Snuba
 

Has anyone done this? Snorkel fanatic- thinking of taking up scuba. I thought this might be a good intro. Personal opinions valued. Thanks

Why don't you just do a "resort scuba course" its usually a brief intro with a "real" scuba dive. With snuba you do not wear the scuba equipment. With the resort course you will be in full scuba gear, that way you will get the total scuba experience.

I would agre with the previous poster. I wanted to do the snuba thing when I was in St John this past September, but was not impressed. While snorkeling in Trunk Bay I ran into the snubers. They were at the same dephs I was and looking at the same scenery. After observing this I decided not to do it. If you really do not want to come up for air while snorkeling, do the intro to scuba.

We tried snuba a few weeks ago in the USVI. I'd recommend giving it a try--particularly if you really enjoy snorkeling. We had about 45 minutes of instruction before going into the water and by the end our instructor told us that we'd pretty much learned all the basic skills involved with scuba as well.

Hi Debb! I took a resort course at the Westin in St. John a in '99 and did SNUBA at the Prospect Reef in Tortola this year. I absolutely loved SNUBA and absolutely hated the resort course at the Westin (I have posted about my unsafe experience at the Westin in this forum, do a search and you will find it). <BR><BR>In the Westin scuba course they took us down to 35-40 feet with only a 5 minute introduction in the boat (to put the equipment on us, to show us how to clear the mask, and to show us the signs "OK" and "back to the boat.") They didn't give us a class nor try the equipment before on the shore or at the pool. The diver that took us down (along with another couple who were doing their resort course too) was very young and inexperienced and didn't calibrate my equipment nor my husband's equipment correctly - I floated up to the surface twice, while my husband was stuck at the bottom. The equipment is heavy and cumbersome and without time to become adjusted to it, it's hard to enjoy the time that you spend underwater. You'll spend the time in your dive worrying about the equipment rather than looking at the marine life.<BR><BR>On the other hand snuba was REALLY easy. We went down to 20-25 feet and were able to see very up-close the coral and the nooks and crannies where the fish were. The instructor spent 45 minutes with us at the shore giving us explanations and making sure we were comfortable with the equipment. You only have on you the weights, the tanks float above you and you don't need the jacket. We were able to relax and enjoy what we were looking underwater during the dive. There was a lot to look at and it was a different experience than snorkeling.<BR><BR>What Jesse has suggested is very important too. If you try snuba, just make sure they don't take you to a place like Trunk Bay. The coral at Trunk Bay is dead and it's very shallow and overrun with people. Ask them where they will be taking you and make sure there's enough marine life that it'll be worth it. Good luck!

It is necessary to know how to swim in order to snuba? Thanks.

I'm not authority but I think you would be a whole let more comfortable knowing how to swim if you were going to be underwater 25-30 feet.<BR><BR>Does anybody know how much it costs to SNUBA, particular on St. John? (And how long do you get for your $$?)

I'd do a resort course....there's nothing like the rush of swimming with the fish!

I think we paid around $60 per person for snuba on St. John. We got 30-45 minutes of instruction and another 30-45 minutes in the water. The instructor was very nice and very patient.<BR><BR>Kelly: I'm not much of a swimmer and I did fine. You don't go that far from shore and the fins really do all the work. With that said--the more comfortable you are in the water, the better time you're likely to have. If you're not focused on being nervous, you'll be able to concentrate more on what you're seeing.