jaquan123ism Posted December 28, 2018 Report Share Posted December 28, 2018 hi i am booked on the harmony of the seas for dec 2019 and im am booking the discover scuba excursion in san juan puerto rico and i want to know if i can bring my own gear i already have fins and sorkel and want to know if i should by my own wetsuit also Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WAAAYTOOO Posted December 29, 2018 Report Share Posted December 29, 2018 On 12/28/2018 at 6:54 PM, jaquan123ism said: hi i am booked on the harmony of the seas for dec 2019 and im am booking the discover scuba excursion in san juan puerto rico and i want to know if i can bring my own gear i already have fins and sorkel and want to know if i should by my own wetsuit also They usually have 2 options for SCUBA. 1 with equipment (for those who don’t want want to haul their gear around) and 1 without equipment (for those who bring their own). If your excursion doesn’t distinguish, I would assume that they are providing everything. I certainly wouldn’t want to carry all that gear with me but I guess some do. I think it’s common for most divers to carry their own mask, snorkel and fins though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twangster Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 Welcome to the message boards! You can always bring your own gear. As a fully certified diver I bring all of our gear including a full body rash guard and wetsuits. On dive excursions there are usually some people that don't bring their own gear and it's not uncommon to hear them later say "next time I'm bringing my own gear". Nothing like a leaky mask to ruin an otherwise great dive. Often the fins they supply are simple and cheap slip on fins that I don't like. It is a bit of pain as I use a separate very large suitcase for two of us dedicated to just our scuba gear and I rinse all of our gear in the shower after each use to get all the salt water off it which is also a pain but necessary to keep it in good order in the long run. For a discover scuba excursion which is meant for uncertified individuals it's not uncommon for no one to have any gear so they do have everything you will need if you simply don't desire to bring anything with you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaquan123ism Posted January 3, 2019 Author Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 49 minutes ago, twangster said: Welcome to the message boards! You can always bring your own gear. As a fully certified diver I bring all of our gear including a full body rash guard and wetsuits. On dive excursions there are usually some people that don't bring their own gear and it's not uncommon to hear them later say "next time I'm bringing my own gear". Nothing like a leaky mask to ruin an otherwise great dive. Often the fins they supply are simple and cheap slip on fins that I don't like. It is a bit of pain as I use a separate very large suitcase for two of us dedicated to just our scuba gear and I rinse all of our gear in the shower after each use to get all the salt water off it which is also a pain but necessary to keep it in good order in the long run. For a discover scuba excursion which is meant for uncertified individuals it's not uncommon for no one to have any gear so they do have everything you will need if you simply don't desire to bring anything with you. thank you now instead of the discover scuba im going to be doing the full certification thank you twangster 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twangster Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 7 hours ago, jaquan123ism said: thank you now instead of the discover scuba im going to be doing the full certification thank you Royal has very good dive shops on board many (but not all) ships. They are PADI 5 star dive centers which mean they must meet PADI requirements. I was certified many years ago then stopped diving when kids and family came along. Years later I went through PADI as if i never dove before. Living in CO that meant my certification dives were in a local reservoir which was cold and nasty. Had i realized for virtually the same price I could do my certification on a cruise with my certification dives in the warm Caribbean I would never have done it locally. Some people will argue to get certified before your vacation so you can go diving right away and not lose any vacation time. The counter argument is that diving is something that can stay with you for many years. This is the start of a 'career' sport and enjoying your certification dive and seeing some marine life during your certification dive is like getting a free dive in the process. Much of the PADI certification process is now done out of the water, at home on a tablet using their electronic training material so the impact to your vacation is minimal. If I could turn back time I would get certified through Royal. The price is pretty competitive compared to doing it at home. EDIT - to add this this: I took my step daughter to a local Discover Scuba session at a PADI dive shop in our home town. I wanted to make sure she would be okay wearing a mask and breathing underwater before investing in the full certification cost for her. If you already know this won't be an issue for you that's great. 'Discover Scuba' is a PADI program so it's designed to meet certain criteria and be affordable as a way to try it. bobroo 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobroo Posted January 3, 2019 Report Share Posted January 3, 2019 Another well-said post by Twangster! Bringing your own gear is generally always welcome but not necessary. The Discover Scuba and Open Water course have no expectations that you own any equipment and will fill in the gaps for the things you don't have. Gear is included in the course you are taking. I am an avid scuba diver on vacation and at home. Being a diver and cruising really compliment one another well. I have something cool and exciting to do at every Caribbean port I may stop at, even the crumby ones like Martinique or Nassau. As a matter of fact, I've been to Nassau what, a dozen times? I'm not even close to being bored by scuba diving there. I am at least a couple dozen more stops there before diving in Nassau gets old--maybe even more than that. On the other hand, once you've been to a straw market.... When I cruise, I bring a bag with a complete set of my gear. Partly because I already own it, partly because divers have that warm. snuggly feeling when they are in their own rig, and partly because I know I am going to use it. I am also aware that means extra costs checking it in at the airlines, long stares if not interrogation by RCL security getting on and off the ship, and I am willing to drag it around (i.e. I'll be carrying a soggy, dripping dive bag all the way down a very long pier on my way back to the ship. A bag that will be twice as heavy as when I took it off). But for me, all that effort just to scuba dive a couple tanks is worth it. As an alternative, all I really need is an open water certification card. Opposed to my friend Twangster, I am in the other camp when it comes to when you should get certified if you are a person beginning to get interested in scuba and you are planning to do it on a cruise that is months in the future. My motto: bring your certification to the event, don't make it the event. By no means is this a reflection on Royal or the training they do--they are both just fine. For me, I want to go look at cool stuff underwater not learn some fairly simple skills. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gabe Posted January 15, 2019 Report Share Posted January 15, 2019 Does anyone from the ship dive shop accompany the discover scuba tours? do they actually dive with the group as well? I have a few discover scuba excursions booked and was just wondering. I know that if not, Royal partners with highly rated shops in port, so I'm not concerned either way, just curious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobroo Posted January 15, 2019 Report Share Posted January 15, 2019 19 minutes ago, Gabe said: Does anyone from the ship dive shop accompany the discover scuba tours? do they actually dive with the group as well? I have a few discover scuba excursions booked and was just wondering. I know that if not, Royal partners with highly rated shops in port, so I'm not concerned either way, just curious. Yes, if there is a Discover Scuba class (or excursion) it will be taught by the instructor(s) and a dive master or two; all of whom work in the ships dive shop. The class will happen at whatever shop is the dive excursion provider at what ever the port of call is. There is orientation, some learning, issuing some gear and cumulated by a dive. They will be there within an arms reach every step of your dive. Those first few breaths underwater are very trippy soon turning into being very cool. Multiple Discover Scuba sessions? Ummm......you sure you don't wanna rethink just getting your Open Water cert on the ship???? I understand being uncertain or nervous about scuba but on the other hand there is no good reason for doing Discover Scuba several times over during the same week. And, there is no carryover or credit that can be applied to getting your OW in the future. So if someone is showing this much interest in diving before they go on their cruise, I would recommend becoming OW certified; not doing the same introductory class over and over again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twangster Posted January 15, 2019 Report Share Posted January 15, 2019 'Discover Scuba' is a course framework offered by PADI, one of the larger diving certification organizations around the world. https://www.padi.com/courses/discover-scuba-diving Some Royal ships have PADI 5 Star dive shops on board so they can offer PADI based courses. There is likely a PADI dive shop in a nearby city that offers the same 'Discover Scuba' program in a local pool. Doing it in the Caribbean is a whole lot nicer. I don't know that there is any dis-qualifier that says you can't take it multiple times, or that me as a fully certified diver can't take it, but you do have to sit through the same classroom lectures as outlined by PADI before you get to the diving part. They won't just let you turn it into a poor man's scuba diving excursion as a way to dive cheaply compared to being certified and actually diving. While it's geared for uncertified divers it's nothing like a certified dive and very limited in scope, depth and what you'll see compared to the real thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gabe Posted January 18, 2019 Report Share Posted January 18, 2019 I took the PADI cert class several years ago, but life got in the way so I didn't complete the OW dives, so I'm just now at a point where I'm ready to dive back in (see what I did there? haha). My wife is possibly interested in taking the full cert class, but doesn't want to do so on the ship (not that she doesn't trust them, she just wants to have as much free time as possible). We have an instructor here at home we both really like from whom we'd take the class (or in my case retake), so the dives on the cruise are to see if my wife wants to devote more time to this going forward. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twangster Posted January 18, 2019 Report Share Posted January 18, 2019 When i first learned to dive 35 years ago it was all instructor led and required many hours sitting a classroom. When i got my daughter certified in 2013 I went through it like I had never dived before. Much it it now is done on a tablet in an app at home replacing the tedious hours in a classroom. The two pool dives done at home or if you do it on the ship are done on sea days and early in the day typically before pools open to the public. I don't know if Royal will do just the two open water check dives to complete it. I know you can often make arrangements with a dive shop in a Caribbean country to do the check dives but that's something you work out directly with the dive shop in advance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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