We're buddies in and out of the water!

Some people (notably one instructor from another shop) have expressed disbelief that our crew members, instructors and divemasters have great chemistry in AND out of the shop.

So... here are photos from last week's crew BBQ at Julian's house (complete with a healthy dose of Julian's Danish spiced wine, youtube, and "that's what she said"-jokes!).

As a side note, if Julian ever invites you to a bbq, go! Homemade mango salsa, hummus, delicious steak..... It's good enough to turn a vegetarian into a carnivore.

Spring Break 2009 trip?

Don't worry, we haven't forgotten about spring break 2009!

Here's the deal: We usual book discount group airfare and then pass that savings on to our customers. We've been going back and forth with several airlines (Continental, Taca, etc) and none will sign a contact...seriously, wtf?

Also, we should all start using our airline miles before some-thing-bad-happens and we loose them all!

SO, we're trying something new this year: We've picked a destination that American, Continental, Delta and others fly to and we're going to let everyone book their own air travel (using their mileage or from your favorite website). We'll be organizing the rooms, meals and diving.

The trip will cost between $700-$1200 depending on the airfare you pick, total (air-meals-room-diving for a week).

Full trip detail will be available on monday (1/19)...check your email or aquaticdiscovery.com

Happy New Year!

What's gonna be new in 2009?

Well, we have a lot of new stuff that'll be happening in 2009, let's take a look:

New "While You Wait" Nitrox blending/filling: We'll definitely be the only dive shop in the area and depending on what our patent attorneys find out maybe the only dive shop in the world to have a system that will automatically blend partial filled nitrox tanks to any mix a customer wants while you wait!

More Specialties and Advanced Classes: One of the biggest suggestions we've heard this year is "you need to offer more classes like Search & Recovery and Equipment Service/Maintenance." When we launch the new education section of the website you'll see 24 new specialties being offered along with many more openwater, advanced and rescue classes!

Dive Club: We've wanted to put together a different kind of dive club that's more about "the diving" and less about "the club". In 2009 we'll roll our Sunday and Thursday night dives into a social networking group so you can network and go diving with other divers while still feeling the support of our worldclass dive staff. Of course, it'll be free...we like free. :-)

Divemaster-Led Dives: For a small fee you can enjoy the safety and comfort of a Divemaster leading you and your buddy through the underwater wonderland right in our backyard! Your dive master will help you get in and out of the water, navigate and, of course, show you all the neat little creatures you've never noticed before!

Underwater Scooter Tours: Experience the ease of boat diving and the simplicity of shore diving with an Underwater Diver Propulsion Vehicle-- or scooter. Cruise along for an hour as our Divemaster navigates you through several miles of pristine diving!

Have a suggestion? Let us know, we're always looking for new, fun ways to get people involved in diving!

Point Lobos!

Our post turkey-day trip to Point Lobos was a lot of fun and we were lucky enough to have nice conditions (35+' of visibility) before the weather hit.

Check out the photos in our photos sections...underwater photos will be posted soon.

The NEXT Point Lobos trip is planned for Saturday Jan 3rd!

Free Stickerson Election Day!

Our first ever Free Sticker on Election day was a success and we hope to see lots of the little red and white "diver down" stickers replacing Obama and McCain bumper stickers this year!

Channel Islands Sea Bass Video

On the San Diego Wreck Diving Trip we were fortunate enough to see a Sixgill shark so what could out do that?

A 100+ pound Black Sea Bass hunting Halibut!

Believe me, a fish the size of smart car darting around is a very humbling experience (imagine swimming around the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Blue Water tank when they're feeding the Tuna!). Jeremy, Julian and Paul were lucky enough to catch this rarely seen behavior on video!



You know what...this Black Sea Bass is still a juvinile!

See all our videos (in higher quality) on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/AquaticDiscovery

Channel Islands Trip Recap (better late then never...right?)

Okay, so we've been getting a little behind on our blogging; nonetheless Channel Islands was great! The crew, of course, was excellent and the food was hearty but what set it apart from last year was we did some really unique dive sites.

Photos are now up for your perusal on the photo section of aquaticdiscovery.com

Video will be up shortly (hold on to your hats!).