Whether you’re a newly certified open water diver or you dive year on year, for the last Ten years plus, but never ventured below 18 meters (60 feet). You might be thinking is the PADI Advanced Open Water Diver course really for you? Yes, it is and here are six great reasons to get started!

1. You’ve already started - You get to build on the Skills You Learned in the Open Water Diver Course.

So let’s dismiss the myth that you need to be advanced or have advanced skills start your PADI Advanced Open Water Diver course, with The Waterhoppers. Where you will build on the skills you already have and by taking the courses back-to-back, you can develop stronger diving skills. However, waiting to complete the Advanced Open Water Diver course is also a great option, as you can practice the skills you learned in the initial before advancing to the next level.

The Advanced Open Water Course allows you to continue learning, enhancing your skills over five dives with a PADI Instructor. Remember that practice makes perfect, so the more you dive, the better diver you’ll become!

2. Develop New Skills.

The five dives required to become a PADI Advanced Open Water Diver include two compulsory dives: an Underwater Navigation dive and a Deep Dive (up to 30meters/100feet) as well as three other dives of your choosing.

So, what diving do you want to do?

Deep Diving

Once you are certified as an Advanced Open Water Diver, you’ll be able to dive to a maximum depth of 30 meters (100 feet).

Underwater Navigation

Remember the compass skills from your Open Water course dives? The underwater navigation dive refines your compass navigation skills, helps you better navigate using kick cycles, visual landmarks and time.

Peak Performance Buoyancy

Are you still going up and down more than you’d like to? Do you use your air faster than your buddies? Do you have trouble staying still underwater? You may want to choose the Peak Performance Buoyancy dive for one of your three additional dives. During this dive, you’ll perfect your buoyancy skills. You’ll also learn how to gauge the weights you need for diving, how to use breath control to fine tune your positioning, how to kick efficiently and ultimately how to be more streamlined, comfortable, and efficient underwater.

Night Diving

Why limit yourself to seeing only the marine life that’s active during the day? As the sun goes down, many of the most cryptic critters come to life! If you choose a Night dive as one of your additional three dives, you’ll learn how to plan a night dive, how to communicate with your buddy during a night dive, as well as how to navigate at night.

3. Your Air Consumption will improve.

Many new divers will find that after their Open Water course they air a little faster than more experienced divers. The Advanced dives (particularly the Peak Performance Buoyancy dive) go a long way toward solving this problem, by learning a more relaxed breathing style, which will increase your air efficiency – meaning longer dives and more time underwater.

4. Discover New Marine Life

Marine life is the main reason most divers learn, and continue, to dive. There are multiple options within the Advanced Open Water Diver Course to increase your opportunities to see a wider range of marine life. Being certified to dive to 30 meters/100 feet gives advanced divers the chance to see marine life that lives at deeper depths – which includes many pelagic species (the big stuff!)

5. Discover New Places and Travel Opportunities

Your PADI Advanced Open Water certification card is literally your passport to a world of adventure. You’ll no longer be limited to areas that are considered suitable for Open Water Divers. There is nothing wrong with that level of diving, but the AOW, gives you more options, more adventures.

6. Build Confidence Underwater and on Land

By completing a further five dives under the guidance of a PADI Instructor, your confidence underwater, and your confidence in your abilities underwater, will grow exponentially.

So for more information and to book your PADI Advanced Open Water Diver course click here!