Dive Kayaks

[FreediveWI]

I have talked about these before and my friend, Gert, just got his new one this week. I took him out on Lake Michigan for a spin with his today. I think that he is offically hooked.

Jon

[FreediveWI]

HE ended up getting a Scupper pro with the dive tank well built into it. It will be the perfect boat for inland lakes and Lake Michigan beach dives. There is lot's of room to carry lots of toys.

Jon

[FreediveWI]

Here is a better shot of the tank well that can easily hold a Lp95 or an Hp120.

The front hatch holds all the rest of your gear. There are even places to mount flag, compass and water bottles.

Jon

[raveon1]

were did you purchase your kayak? what do you think of those inflatable dive kayaks?

[FreediveWI]

I bought mine at Rutabaga in Madison. They recently got out of the dive-kayak business. Now you can rent them from Deep Blue. They also sell them, as does Pirate's Cove.

The general consensous on Inflatables is that they are pool toys that are niether long enough or rugged enough to acutally dive off of. Check out soem of the kayak diving web sites to see for yourself.

I standard plastic kayak is stornger, faster, cheaper and will "track" much better in the wind.

Jon

[freediverND]

and you can't poke a spear point through a plastic/fiberglass one. :
Fred

[jasondbaker]

Jon, what is the process for diving from a kayak? So, I put my gear into the kayak, paddle out to the dive site, now what? How do you anchor the kayak? I assume you gear up in the water. How do get back in the kayak and stow the gear? I'm very interested in learning more about kayak diving.

[FreediveWI]

Deep Blue will be running PADI kayak diving classes later on this summer.

In the mean time I will give you a short explanation.

Dive kayaks are sit-on-top kayaks that have extra stability built into the sides of their hull. I paddle out to the site and hook my gear onto short pieces of rope that are clipped off to the kayak. I can then toss them over board and let them float in the water- tank/Bc's and paddles.

First I put my fins on and hang my legs over the side to become even more stable. then i put on the top half of my wetsuit. Fianlly I put on my mask and mitts.

Now, I jump into the water a start to put on my scuba unit. Last would be the weightbelt- if you use one.

I don't usually anchor my boat unless I am freediving off of it. For scuba diving I will just hook the end of my wreck reel onto the bow of the kayak and tow it with me. It acutally tows MUCH easier than any flag and float that I have ever used.

At the end of my dive I surface and my boat it there waiting for me. ;D I take off my gear and clip it to the short lines I have clipped off to my boat. I put everything back in its palce and climgb back onto the boat. I stow my fins and paddle home. 8)

Jon

[Omicron]

That's pretty neat looking FreeDive. That's the first time I've ever actually seen one of the Dive Kayak's...

I know that Divepoint Scuba here in Stevens Point deals in a LOT of kayak's as well and they also offer kayaking classes.

They don't offer any scuba kayaking specialty courses yet, but that would be a lot of fun.

[dfreeman]

DivePoint has diving kayaks on display and in stock. Could be a fun way to go for the inland lake diving that we do a lot of.

Doug