depends on the vacation, obviously if it is dive vacation everything but weights and tanks.

 

If it is a resort vacation - usually mask, snorkel, regs, and skin and gloves. I personally will not go 60 ft in the ocean without my full body being protected, just in case. :D

[Corigan]

I pack different variations depending on what kind of trip I'm going on. If I can drive to the vacation destination I will usually bring everything with me, including tanks, gas, weights.

 

If I am flying it all depends on what kind of diving I'm going to be doing on the vacation. I never bring weight or tanks. Most of my weight is in my Backplate anways. I'm not going to be bringing a primary can light, 2 backup lights, primary reel, safety reel, spools, backup masks, lift bags, smb's, etc. with me if all I'm doing is shallow reef dives during the day. Of course if I'm going to check out the cenotes, the load gets heavy quick.. :) Exposure suits/combinations are also something to think about. I dive in water ranging from 40F-86F. I have plenty of different suit combinations for that kind of range. Most of these would be left behind, depending on location.

 

Matt