What is it about diving you like?

[Sarah]

I thought I would open this discussion and poll up to see what it is that makes diving appeal to you.

I will start by saying it isn't really so much breathing underwater, which I know for many is a thrill, but it is about the beauty of the marine life. I would love to have a professional camera setup to capture it, but try buying all that on a college student budget!

For guys I know the gear and operating all the gear has it's appeal, and we love that about our guys....especially when we need things fixed around the house!

But I hear time and time again some divers, both men and women will dive in what many consider less than ideal conditions, like 3 meter visibility and nothing but sand.

So what appeals to you, and what appeals to you the most?

[BamaCaveDiver]

I thought I would open this discussion and poll up to see what it is that makes diving appeal to you.

I will start by saying it isn't really so much breathing underwater, which I know for many is a thrill, but it is about the beauty of the marine life. I would love to have a professional camera setup to capture it, but try buying all that on a college student budget!

For guys I know the gear and operating all the gear has it's appeal, and we love that about our guys....especially when we need things fixed around the house!

It is all about the chicks and the toys It is also physical rehab for my battered body.

But I hear time and time again some divers, both men and women will dive in what many consider less than ideal conditions, like 3 meter visibility and nothing but sand.

So what appeals to you, and what appeals to you the most?

3M vis is considered great in some of the areas I have been in Being able to explore a portion of our planet that no other soul has ever ventured through makes it all worth while

[Sarah]

Although too chicken, the idea of cave diving and seeing a part of the earth that no human has ever seen is REALLY cool.....

[seasnake]

Wow ... "What I Love About SCUBA" is a book I haven't finished writing yet, but it will be lengthy! There is no quick and easy answer to that question. I used to say "wrecks" ... but I've come to realize that one of the biggest appeals for me is the sensation ... the feeling of hovering, the feeling of the water around me ... the serenity ... the sensation you get hovering beside a huge structure like a wreck or a wall in awesome viz, that sense of scale ... that really opens my valves, if you know what I mean! Plus all the other stuff too: the adventure, the challenge, the beauty, the mission, the freedom ... whew, I could go on and on!

Ron ...

[SoCalDiveGirl]

For guys I know the gear

Ahhh gear... I can't ever get enough gear.... (I hope Joel's not reading this... he has my credit card #).

Divings appeal is easy. You enter another world... A world that is no longer yours and you are no longer top dog.... It can be a challenge... it can be like flying over the Grand Canyon in good vis... it can be like being inside of a washing machine on bad days... it can cause a fear like you've never experienced before, or an excitement you've never felt on the surface....... seeing and interacting with creatures that the majority of humans never see outside of the aquarium.... watching as a wreck come out of the gloom and into plain sight....

Ok, back to the gear

[seasnake]

Oh yeh, the gear. Did I mention the gear? Guys LOVE toys!

[amtrosie]

I am with Bama Diver on the cave diving. I love the thought of seeing something that few-or-no one has seen. The untouched beauty that is found in caves is unrivaled. Out side of the caves, it is the whole marine enviroment that envelops me. The way I am de-stressed after a dive allows me to function away from the water. The precious ecology and the knowledge that the delicate balance is unmatched any where. The sheer beauty and the interaction of the marine life in maintaining the balance is always a source of wonderment to me. I never get out of the water without feeling that my brief visit to this marine wonderland has been an awesome privelage. I am always being asked "what do I see, or what is it like?" That I am a steward of this world always fills me with a sence of inadequacy.

The intense reliance on gear is about fourth or fifth down on my list, which is rather strange for me, given that my vocation is that of maintaining complex (and VERY MECHANICAL) aircraft. That attraction has dimed as I advance in years.

I will, without hesitation, leap into a conversation if it is about diving. Outside of that, I will say little. For I have little to say.

What do I like about diving? What is there not to like?

[rubber chicken]

When i was a kid, i used to sit, totally entranced, in front of the television watching the "undersea world of Jacques Cousteau". I was amazed at the fantastic experiences and life that J-Y and his crew had but believed that this was the sort of existence only available to the privileged few. A bit like being an Astronaut or explorer, I would only experience these things third hand.
Many years later, I decided, on a whim, to sell everything i owned and travel around the world. At some point on this journey i knew that i would be visiting Australia's Great Barrier reef. I wouldn't be satisfied seeing this through the bottom of a glass-bottomed boat so decided to visit a small dive shop that i had noticed hidden away down a side street in my local town. A brief chat with the owner and i allowed myself to be talked into signing up for an Open Water course.
After the usual skill sessions in the local municipal pool, the great day arrived and i found myself clad in tight fitting, ( and slightly smelly), neoprene staring down into the cold looking , green and murky water of the Royal Navy's former torpedo testing range at Horsea Island in Portsmouth on England's South Coast.
A few minutes later and i was under the surface, breathing and having the greatest time of my life! I have never looked back from that moment. As soon as the warm and fuzzy feeling of the post dive excitement is over, I am looking foreward to the next dive, be it supervising student divers in a cloud of silt or exploring a totally new site in crystal clear viz, i don't care! Just being underwater and breathing is such a fantastic honour that i frequently have to shake myself to prove that it is actually happening to me. I cannot articulate what, exactly, i find so mesmerising about the whole thing but I now define myself as a diver first and foremost and will remain so for the rest of my allotted time on this mortal coil.

[BamaCaveDiver]

...What do I like about diving? What is there not to like?

I think that last line sums it up rather well amtrosie

[PinayDiver]

I dive because:

1. We’re more Water than Earth (the planet is misnamed ) and it would be a crime not to go-and-see for myself. And I’ve always understood that being a visitor demands all the courtesy due to the homeowners. The cautionary tale I heard as a student was of this diver whose body was fished out, whose death was a puzzle, until one of the rescuers found a textile cone shell in his pocket—such a tiny exotic souvenir, such a highly venomous mollusk residing within.

2. While whalesharks and manta rays are undisputed superstars, micro-life (with its constant plays on defense, offense, and interdependence) fascinates me as well. Shrimps that reside between the poison-tipped spines of urchins; vividly-colored nudibranchs that eat lethal sponges to ingest the toxins; the odd partnership between the blind goby shrimp (which cleans the burrow) and goby fish (which acts as “seeing eye”)…

3. Tethered by my reef hook or letting go, I enjoy riding the current like a kite.

4. I even like how the sea can choose to withhold, how we’re reduced to prayers and bargaining: Dear God, give us this day our manta, and we’ll be content and undemanding for the rest of the year.

5. I appreciate the built-in drama, how pressures and predators simply prompt unique adaptations (that I can surely take survivor lessons from ). During especially good dives, I feel "connected," when the so-called tapestry of life is a tangible thing. After all, I share these creatures’ needs for space, oxygen, nourishment, reproduction (er, maybe not the last one. I’ve always contended that my brother had already fulfilled our mother’s grandkids’ quota )