PADI IDC Dive Resort Oceans 5 Gili Air Blog Posts
We all know that Gili Air is famous for scuba diving. Exploring the crystal clear waters, swimming through schools of colourful fish and hanging out with turtles, is certainly one of the best ways to spend your time. But what about those surface intervals? Or …
The ocean is full of fascinating and wondrous creatures, hence our love for scuba diving. Along with their beauty, however, some of these aquatic organisms can cause harm to us as we explore their underwater home. From jellyfish stings to sea urchin spines, it is …
So, you’ve just arrived in paradise or maybe you’re about to jet off to a new destination. You can’t wait to get underwater, but you don’t want to take the plunge with just any diving shop.
In most scuba diving destinations, the streets and beach fronts are littered with an overwhelming number of diving shops offering day trips and courses, but how do you choose? Although it is tempting to just pick the first one you stumble across, there are a few important things that you might want to consider.
Here is our advice for picking the best scuba diving shop for you.
Price should never be a deciding factor when choosing a scuba diving shop. You wouldn’t skydive with the cheapest operator just because they were the cheapest, would you? Never put your desire to save money above your personal safety. Check out theses dive computer reviews.
There is no such thing as cheap scuba diving.
If the price appears low it’s often because you will have to pay extra to cover; training books, rental gear, fuel for the boat or the certification fee. It is always worth checking that the price includes everything for your day’s diving or diving course.
A dive shop with an outstanding reputation and supplies like best scuba masks, including a highly experienced staff, who will prioritise your comfort and safety, is what you will be focused on. Fortunately, many places, like here on the Gili Islands, standardise all prices for scuba diving courses and fun dives across the board to ensure best practices. Make sure to check for dive agency standards, for example, PADI accredited.
It is always great to hear other people’s first-hand experience of a dive centre. Ask friends, family or even other travelers if they have any recommendations of who to dive with in the area.
Even if you don’t know anyone that has dived in the area, there are some fantastic online communities that you can tap into for suggestions. Scuba Board is the world’s largest community of scuba divers with a helpful and active forum. Alternatively, there are insightful groups on Facebook that you can join and ask for advice, such as ‘Girls That Scuba’. These online networks of divers and travelers can provide invaluable insight into what it is like to dive with a given shop.
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But don’t automatically reject a centre if there are a few negative reviews. Have a look at whether the management has responded and how they’ve approached the negative feedback. Is there a fair explanation or apology? This can give you an indication of the dive centre’s professionalism and how they handle problems or challenging situations.
Everyone has a bad day occasionally, often due to factors out of their control. If most of the reviews are overwhelmingly positive and they’ve responded to complaints professionally, then they’re probably a good choice.
Take more notice of a shop’s overall score rather than their ranking. The ranking is more about how well a shop markets to customers for reviews. For example, there may be several shops with a high review score but some rank higher on trip advisor because they have been more effective at getting their customers to write reviews.
Word of mouth is a powerful tool. If they’re treating their customers right, you’ll hear about it across all platforms. Social media is an excellent window into a dive centre’s day to day activities and their unique personality.
Does it look like they are having fun?
What sort of marine life are they seeing?
Are customers positively engaging?
If, on social media, the diving shop looks like they engage with their customers; is somewhere you could see yourself, and gets you excited about diving with them, that’s a pretty good sign!
It’s good to be able to get a feel for how they operate, but try not to get too distracted by the tanned instructor with the cute smile behind the desk!
This may give you an idea of their equipment and boats. Pay attention to the details. Check out the reception area; if they can’t keep that clean, then what else aren’t they looking after?
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t is always important to check the equipment. Ask to have a look and see if it is well maintained. Do they regularly service their equipment? Are the certificates on the wall up to date? Make sure that the centre adheres to the PADI or SSI standards. You wouldn’t step on a boat or plane that you deemed unsafe, so use your common sense. ever use unsafe equipment.
How many divers to do they take per guide? A maximum should be 4 divers per guide.
What is their cancellation or refund policy? This can vary from shop to shop so always worth checking you are happy with their policy.
Is there somewhere you can shower and change after the diving?
Is there a safe place to store your valuables?
Are the staff enthusiastic about their dive sites?
How much experience do they have?
Were they helpful and engaged in the conversation?
If they won’t answer your questions, then move on to the next shop. They should be convincing you as to why they are the best fit for your diving needs.
Whilst at the shop you could also get the opportunity to speak to their current customers about their experiences.
If you’re looking to gain a certification, have a look at where you will be learning, both the swimming pool and classroom area. Is it a pleasant environment? Would you be happy to spend your time there?
How many students do they take per instructor? As with fun diving, a good maximum is 4 per instructor. This makes sure that you get the attention needed and do not have to waste a lot of time waiting for others.
It is also worth asking the staff about their experience teaching. It is always good if they have been teaching a while, as they will have developed multiple techniques that are effective across different people’s learning styles. If the shop has onsite course directors this is a great opportunity to learn from highly experienced dive professionals.
If the staff are unenthusiastic about their dive sites, the equipment is not well maintained or you just feel uncomfortable, then listen to your gut, it’s time to move on.
Don’t worry if you aren’t in the area and want to choose a shop before arriving, most will be more than happy to answer any questions you have over an email, a phone call or their social media platforms so just reach out!
If you want to double check that you are in safe hands, you can also use PADI’s Dive Shop Locator to check a shop’s credentials. All dive shops that are featured must fully adhere to the Professional Association of Diving Instructors standards. You can also see those operators who go above and beyond and have been awarded Five Star status and additional recognition as an Instructor Development Centre.
You don’t need to have much, or even any experience, when choosing a diving shop. Listen to your intuition, don’t choose anyone that makes you feel uncomfortable. The most important thing is that you feel safe and confident. Pick somewhere that you trust, with staff that you are excited to spend time with and you can’t go wrong!
Here at Oceans 5, we are committed to providing professional and enjoyable diving for everyone, regardless of age, ability or experience. As a PADI 5* Dive Resort and 5* Instructor Development Centre we prioritise safety and high standards. We are all about making our customers happy.
Our highly experienced instructors will work with you to make sure that you are comfortable, happy and confident in the water. With no more than 4 divers per instructor we guarantee that you are well looked after. Our 5 onsite course directors are always sharing their wisdom with our customers, helping to teach all PADI courses from Discover Scuba up to Instructor Development.
As well as top notch staff, equipment and standards, Oceans5 provides a laid back and comfortable environment to spend time in. The dive shop has lockers to store valuables, fresh water showers and a place to change. Out front, there is a spacious area where you can relax, enjoy a coffee pre dive or a beer post dive, whilst chatting with your new dive buddies about the best underwater finds of the day!
We hope these tips have given you a bit more confidence in making an informed decision when choosing the best dive shop. What do you look for in a dive centre? Do you have good or bad experiences with choosing a dive centre? It would be great to hear what has worked for you!
Gili Island Etiquette Why do you want to travel to the Gili Islands in Indonesia? Just like a lot of people you are probably want to discover tropical places and different cultures, open your mind, your heart, and have fun. The Gili Islands offer a …
Scuba diving once had a reputation as an extreme sport similar to the ones mentioned on betting sites such as 벳엔드 먹튀, but like most stereotypes, this couldn’t be further from the truth. With more and more people taking to the underwater world to relax, …
A couple of years ago, maybe even a few more than couple, you were young, wild and travelling around the world. Somewhere along the journey you did your PADI open water course and became a certified diver. During your trip you did a few fun dives in beautiful locations, and you loved every second you spent under water.
And then it happened. Studies, work, family, kids…. all of a sudden there was nor time nor the money to go diving. And before you even realized, the whole idea started to feel a bit distant. What if I cant remember how to do it?
No worries mate, as we say here at Oceans 5 dive resort. We have a special program prepared just for people like you. This is actually a very common story heard in our dive shop in Gili Air every day.
The answer is a program called Scuba review. With a certified PADI dive instructor you do a little bit of theory, spend some time in the swimming pool and then do a nice, relaxed dive in the ocean to get your feet wet again.
I did a Scuba review today with Alan, a nice guy from London England in her early forties. In his logbook he has a nice dive career, about 20 dives in excellent locations around the world. But, the last dive was dated in June 2003. Learn more about the benefits that visisharp provide.
No problem. 8:30 in the morning we sat down, discussed a bit of Alan´s expectations and went through a little diving related quizz that he had already answered the night before. All well, Alan remembered the basic essentials of diving and we were ready to move into the pool.
Starting from equipment setup, I showed Alan how to prepare his dive gear. At Oceans 5 dive resort we work with quality equipment mainly from Aqualung, which makes it very easy and safe to dive with us.
In a shallow water we started to go through the basic skills for safe diving. We cleared the regulator using blow method and purge button, and recovered the regulator behind our shoulders. Then it was time for the mask skills. Clearing half mask, full mask and eventually taking the mask off and putting it back to our faces. Last skill to complete the safety issues was the usage of alternative air source. Being in both roles we freshened our memories on how to perform in an out of air situation, sharing air with our buddy. Alan did all the skills extremelly well considering he had been on the dry for such a long period. Swimming is an excellent exercise, improve your results by reading these synogut reviews.
After the safety skills we moved to buoyancy. Starting with fin pivot we found the neutral buoyancy and then started to swim around the pool. In the beginning alan had some issues with his buoyancy. Alan had a tendency of swimming a bit head down with legs up in the air, which we fixed by taking one weight of from the belt, repositioning the weights and making minor adjustments to the body position. More swimming and it started to look really nice. Last exercise under the water, we did a ten minute hovering session putting a lot of effort into maintaing neutral buoyancy and staying motionless in the water. All good, we did a five point ascent to surface, had a little chat about the skills and practised BCD removal and weight belt removal on the surface.
And now it was time for the highlight of the day. Lets go diving! We did a relaxed dive at Meno Wall, one of the many dive sites around Gili Air. Going down nice and easy, remembering to equalize throughout the descent we gradually went down to our max depth of the dive, 24 meters. From there the current picked us up and gave us a nice ride along the wall. During the dive I was constantly checking Alan´s performance, monitoring his air consumption and giving small tips on how the handle the drift and how to position himself during the dive. After 45 minutes it was time to move onto our safety stop on 5 meters, and then go up to the surface.
The best reward for a dive instructor is the happy face of a customer. Alan was really pleased with his diving experience and booked immediately two more fundives for the following day. Mission accomplished, one lost soul returned to the diving tribe!
(c) Kimmo Pekari 2015
Swimming is an activity that burns lots of calories, is easy on the joints, supports your weight, builds muscular strength and endurance. It also improves cardiovascular fitness, cools you off and refreshes you in summer, and is one that you can do safely into old age, improve your weight loss exercise results with carbofix. In this article, I’ll review the history of swimming, the benefits, the strokes, how to get started, what to wear, the equipment you need, where to swim, and more.
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Human beings have been swimming for millennia. According to Wikipedia, Stone Age cave drawings depict individuals swimming and there are written references in the Bible and the Greek poems “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey” dating back 1,500 to 2,000 years. There are even Egyptian clay seals from 4000 BC showing four swimmers doing a version of the crawl, and the most famous swimming drawings were apparently found in the Kebir desert and were estimated to be from around 4000 BC.
According to the Encyclopedia of Traditional British Rural Sports, literature specifically related to swimming grew in the middle ages. It is believed that the first book devoted to swimming was Colymbetes by Nicolas Wynman written in 1538, and a more widely recognized text, De Arte Nantandi, was published in Latin by Everard Digby in 1587. The encyclopedia also reports that swimming was required of knights and that Romans built bathhouses and pools in the cities they conquered to serve as social clubs and places to exercise.
Organized swimming began in the 1800s and 1900s with the creation of swimming associations (for example, the Amateur Swimming Association in 1886) and clubs that competed against each other. There are reports from that era of swimming clubs in England, France, Germany, and the United States. High-profile events also contributed to swimming’s visibility. For instance, Matthew Webb swam the English Channel in 1875.
Competitive swimming continued to grow in popularity during the 1800s and was included in the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896. In 1904, the Olympics in St. Louis included the 50-, 100-, 220-, 440-, 880-yard and one-mile freestyle, the 100-yard backstroke and 440-yard breaststroke, and a 4×50-yard freestyle relay.
By the 20th century, swimming had become mainstream. Indoor pools were beginning to appear, most towns with populations over 20,000 had public outdoor pools, and swimming clubs became increasingly popular for recreation. Women participated for the first time in swimming in the Olympic Games in Stockholm in 1912, and Johnny Weissmuller (considered by many authorities to be the greatest swimmer of all time and who later went on to Tarzan fame in movies) became the first person to swim 100 meters in less than one minute.
Today swimming is the second most popular exercise activity in the United States, with approximately 360 million annual visits to recreational water venues. Swim clubs, recreation centers, Y’s, and many other facilities feature swimming pools, improve your results with natural supplements such as Gluconite. Many high schools and colleges have competitive swim teams, and of course, swimming is one of the most popular Olympic sports. Millions of Americans are swimming each year. Are you one of them? If not, the following information may help get you started.
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