Welcome Groupon Subscribers! We're excited to have you join us.
HydroSports special Groupon
pricing is available only to Groupon subscribers.
To participate in a Discover Scuba Diving or Open Water Diver class
please call Mark Fischer at 503-304-5383.
Answers to many common
questions about diving can be found below.
If you have further questions, please contact me, Mark Fischer:
hydrosports@gmail.com or
503-304-5383.
We've put our very best offers
here for you
and look forward to sharing the excitement, tranquility and
adventure of diving.
When
are Discover Scuba and Open Water classes scheduled?
What is the difference
between Discover Scuba and the Open Water Diver class?
What's Involved in Open Water Diver
Training?
How long is the Open Water Diver class?
Are there sharks where we train?
Where do classes and pool dives take place?
How safe is scuba diving?
How much does it cost to learn to dive?
What equipment will I need?
How large will my class be?
I don't have a dive buddy. How do I find someone to dive with?
What will I see during my dives?
Am I healthy enough to scuba dive?
I have claustrophobia. I can't dive, can I?
My ears hurt diving to the bottom of a pool. How can I dive deeper?
Click HERE to go to
HydroSports website or www.hydrosports.com
What is the difference between Discover Scuba and the Open Water Diver class? Top of Page
Discover Scuba is an introductory dive experience. The Open Water Diver class prepares a diver to dive independently.
Discover Scuba Diving is an
opportunity to try scuba diving in a swimming pool. Participants are guided by
licensed instructors, learn the basics of diving safety and will have an
opportunity to scuba dive wearing a wet suit, mask, fins, tank, buoyancy
compensating vest and regulator. During your dive you'll learn how to keep your
ears comfortable while descending to the bottom of a 12 foot deep pool and will
experience the weightless exhilaration of diving. Your HydroSports staff will be
filming your adventure and will produce a high definition video of
your experience. Completing the Discover Scuba Diving experience does not
prepare participants to dive independently. Watch a Discover Scuba program click
HERE .
What's Involved in Open Water Diver
Training?
Top of Page
The PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) Open Water Diver class taught by HydroSports is the most widely recognized scuba certification class in the world. By completing the Open Water diver class, participants learn to independently plan and execute dives in conditions similar to those in which one's dives take place. As a certified diver, you will be welcome to dive at resorts and dive shops around the world.
Learning to dive isn’t difficult, but like any activity worth doing, it requires some time and effort. While taking the PADI Open Water Diver course, you’ll enjoy three phases: Knowledge Development, Confined Water Dives and Open Water Dives
The PADI Open Water Diver course is incredibly flexible and performance based, which means that your PADI Dive Center or Resort can offer the program on a wide variety of schedules, and paced according to how fast you progress. It’s possible to complete your confined and open water dives in as few as four days (provided you take care to read the manual and watch the DVD ahead of time).
However,
many people prefer a more leisurely schedule. Contact HydroSports Dive and
Travel to find schedule options or ask about a private or semiprivate
course.
1. Knowledge
Development:
This develops your familiarity with basic principles and procedures. You learn
things like how pressure affects your body, how to choose the best gear and what
to consider when planning dives.
You complete Knowledge Development on your own, reading each of five sections of
the PADI
Open Water Diver Manual
and watching the corresponding section of the PADI
Open Water Diver DVD
(which also
previews skills you’ll learn). If you like learning with a personal computer,
you can also get the
Open Water Diver
Manual and
Video
together as a CD-ROM. You briefly review what you studied in each section with
your instructor and take a short quiz to be sure you’re getting it. At the end
of the course, you take an exam that makes sure you’ve got all the key concepts
and ideas down.
2. Confined Water Dives:
This is what it’s all about. You develop basic scuba skills in a pool or in a
body of water with pool-like conditions. Here you’ll learn everything from
setting up your gear to how to easily get water out of your mask without
surfacing. You’ll also practice some emergency skills, like sharing air just in
case. Plus, you may play some games, make new friends and have a great time.
There are five confined water dives, with each building upon the previous. Over
the course of these five dives, you develop the skills you need to dive in open
water.
Your HydroSports staff will be
filming your adventure and will produce a personalized high definition video of
your experience.
HydroSports
conducts our Open Water Dives at the Yellow House in Hoodsport, Washington.
The
Yellow House is a private home custom outfitted for scuba diving. Owned
by a diving instructor, the house sleeps 9 guests in the basement in comfortable
beds and up to six additional guests in private bedrooms on the main and upper
floors.
The house is equipped with a fully stocked kitchen, living and dining rooms, four and a half bathrooms, hot tub, barbeque, heated drying room, indoor dressing room for setting up scuba equipment and a private beach for training dives. The local air fill station is 1/8 mile up the road. Most of our guests consider The Yellow House to be a comfortable, well-appointed Bed and Breakfast. We host a pot-luck dinner on Saturday night, one of the traditional highlights of every open water training weekend.
How long is the Open Water Diver class? What are the schedule options? Top of Page
HydroSports Open Water Diver classes have two traditional formats; Tuesday and Thursday nights over a three week period or a two weekend format. Week night classes begin at 6 PM at HydroSports and end with nearly two hours of dive time in a local pool.
Weekend classes run from 8 AM to 6 PM Saturday and Sunday on the first weekend. The second weekend we conduct the open water dives at the Yellow House in Hoodsport, Washington. The diving day begins at 8:30 AM and is usually completed by 3 PM each afternoon.
We also conduct classes on a custom or private basis. Private and custom classes have additional fees.
Are there sharks where we train? Top of Page
Truth be told, sharks or some relative of sharks, live in nearly every ocean of the world. The better question is: Are we likely to be threatened or injured by a shark while scuba diving? No. Reality vs. Hollywood.
In the Hood Canal, an arm of Puget Sound, two species of shark are seen. The more common species is a spiny dogfish. This animal is a relative of the sharks we see in movies. Spiny dogfish can reach up to three feet in length, have big eyes, and have a typical shark silhouette. They are rarely seen during the day and are very timid. The second species of shark rarely seen in the Hood Canal is the six gill shark. This species commonly lives in very deep water, 3,000 feet or more, is very timid, and can grow to 12 to 14 feet. Six gill sharks have a classic shark tail but no dominant dorsal fin. There are NO recorded incidents of any injury to divers from either of these species.
The number of shark attacks on humans world wide is exceptionally small. Attacks on divers is even smaller. One is dramatically more likely to be struck by lightening, twice, than to be injured by a shark. Sharks deserve our respect and caution. Most divers who observe sharks underwater hold up a camera and take photos.
Where do classes and pool dives take place? Top of Page
Classes will meet at HydroSports Dive and Travel, 3846 River Road North, Keizer. Our classroom comfortably accommodates 12 to 14 students (class size is typically 8). We dive in one of several local pools, at Willamette University, the Salvation Army Kroc Center or Western Oregon University.
How safe is scuba diving? Top of Page
As mentioned above, one is far more likely to struck by lightening twice, than be injured by a shark. Other statistics sited by the diving industry are that one is more likely to be injured while bowling or driving, or crossing the street at a crosswalk than while diving. While diving is very safe, there are risks. One needs to be in good health and comfortable in the water. One does not need to be a powerful swimmer to dive effectively, however, one should be comfortable in the water. During pool training participants are asked to swim 200 yards with no swim aids (and no time limit) or 300 yards wearing mask, snorkel and fins and participants are asked to spend 10 minutes in water too deep to stand treading, bobbing, floating, etc.
How much does it cost to learn to dive? Top of Page
Your Groupon package price, $199, covers your books, instruction, pool rental and most rental dive equipment. One may upgrade to PADI's eLearning (online education program) for $99. By using eLearning a student will not need to participate in a 6 hour Saturday class meeting.
You are also responsible for bringing a smile, towel and swim suit.
Your lodging during our training weekend, beech fees and air fills are not covered by your Groupon package. HydroSports invites you to join us at the Yellow House. We will be training at the beach across the street from the Yellow House. The house is a very comfortable property custom-converted for divers. We can refer you to alternate lodging accommodations nearby if you prefer private quarters. Lodging for a training weekend at the Yellow House is $130 per person and includes two air fills for training dives and full use of the private beach owned by the house. Students choosing to find alternate lodging pay a $70 per person fee which covers the property owner's cost of operations (property taxes, maintenance, compressor operation and utilities). Students staying at the Yellow House do not pay the $70 fee.
Once each diver completes their open water training dives HydroSports collects the PADI certification card application fee, $35.
What equipment will I need?
Top of Page
You will need to supply
your own SCUBA-quality mask, snorkel, fins, gloves and rubber ducky. These are items
which, for hygiene and fit reasons, are very
personal to a diver. HydroSports sells a wide range of these items and
guarantees each divers satisfaction with their purchase. When purchasing these
items at HydroSports we offer a 20% discount to Groupon student divers.
Traveling divers usually bring their personal snorkeling gear with them (this all fits easily in a carry on bag) when traveling to Hawaii, the Caribbean, Mexico or other dive destination. Renting buoyancy vests, regulators, tanks and weights at a resort is very easy.
How large will my class be? Top of Page
PADI standards allow one instructor to teach 10 students at a time in the pool and 8 at a time in the ocean. HydroSports believes this is too many students for one instructor to supervise alone.
HydroSports maintains a student to staff ratio of 4:1 in the pool and 2:1 in the ocean. Our class is limited to no more than 8 students per instructor. If our class numbers grow, we'll bring in additional instructors, assistant instructors and dive masters to keep our student to staff ratio small. This enables us to work closely with each student insuring comfort, confidence and preparation for every step of the training process. Learning to dive is both fun and serious. Expect to ask questions of our staff during class. Expect to learn to laugh underwater as well.
I don't have a dive buddy. How do I find someone to dive with? Top of Page
You'll be surprised at how many
divers you know. Once you start talking about taking a scuba class, buddies will
come out of the woodwork. Additionally, you'll meet dive buddies in your class,
at the yellow House, while visiting HydroSports and attending club meetings. Our
staff dives actively and we're happy to have you join us.
What will I see during my dives?
Isn't it dark and lifeless in the Hood Canal?
Top of Page
Prepare to be amazed at the amount, diversity and color of the marine life you'll see in the Pacific Northwest. While the underwater visibility ranges from 10 to 60 feet, the density and variety of marine life rivals the beauty you'll see in tropical waters. The nutrient-rich waters of the Northwest support a wide range of fish, invertebrates and aquatic plants. During your training dives in Hoodsport you're likely to see three species of perch, two species of rock fish, sculpin, ling cod, gunnels and gobys. You'll see giant plumose anemones, kelp, sea cucumbers, multiple species of crab, squat lobster, spot prawn, geoduck and green sea urchins. I could go on and on. You can find pictures taken in the Hood Canal at my friend Janna Nichols web site, http://pnwscuba.smugmug.com/Diving/pnw/901731_ZTiat#130390891_PSVCq.
Am I healthy enough to scuba dive? Top of Page
Good question! One does not need to be an Olympic swimmer or professional athlete to scuba dive, but one should be in good overall health.
Over the years I've taught people
with diabetes, high blood pressure, claustrophobia, motion sickness and a
history of open heart surgery to scuba dive. What all these folks had in common
was a desire for adventure and their physician's signature on a medical release.
Download the UHMS Medical History form by clicking
HERE (you'll need Adobe
Reader 5.0 or higher to open the file). Print the file and write the full word
YES or NO as you answer each question on page one. If you answer YES to any
question, you'll need to obtain your physician's signature on page two of the
form before any pool dives take place.
I have claustrophobia. I can't dive, can I?
Top of Page
Claustrophobia is a fear of confined spaces. As a scuba diver, we can see very clearly through our mask, we take air with us when going underwater, and we have the freedom to move in all directions. As a mammal, humans instinctively "know" that we cannot breath with our face underwater. What will astound you by participating in a Discover Scuba Dive experience is that by following the guidance of a complete stranger, me or one of my staff, you'll be able to do something that you know you absolutely cannot do.
I call this a paradigm shift, a reality change, a belief changing experience. After practicing breathing air delivered by a scuba regulator with you head above the surface of the water, I'll ask you to slowly lower your chin, nose and eyes an inch or two below the surface of the pool. Your first few breaths will be tentative and cautious. You'll discover that you can, in fact, breath with your face underwater using special equipment. Gills come later.
While some people will be uncomfortable diving, the vast majority find the experience of diving in a pool to be exhilarating and liberating. Allow yourself to change reality. Be adventurous. Be amazed. Be a diver.
My ears hurt diving to the bottom of a pool. How can I dive deeper? Top of Page
The pressure we feel in our ears and sinuses as we swim to the bottom of a pool can easily be eliminated by using a few simple techniques. If you can "pop" your ears as you take off and land in an airplane, you can "pop" or equalize the pressure in your ears and sinuses while descending through the water.
As you'll learn in chapter one of the Open Water Diver manual, pressure change is felt in the air spaces of our body, most commonly the middle ears and sinuses. To equalize the pressure as we descend, we use one of several techniques; we blow gently against our pinched nostrils, we pinch our nostrils and swallow or we wiggle our jaw from side to side, just like we do when landing in an airplane. During ascent, the expanding air in our middle ears and sinuses escapes on it's own passing through the Eustachian tubes in out throat into our mouth
Discover Scuba Diving Dates. Please register two weeks in
advance.
Check the Calendar for Discover Scuba
dates.
Open Water Class Dates. Please register at least one week in advance of Orientation date. Top of Page
Classes begin monthly throughout 2013. Check the
Calendar for class dates. Classes are numbered on the
calendar.
Classroom and pool dive sessions meet on either Tuesday and Thursday nights from
6 to 10 PM
OR one week night from 6 to 10 PM, one Saturday from 9 AM to 3 PM and two weekend days from 8 AM to 6 PM.
Following the classroom and pool training we spend a weekend in Hoodsport,
Washington completing four open water training dives.
More questions?
Please contact Mark Fischer directly at 503-304-5383 during business hours or
drop me an email at hydrosports@gmail.com.
HydroSports has been teaching the Pacific Northwest to dive since 1994. We're
experts at working with new divers. Patience is a specialty.
The adventure of a lifetime begins at HydroSports today.
Updated 12 April 2013
