SCUBA

After my initial excitement of buying new diving gear passed, I had to deal with something unpleasant. The owner of the dive shop took it upon himself to glue a sticker promoting his shop on the back window of my vehicle. That was a mistake on his part, and I'll never spend a dollar in his shop again. Moving on, I've scheduled Open Water Diver Certification classes for November. The first weekend will be three days of education: Friday evening from 6pm to 10pm, then Saturday from 9am to 6pm, followed by the same hours on Sunday. Two weeks later, we'll drive to a lake in Glen Rose for dives on Saturday and Sunday.

This is PADI instruction, which seems to be the most widely accepted dive instruction organization. For two weeks, I'll be studying ...

Today, I finally took the official plunge into the SCUBA world. I've been circling the idea for the past six years, but knew it was an expensive hobby. I already have one of those as it is. Still, I've read articles about our beautiful reefs, read stories by my diving friends, and seen pictures that made me envious. National Geographic and IMAX movies whetted my appetite to see some of these places in person, and opportunities arose repeatedly where I had to decline because I wasn't certified yet. When I was applying for health insurance years ago, they asked me about a number of possible high-risk sports I might be involved in, including SCUBA. My answer was "no to all of the above," but that they were giving me some great ideas. hehe The SCUBA diver on the Melev's Reef branding wasn't just a look, it was a personal goal. ...

The Coral Triangle covers approximately 2.3 million square miles of ocean and encompasses six countries in the Indo-Pacific: Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Solomon Islands, and Timor-Leste. An unbelievable amount of biodiversity is condensed into less than 1% of the world's ocean surface area: The Coral Triangle (CT) is home to one-third of the world’s coral reefs, 75% of known coral species (~600 species of corals), nearly 3,000 species of fish, half of the world’s ...

This new video was released by the CRF on July 29, 2012, showing how corals are not only grown out from frags but then planted back on actual reef foundations to restore what has been lost over the years. Ken Nedimyer organized his dream to rebuild our reefs on frag at a time, and it is gaining momentum. As hobbyists, we are more inclined to dream about what we can add to our aquarium next, but Ken's vision is what can we do to help the ocean regain some of its former beauty?

If you'd like to learn more about the Coral Restoration Foundation, be sure to attend MACNA September 28-30, 2012. Ken's going to be speaking: “Coral Replanting: Hope for Caribbean Coral Reefs” ...

Lately I’ve been asked a lot about my underwater videos and what gear I use. There isn’t really an easy answer for this so I figured more people in this hobby would benefit from me documenting the answer for future reference. I have a GoPro Hero 2 camera and I love it. It is a great camera that is relatively inexpensive for what it does. Because of this, I am not afraid to take it everywhere and put it in conditions that could be considered precarious. For example, over the side of a speed boat in Thailand to film the wake and the approaching islands; the GoPro goes everywhere. Here is the website for all the specs.

There are two shortcomings when ...

DAY 4- Veteran's Day Pool Cancellation
Well Day 4 of my class fell on Veteran's Day and the pool we swim in happens to be on a Naval base. So the pool was canceled and we drove to the store location for the classroom portion of the certification.
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