The Argonauts John or Jean Francois ???????

[grumpie]

John its knowing what your looking at, whenyou see it.Most people don't know that if its straight or curved that its most likely man made

[DetectorGuy]

I am with you on that Grumpie. Sometimes when the viz is bad, its whether or not something feels like its man made. I have so much Aquaseal on the fingertips of my 7mm gloves that I can't even feel much with them. Cant wait for warmer water to get out and do some muck diving barehanded.

[jasondbaker]

John, I understand your perspective but I think you are painting with a broad brush.  The guys up at MSD in Brainerd do a pretty good job supporting the diving opportunities in their back yard.  Air Down There has been encouraging local diving consistently since they started their business.  We've had various shops supporting technical and rebreather divers over the years. Aquaventure is building what is arguably the premier underwater photography store in the region. It seems like there is something for everyone out there.  I agree with you that the business model of most diveshops is based around attracting new customers.  They experience heavy customer churn and have to keep the new customer pipeline full.  That's the model today and I can't fault it.

And I wouldn't call you a newbie with 197 dives.  That probably puts you in the top 1% of all divers in terms of underwater time.  We're surrounded by some of the most experienced divers in the country.  That can make one feel like a newbie at times.

[DetectorGuy]

I guess I was a bit negative. You are right with MSD having great intel on the pits and Aquaventure having great info on cameras. I think I am still going through NAUI withdrawls from Smith Diving going out of business. I wasn't diving yet when Argonauts or Vets Salvage Diving were in business, but those shops sounded like they were fun to be in. Smith Diving for me was a fun shop to be in as I could ask Lee or one of his employees a question about a certain lake (that was not a training tub) or a spot on the mississippi river, and they would give you an intelligent answer as to any experience they or people they know had there. If I had a question about gear they had a pretty knowledgable staff that could answer "correctly". I never got wrapped up in the fun dives they did at Smith, but I really liked the treasure dives (not because they were at Square but because I won a lot of neat stuff at them).
When I was refering to myself being a newbie I was comparing the four years that I have been diving with the forty years so many in the area have been diving. I am bummed out that I haven't used my time more wisely and talked to more of those more experienced divers, to learn from them where to go based on where they have been (or haven't been). Even folks with 10 years diving experience dwarf my experience and I am humbled when I am around them. Maybe thats why I like solo diving so much... less humility, more "being the best diver in the lake that day". All I can say it to take advantage of your time and talk to some of the more experienced divers in the area before they move to clearer, warmer water.

[Deltaforce]

Being one of the old timers (certified in 1977 by, oh my gosh...PADI), I highly appreciate shops like AquaVenture and Air Down There.  These guys both run a full schedule of fun dives throughout the summer at lots of different venues.  If you think they only know about Square and Perch you are misinformed.  They are willing to provide (at no or low cost) an opportunity for a Divemaster-organized experience for the recreational diver that wants to get more experience and continue to have fun with the sport.  And will grill burgers and brats after to boot!

The old shops (VSD, Club Scuba, etc.) did not provide this service.  Back in that day, scuba clubs were about the only way to take part in organized dives.  As a member of the Owatonna Diving Club back then (still the oldest diving organization in the state, I believe), this was the main way I gained knowledge and experience.  There were plenty of old timers around that were willing to teach and I learned a lot.

The bottom line to me is that the shops are in business to train and sell gear.  The fact that they are willing to put together summer fun dives at all is really a bonus.  If you want to promote diving as a sport, stop complaining about the shops and start a club to meet new divers and share your diving experience.  Or contribute info to mnscuba about the hot new dive site that you've found.  Or else just go and do your own thing.  Just don't denegrade the shops who are doing a great job of promoting the sport.

[Terry]

                         USDiver, I meant no denegrade to the local shops, its just an observation I had that the older shops had more "character", if you will, by feeling like a dive shop in having stuff from the bottom in their stores, dosent really cost anything, often times rotated thru, "loaned" from people who frequented their shops, and was often very intriguing to the guppies they were trying to sell classes and gear to.
                        Ive seen a lot of newbie divers (not like my friend John, I mean, even newer ) run off to the Carib. who then tried and  never got into local diving. Then state, "why would anyone dive in those cold sterile, various shades of brown, mudholes?"  I think "local" diving should be required, like an apprenticeship, its clearly tougher, often times less rewarding, sometimes frustrating, but it does teach you a lot, just like an apprenticeship. I mean look at the scary divers you see in Cozy, and the Keys, whole lot more by percentage then you see in the Great Lakes. I remember Aubineau stating, "if you can consistantly dive the Great Lakes you could dive anywhere in the world, because it dosent get any tougher", and thinking it was more BS from him, there was some of that from JFA, but it turns out he was right. When you factor in the difficulties on the Great Lakes diving, especially oftentimes combined, like, depth, darkness, waves (surge), fog, cold, remoteness, rugged shorelines, rapidly changing weather, lack of other boaters, entrapment hazards of uncleared wrecks, and so on. You do have to be pretty good. I think its nice to start out local then as you get older (like me, for those that wanted to take, that shot), "slowly" switch to that warmer, clearer, more colorful, white sand, bikini filled, islands of the Carib.

[Deltaforce]

Hey Trinity --

My comments weren't weren't directed at you regarding the LDS's.  I think you are an old timer like me and understand where we came from 30 years ago and probably have the same appreciation that I do for the current LDS offering.

I guess my take is that local diving is not everyone's cup of tea.  I have seen many people try it, but after donning a 7mm suit, 20+ lbs of weight, gloves, hood, etc. only to experience the typical muck bottom with 5 feet of visibility, they wait for the next trip to blue water to dive.  "Requiring" local diving seems silly -- this is supposed to be a fun thing and if someone does not enjoy it, they will never get into it. 

Most people are not candidates for BUDS -- they got into diving so that they can enjoy a few shallow water reef dives on their annual vacation.  There is nothing wrong with that.

[arcFlash]

Seems to me we tried something like this for the ice challenge and only got 6 divers. You want to talk about sad, that post was read 17 thousand time and we could only get 6 people! Right, everyone has an excuse and an armchair opinion while the rest of us diving every weekend are the 'complainers'. Terry gets a pass on account of seniority but John and I are troublemakers. That's just super. :-\

[Deltaforce]

Hard to understand your rant -- but let me try.  The thread originally came down on LDSs because they did not provide opportunities / information for local diving.  I disputed that because of my experience -- that they have great summer programs at a number of locations which you apparently are not aware of.  The second issue was that more people are not enamored with local diving.  Your comment on ice diving only reenforces my point -- I'm actually surprised that you got 6 people to sign up for that pleasure cruise.

Believe it or not, you are not the only guy that does a lot of diving.  I know most of us don't feel the need write endlessly about our diving experiences online, but it doesn't mean that we aren't out there most weekends.  One thing this sport has taught me over the years is that there are all kinds of divers with all kinds of interests, abilities, and motivations.  They do not need to fit any particular profile or mold.  The goal is to get out there and to experience whatever it is that you deem is fun. 

[NorthlandDivers]

Our Trident Dive Team has bean out doing quite a few dives this summer.  So far they have logged over 75 local dives.  We only let them count the local diving not there travel diving.
They have not only been to Square and Perch but Lake Elmo, Lake Calhoun, Lake Minnetonka, Lake Wazee, and Lake Phalen where we did a beach and lake clean up with Venture Crew 820 . Plus they are planning dives to Lake Superior, Lake Ore-b-gone, Lake Mine, St James, just to name a few.  They post all of there info on their facebook page.

As to your other questions on where people  like to go diving.  We run a survey in almost all of our beginning classes and 99% of the people taking classes took then to dive in the warm ocean waters or to put it another way they pictured themselves scuba diving on coral reefs in warm tropical waters.

We work hard to promote local diving, but the majority of our divers tend the warm tropical ocean direction.  As long as they are diving and having fun I'm all for it.

Just for background info I have been diving for over 34 years anywhere from the local lakes to Isle Royale to Truk Lagoon just to mention but a few destinations.