Lost Dive Log Book. Considering Advanced Cert. Does It Matter?

[cloud96]

Some time ago I lost my dive log book while on a live-aboard in the Bahamas. Personal equipment was kept in a common area and I suspect my book went overboard somehow.

I'm considering getting advanced certifications in order to possibly be a dive guide somewhere in Thailand for a bit. I was thinking about the 'internship' option, where you work for a dive shop for a while in exchange for the certifications.

My understanding is that you need to have a certain number of dives under your belt to be able to take some of these certification courses. I've got over 50 dives, but no proof. Is this a problem, or is it something that people will let slide after a conversation or two with the potential student?

I know it's possible to reconstruct the dive logs and have them signed/stamped, but I want to avoid this if at all possible due to amount of time and effort it will take to contact all my old dive buddies, get the records straight, mail them to the states to be signed, have them mailed back, etc.

Any advice?

[redfish44]

hi cloud96,

That sucks to lose a dive log, as is a nice record to have.

I use blank notebooks as dive log books these days - I stick pictures in there and make drawings etc, so would be gutted if I lost one of them.

Have asked my diver boyfriend and he says if you only have your open water certification registered with PADI (or whoever), then that is enough to go for advanced open water.

If you have lost your card as well, a dive shop can confirm with PADI, NAUI etc that you are registered as an open water diver (assuming that the place you were certified sent in the paperwork). People forget their cards on holiday all the time, so most dive shops do this from time to time.

Similarly if you are already an advance open water diver - they can check your level of certification with the respective dive organisation.

The dive log book would only be a requirement for higher certifications such as divemaster, which require a certain number of logged dives.

He also recommends getting another log book and trying to roughly note the dives you have done.

He says a good dive shop will not offer divemaster training to someone with less than 60 dives.

You need to do EFR + Rescue Diver training first (17 to 18,000B on lanta) which takes a few days (depending on location/weather).

You do divemaster training for 6-8 weeks (lanta it costs around 30,000+. Then you do an internship as a divemaster for another 6-8 weeks.

You want to chose a reputable company/location to do your DM training as you may find it hard get work in other places if you do it somewhere with a bad reputation.

If you have 50ish dives, probably a good idea to do some fun dives to reach 60 with the place you are considering DM training with to scope it out a bit and get to know the staff before committing to DM program.

Lucky you to get to dive the Bahamas - i'd be making another log just so I could reminisce at a later date.

Good luck!

[redfish44]

By the way, my boyfriend didn't have to show his log book before DM training, but then he did that on a small island where everyone had known him for years, and he worked as the compressor guy for 2 years before starting to dive, so the whole island probably knew how many dives he had done when he started DM training.

Good dive instructors can usually tell roughly, based on your skill level. If you suck a good place won't take you on as a DM trainee till you get more practice and improve.

Rescue diver training at my fellas shop has 4 dives by the way.

[britmaveric]

Never had an outfit ask to see it, apart from when doing the new courses and they log the dives we are currently doing.

[H2oDunc]

Cloud96 the above are all correct. You do not need to have done a set amount of dives before you do your advanced course. In fact a lot of people go straight from open water to advanced. If you are looking to do your DM or internship think about doing it on Koh Tao. It is about the cheapest place to get certified and you also have a good choice of schools, 48 at last count. You also get unlimited free fun diving at most dive shops when you sign up for a DMT course so you can bump up your dives at no cost. Advanced you can get for around 8-9,000 baht. A rescue course on Tao is around 9000 baht and DMT around 20,000 25,000 but as there are lots of shops to choose from you are in a good bargaining position.

[limbos]

Cloud 96,

In Thailand it's illegal to work for training. You would need a work permit and it's extremely unlikely that any company offering this kind of internship will supply you with such work permit.

[H2oDunc]

And of course NOBODY does that at all do they ?

Get real!

[cloud96]

Yes, I'd be interested to getting to the level of divemaster. I'm not too interested in instructor level or above as I've heard you need to pay a lot of money for things like monthly dues, insurance, etc. to maintain your level. And divemaster doesn't require that, right?

So, based on the above emails and the website, to get to divemaster with the open water cert I already have, I would need advanced cert, rescue diver, emergency first response provider, and then Divemaster training. And it's the last 3 that require the 60 dives logged.

As much as I really miss my dives logged, I figure it will probably take a week full time to recover all my dives and will piss off all my old dive buddies back in the states asking them to scan and send my copies etc.

H20Dunc mentioned something about the free fun dives. Are they really just that? As long as I have a buddy, I can use the equipment, air etc and dive for free? Would I go out with them on the boat when they are taking customers normally and therefore get to do that for free as well?

So it sounds like here are my options:

- Log another 60 dives during my free fundives

- Go through all the trouble of reconstructing my dive log by having my friends scan in their dive logs and sending it to me, at which point I'd write it out myself along with anything I remember. Then send the original back to my buddy, dive instructor, dive company, or dive club to have them sign or stamp the log as a witness.

- Do the above, but don't bother with the originals, just trying to remember as much as I can (not really the best choice, as I have a memory like a fish and need something in front of me to remind me!).

- Sign up for the divemaster training and hope they don't ask to see my logs.

- Make friends with some of the dive outfits and try to convince them that I really do have 50-60 dives or whatever it is, and that they should give me the training anyway.

Can anyone think of any others? Of all the choices, I think the last one is easiest, but I admit it would be nice to have the dive records. Does anyone know of a computer program that can be used to keep an electronic record of my logs? I imagine it would be harder to lose. I guess the best ones work with a dive computer, but those are so expensive!

Thanks for the advice all. p.s. redfish, the Bahamas were amazing, but I've got to say nothing compares to Honduras! Finally saw a seahorse there

[cloud96]

One more post about the prices

Adding up what you gave me, in order to get a job in diving, I've got to not only give 13-17 weeks of my time, but also pay 45000-52000. That's something like $1300-1550. And Koh Tao is the cheapest in Thailand, or in the world? And that's not including other expenses as well... ouch a little bit to be honest.

How much bargaining power would you say I really have? I went for a few dives on Koh Phi Phi, all the prices were the same, there seemed to be some sort of price collusion, and although they were all eager for the business, nobody gave any indication of giving a discount. And they were all definitely Westerner run. hel_l, even lonely planet mentioned you could get work as a divemaster without a work permit.

Maybe if I were to go in the low season they'd give a bigger discount? Then again, if I did the whole "I work for you and you train me", wouldn't they give me a better deal if I worked in the high season? And how much (how many hours) of work would I really have to do to get the training?

Last, and perhaps I'll catch some crap for not searching first and posting about another topic, but can anyone recommend who to look into and who to avoid? In addition to Koh Tao, I'd also consider the Similan Islands, but only if not too much more expensive.

[limbos]

And of course NOBODY does that at all do they ?

Get real!

Not saying it isn't done in Thailand but if the OP is found out, a lot of very unpleasant things will happen to him in Thaialnd, including a few days in a Thai prison and deportation to his original country and no way he will ever be able to enter Thailand again.

Just not sure if it's worthwhile the hassle, not to mention the professional idea I have about such set up, they're way open for abuse towards the internee. Just not a good situation overall.

[limbos]

Yes, I'd be interested to getting to the level of divemaster. I'm not too interested in instructor level or above as I've heard you need to pay a lot of money for things like monthly dues, insurance, etc. to maintain your level. And divemaster doesn't require that, right?

Hi, your information isn't right. Both DM's and Instructors need to renew their membership fee with PADI on a yearly base. If you live in an area that requires insurance, both at DM and Instructor level you will need to acquire this. Thailand is exempt for insurance. The membership fees for DM's and Instructor don't differ too much in the Asia pacific region.

So, based on the above emails and the website, to get to divemaster with the open water cert I already have, I would need advanced cert, rescue diver, emergency first response provider, and then Divemaster training. And it's the last 3 that require the 60 dives logged.

Nope, wrong information again. You need 20 logged dives to start your DM training and 60 logged dives before you can send in your DM application to PADI.

As much as I really miss my dives logged, I figure it will probably take a week full time to recover all my dives and will piss off all my old dive buddies back in the states asking them to scan and send my copies etc.

It'll save you a lot of hassle once you start your DM course. It's entirely up to you if you want to hassle your dive buddies. Pending on how much time you have available and which what company you end up complting your training, dives may be included in the package. I do offer 60 logged dives up to Divemaster level in my packages here You only need 60 logged dives in total, it doesn't matter if they're fun dives or training dives.

H20Dunc mentioned something about the free fun dives. Are they really just that? As long as I have a buddy, I can use the equipment, air etc and dive for free? Would I go out with them on the boat when they are taking customers normally and therefore get to do that for free as well?

For the DM course it's highly recommended that you posses your own dive equipment. At the end of the day it's a professional rating which requires professional equipment. How would you like it if you needed a carpenter to fix something at your house and he asked you for a hammer and some nails?

So it sounds like here are my options:

- Log another 60 dives during my free fundives

- Go through all the trouble of reconstructing my dive log by having my friends scan in their dive logs and sending it to me, at which point I'd write it out myself along with anything I remember. Then send the original back to my buddy, dive instructor, dive company, or dive club to have them sign or stamp the log as a witness.

Just the scan which states your name should be sufficient imho.

- Do the above, but don't bother with the originals, just trying to remember as much as I can (not really the best choice, as I have a memory like a fish and need something in front of me to remind me!).

- Sign up for the divemaster training and hope they don't ask to see my logs.

Any serious school will ask you, since this needs to be filled out on the application form.

- Make friends with some of the dive outfits and try to convince them that I really do have 50-60 dives or whatever it is, and that they should give me the training anyway.

This should not work, if it does, consider where else they are willing to break rules and what kind of (substandard) training you eventualy will get.

Can anyone think of any others? Of all the choices, I think the last one is easiest, but I admit it would be nice to have the dive records. Does anyone know of a computer program that can be used to keep an electronic record of my logs? I imagine it would be harder to lose. I guess the best ones work with a dive computer, but those are so expensive!

Any dive computer will log your dives, than you can purchase software to store them on your computer/laptop.

Thanks for the advice all. p.s. redfish, the Bahamas were amazing, but I've got to say nothing compares to Honduras! Finally saw a seahorse there

[limbos]

One more post about the prices

Adding up what you gave me, in order to get a job in diving, I've got to not only give 13-17 weeks of my time, but also pay 45000-52000. That's something like $1300-1550. And Koh Tao is the cheapest in Thailand, or in the world? And that's not including other expenses as well... ouch a little bit to be honest.

Not sure who you are referring to, but yes, that's a fair qoute and probably one of the cheaper qoutes you can get in Thailand. Koh Tao is the cheapest option in Thailand and to the ebst of my knowledge there are no work for training programs there.

How much bargaining power would you say I really have? I went for a few dives on Koh Phi Phi, all the prices were the same, there seemed to be some sort of price collusion, and although they were all eager for the business, nobody gave any indication of giving a discount. And they were all definitely Westerner run. hel_l, even lonely planet mentioned you could get work as a divemaster without a work permit.

The profit margins on Koh Tao are low, there won't be much room for discounts. This is about as cheap as you can get it.

Maybe if I were to go in the low season they'd give a bigger discount? Then again, if I did the whole "I work for you and you train me", wouldn't they give me a better deal if I worked in the high season? And how much (how many hours) of work would I really have to do to get the training?

As I already mentioned in this thread, it's illegal to do a 'work for training' program in Thailand and the conseuqnces can be very unpleasant for you. My professional advice is to start saving money and invest it in proper training and buying your self a set of equipment and maybe hold back for a while on the cheap options that you're looking for.

You'll get what you pay for.

Last, and perhaps I'll catch some crap for not searching first and posting about another topic, but can anyone recommend who to look into and who to avoid? In addition to Koh Tao, I'd also consider the Similan Islands, but only if not too much more expensive.