I think I caught the scuba diving bug because after I got the initial certification, I’ve been working to figure out how I can get more certifications and more diving into my schedule! I cautiously signed up to do my PADI Advanced Open Water certification dives on October 6-7 fearing that it may be very cold by then. However, as those in Chicagoland can attest, the temperatures hit 85+ degrees each of the two days. The water wasn’t as cold as I thought–about 70 degrees at the surface.
For Advanced Open Water certification, you have to do five dives. The first three are mandatory for everyone: Underwater Navigation, Deep, and Night. Then, you pick two more from a list of 5-7 (can’t remember exactly) others. My two electives were: Peak Performance Buoyancy and Wreck Diving. Of the five dives, my favorite was the Deep Dive. It was in a place in Haigh Quarry referred to as “the hole”. It’s a relatively small place in the back of the quarry (read: long surface swim) that goes down to a platform at 80 feet. As expected, the water got quite cold at depth and the usual cloudiness in the water made it pretty dim down there as well. Those carrying computers reported that the water temperature at 80 feet was 49 degrees. We stayed there for a few minutes and did a few games to test ourselves for nitrogen narcosis, a common condition at deeper depths. I wasn’t experiencing any signs during my test–not sure about the others.
I managed to convince my wife to let me go on a dive trip with a dive buddy (that I’ve known since grade school). We go to Cozumel on December 14th–less than 2 months away!
Congratulations to all my dive buddies in the Advanced OW class–we all passed. Thanks also to Eunice Z (our esteemed dive mistress and instructor) as well as Divemaster Ted who was great at getting us all down to the cold depths.
Only Deep & Navigation are mandatory. Other 3 dives are student choice. Anyways glad you’re enjoying it and thanks for your article on cloning a VM, saved me days of work…
If you ever pass by New York, and want to dive I’ll certify you for free any specialty of your choice…
Hey there fellow diver. Thanks for stopping by. I thought there was some disagreement between the master diver in the dive shop and the instructor, but I wanted to do the night dive anyway, so it wouldn’t matter to me.
As for the offer in NY–no plans to be out that way right now, but I’ll keep you in mind. Glad you found the VMWare cloning article useful! If you’re ever in Chicagoland and looking to dive around here, look me up–I’m ready for (almost) anything!
Dan,
I know what you are talking about.
I’ve got my Open Water about 8 years ago when I was in Malta. Initially, I just decided to try and was so impressed with it that I decided to immediately for for certification. I think I packed 5 days into 3 as this was what I had left from my stay there. Thanks god it was no season and I was pretty much the only one diving (and it was somewhat cold).
Now, 6+ years ago I was diving in Mexico (Cancun) and I even got certificate for something like Adventure Open Water, which somewhere between OW and Advanced OW. I couldn’t find my new card so I guess I will have to repeat Advanced OW dives from scratch. Interesting, I couldn’t find that certification now looking on PADI web site… Could be Mexican instructor played a nice joke to me? π
Anyway, congrats on diving progress!
Hi Alex. Thanks for stopping by.
I’m not sure why PADI doesn’t put it on their site, but Adventure Diver is just doing 3 of the 5 adventure dives that make up the Advanced OW Certification. However, if you lost the card, you’re probably going to have to repeat them. It’s only 5 dives and a little reading, so pretty easy to knock out in a couple of days.
Let me know when you’re coming by Chicago…we’ll go see a wreck in Lake Michigan or something. Or maybe we’ll just go hang out in a pub :).
Thanks Dan. I might actually do that! π
I haven’t had a chance to dive in the lake plus it’s been a while since my last dive so I need a refresher first. π
On which dives are required, PADI AOW is 5 dives, with Deep and Navigation mandatory. NAUI AOW is 6 dives, with Deep, Navigation, and Night mandatory. One of the two guys might have gotten a NAUI AOW. It’s not that uncommon to start with one certification agency and switch to another. I got my OW through NAUI, but my AOW and Rescue through PADI.
Thanks for the info, Mark. Your comment got trapped by Akismet for a while–sorry for that. I’ve since progressed to Rescue certification and am working on completing the PADI Divemaster course now, slong with a few other specialty certifications along the way (wreck this weekend).