UKskins

7 hours ago, purbeast said:

 My plan is to do the pool and class work around here, and then do the checkout dives either in Grand Cayman in September or take a trip to the Keys over winter time and do them there.

 

 I'm going to their free orientation tonight since that is a requirement anyways, plus it will help me get some questions answered.  I've gone back/forth of doing the eLearning versus classroom setting, however I think for the way I learn best a classroom setting where I can ask questions and interact will be the best for it.  I'd be curious though if anyone has any other recommendations for companies.

 

And there's no chance I'm doing my checkout dives at the quarry in VA so no need to even mention those!

I chose to do my certification in a classroom setting for all the reasons you outline - can't overstate how glad I am that I did so. E-learning just doesn't give you the same preparation. Can't recommend any companies as I'm not in the DMV.

Definitely do your checkout dives somewhere memorable. 

I certified in Egypt, so I did all the skills learning in the ocean rather than a pool and that was amazing, but it did sacrifice 3/4 days of my vacation (although we did skills in the morning and then did one or two of the checkout dives in the afternoon so that broke it up a bit.

Good luck dude, you won't regret it!

2 hours ago, Skinsfan1311 said:

Yes.

Strictly warm water diver here.  So far, I've blown bubbles in Grand Cayman, Cozumel, Cancun, Riviera Maya,  Bermuda, St Lucia, Jamaica & Belize.  

Those Redskins shirt dive pics are class. Might have to get involved on that next time I dive!

18 hours ago, Predicto said:

 

 

Thailand was one of my earliest trips - over 20 years ago, and we only did a couple of dives off of Phuket.  I can't remember the specific locations.   I do remember a ton of lionfish the size of basketballs, and a lot of giant clams.  

Interesting to hear - I dived off Phuket and saw very few Lionfish and not particularly big ones. That's where the coral bleaching was worst there too, although there were some cool wrecks with a ton of Batfish hanging out. We did see a Leopard Shark there too, and randomly watched a jellyfish being killed by reef fish right in front of us as we descended - they literally just teamed up and ripped chunks off it - was a very strange sight!

Sail Rock is just off Koh Phangan/Koh Samui - it is worth a visit if you find yourself in the area again - there's no other landmarks on the sea floor for 4 nautical miles in any direction so ALL the fish in the area congregate around this rock. The sheer numbers there are just overwhelming - never seen anything like it.

8 minutes ago, TheGreatBuzz said:

I have heard getting the permits and whatnot to dive the Galapagos is insanely difficult because they want to protect everything.  Which explains why the diving is so awesome there. 

Depends where you get them - they only release a set number per year and a lot are issued to the travel industry and sold at a ridiculous cost - it is possible to get them through the Ecuadorian government but I think you have to go through a lottery system. Most reliable way is a liveaboard but you're talking several thousand dollars to get on one. Prices vary but they start at around $500 per day for the cheapest.

19 hours ago, LadySkinsFan said:

I worked with a guy and gal once who were avid divers and underwater photographers. He was from New Zealand and recommended that country for one.  This was quite a few years ago, and I can't remember all the places he went.

 

A lot of the reefs are dying because of pollution, so researching spot is good. 

Pollution and the rising sea temps are destroying the reefs everywhere - lots of conservation efforts needed if we're going to save them!

17 hours ago, TheGreatBuzz said:

Im certified up to Rescue.  Dove in Guam, Saipan, Palau, Roatan, Mexico, amd Pensacola.  Palau spoiled me and should be on your bucket list.  Look up Blue Corner there.  Also the great Carrier Reef in Pensacola.  Especially if you like wreck/penetration dives.  There is a place in Guam called 11 mile reef (its 11 miles out) and you can see divers on the bottom at 130 ft.  Im hoping to dive in Dubai when I go there in a few months.

Ah nice, I'll definitely look to try to get out to Palau at some point.

Dubai should be really nice - Egypt is on the Red Sea and that is absolutely spectacular, I'd expect the Persian Gulf to be similarly incredible given the proximity and similar climate. I'm going to Australia in a couple of weeks, but not going to be able to dive this time unfortunately - hoping to get out to the Caribbean next year to get some scuba in then though. We have a quarry here in the UK that's been flooded and they've sunk a load of wrecks in specifically for diving but I've not been down there - might brave the cold and give it a go in the summer.

My dream dive spot is the Galapagos - We dove with a guy in Egypt who freelances for Discovery channel and the videos he had from the Galapagos were absolutely unreal. Hundreds of hammerheads clouding the water above him, must have been an incredible sight to see.

17 hours ago, redskinss said:

I got certified 20 years ago. 

Probably had somewhere around 250 dives or so but haven't dove in close to 10 years. 

Don't have anybody to go with anymore but it was one of the things I used to love more than just about anything. 

All cold water dives for scallops and lobsters in new England. 

Man we used to come back with so much seafood on Saturdays. 

4 divers 3 dives apiece and on a good day we'd get 40 pounds of shucked scallops or a good 30 or forty lobsters or some combination of the two. 

 

If you can dive up here you can dive anywhere in the world. 

Ice cold water,  10 feet of visibility on average and massive rip tides and currents. 

You gotta be on your game to be a diver in new England. 

 

I can sympathise with the cold water and poor viz diving - When I dived in the UK, it was freezing and visibility was literally about a foot as they'd had a storm a few days before which had kicked up all the silt. Once was enough for me - wouldn't catch me doing that again in a hurry - although I guess it's much easier if you know there's a bounty of lobster and scallops at the end of it!

18 hours ago, Predicto said:

I'm not an expert like GreatBuzz, but I've dove Barbados, Cozumel, Thailand, Antigua, all over Hawaii, and Monterey Kelp Forest.   

 

The best boat dive was Cozumel along the Santa Rosa wall.  The best shore dive was Mala Pier in Maui.  The most unique was night diving with Manta Rays off the Big Island of Hawaii.  

 

https://bigislanddivers.com/charters/kona-manta-ray-night-scuba-dive/

That all sounds good! How did you find Thailand? The monsoon runoff had bleached almost all the reefs when we went. Did you dive Sail Rock in the gulf of Thailand? The sheer number of fish there is literally barely believable!

Anyone else on here certified to dive?

I got my Open Water about 6 years ago - living in the UK means I only really get to dive when we go on vacation though - too cold to dive here (tried it once, never again!). Logged around 60 or so dives so far - Dived in Egypt, Turkey, Thailand mainly.

Anyone have any reccomendations for Dive spots I really should get to? Or have a diving bucket list?

9 minutes ago, techboy said:

 

By the way, I was curious, so I looked it up. Although the name "soccer" doesn't make any sense to me, it apparently should make sense to you, because as usual, it's the Empire's fault.

 

Apparently the UK called Association Football soccer for short, to differentiate from Rugby, which was rugger. The US picked it up to differentiate from the other offshoot that became football here.

 

Even more interesting is that soccer and football were still used interchangeably in the UK until the 1980s, when it was deemed too American, it would seem.

 

https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/5492714

 

I haven't read the referenced paper, but it seems plausible to me.

I'm from the UK (hence the imaginative username) - I remember playing a game on the Amiga games console (floppy disks, joysticks and all) called "sensible soccer" and another on PC called "Actua soccer" - that would have been right around the early 90s. No idea about sensible soccer, but actua soccer was developed by "Gremlin" studio who were UK based, so what you say sounds about right.

I wouldn't necessarily say they were interchangeable in conversation at that point, I only recall ever hearing it called football or "footy" but it certainly wouldn't confuse anyone if you called it soccer here, it's just not really common in spoken language.

We were royally done by the refs today. That helmet to helmet on DJax was sickening, and they replayed it on the big screen several times too. The ref was maybe 5 yards away and somehow doesn't see it, yet I was on a similar line of vision and considerably further away and I saw it real time. The refs are the only people in the stadium who didn't see that. It wasn't like a subtle bit of holding off the ball that you could legitimately miss.

The DPI in the endzone was nonsensical. The flags on Norman were disgusting, and the call on Garcon that ended it? Give me a break. Yet we got nothing the whole game, despite a multitude of flag worthy activity, such as y'know, two of our players nearly getting decapitated... smh

Norman was absolutely right with what he said, and given he had 5 flags thrown on him for pretty much nothing, I would hope that Dan will pick up the tab for his fine.

Refs were truly embarrassing today, both to themselves and the sport in front of a global audience.

I went BPA as much as possible, trading back as much as possible to load up in the 2nd round (5 2nd rounders  + 2 in 1st).

Your score is: 6418 (GRADE: A)

Your Picks:

Round 1 Pick 19 (CLE): Landon Collins, SS, Alabama (A)

Round 1 Pick 31 (N.O.): P.J. Williams, CB, Florida State (B+)

Round 2 Pick 6: Arik Armstead, DE/DT, Oregon (B+)

Round 2 Pick 7 (CHI): Todd Gurley, RB, Georgia (A)

Round 2 Pick 8 (NYG): Jaelen Strong, WR, Arizona State (A)

Round 2 Pick 11 (CLE): Jake Fisher, OT, Oregon (B+)

Round 2 Pick 14 (S.F.): Eli Harold, OLB, Virginia (A-)

Round 3 Pick 5: Benardrick McKinney, ILB, Mississippi State (B-)

Round 3 Pick 7 (CHI): Cody Prewitt, FS, Ole Miss (A)

Round 4 Pick 6: Arie Kouandjio, OG, Alabama (A)

Round 5 Pick 5: Ibraheim Campbell, SS, Northwestern (A-)

Round 6 Pick 6: Tyler Varga, FB, Yale (A)

Round 7 Pick 5: Derrick Lott, DT, Chattanooga (B-)

Hey Goritz - yes that site works, Im in the UK watching the NFL countdown show on it as we speak. My Dad ruptured his achilles and he has never watched an NFL game so Im hoping he'll take an interest tonight and I can give him the gift of the Skins for Xmas!! HAIL

GhostofSparta - these are the ones I use - http://atdhenet.tv/index.html - normally has a Vshare feed - http://soccertvlive.net/ and http://www.livescorehunter.com/ (you have to click other sports, american football and then click the top link if it messes around.