Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone knows the diving timeline at Columbus Isle.
I want to book the advanced unaccompanied dives and was wondering when we leave, the surface interval, and the time we get back to the club?
(ie. do we leave at 7am and are back by 11am?)

Thanks, akeem

Hi Akeem,

It's been a while since I was at CI, but the program there has always been similar to Turks:

The boat leaves at 8:00 - 8:15 (sometimes there are two).

Your surface interval on the boat is about an hour.

You return to the club around 12:30 - 13:00. At Columbus, although that leaves you time to shower quickly and make lunch in the main building, most of the divers just go straight to the annex restaurant that is above the sea center. (At Turks, you go eat in the main building.)

If there's a demand, there will also be an afternoon dive boat that only goes out for one dive.

Hope this helps. Have a GREAT trip! (Well, I already know you will, as the diving there is EXCELLENT!)

Trish

Let's go diving!

At Columbus, for buddy divers, there are usually 2 morning boats (each 2 dives) and an afternoon boat (1 dive). The morning boats leave at 8:15 & 8:30; each boat goes to 2 different sites, with a surface interval (45 minutes to an hour) on the boat as you move from the first site to the second. The afternoon boat goes around 2:15 and just goes to one site. Sometimes on arrival/departure days, there will only be one boat at 8:30 (not enough divers for 2 boats), but it will still have 2 dives.
At the scuba shack, there are lists showing which sites each boat is going to each day. You sign up the day before (put your chip in a tube) for whichever boat you want. Usually, we'll stick with one boat (say the 8:15) every day for a week and then switch to the other one for the following week (when we stay more than one week), but you decide every day where you want to go the next day. Next to the list of sites, they also describe what each one offers & how long the boat ride is from the village. They are all fabulous dive sites, mostly all walls. (If you have a chance to go to the site called "Telephone Pole", that one has always been our favorite.) Whichever boat you pick, you are generally back in the village around 12:30 or 1, in time for lunch. (And they also have food on the boat between the 2 dives.)
Scuba students, including advanced courses, are assigned to a specific boat with their instructors; but everyone else just picks which boat based on which dive sites they want to go to or which boat their friends are signed on for the next day. It's an easy system to figure out, and also when you go to sign up with the scuba team your first evening they will explain it all to you. Be sure to bring your c-card & log book, etc.

Adria