Diving log book

HOW TO WRITE THE PERFECT DIVING LOG BOOK ENTRY

Filling in your diving log book is an important part of the dive, whether the information is transferred from your computer and written down or whether you use an app. Your diving log book is essentially a store of all of your dives, so you can show off to your buddies and prove that you're an awesome diver! So, let's get started! 

 

What actually is a diving log book?

A log book is a log of all of your dives. It's absolutely essential that you log every dive, especially when starting out as you may need to prove someday that you've got what it takes to complete a course or successfully fulfil a role, basically to prove you're an epic diver! An example of this would be; to become a Divemaster there is a 40 dive requirement. Soooo… writing down your dives can actually open opportunities for you! 

There are various features in a diving log book such as the number of the dive, dive site, buddy and marine life you saw! This is the nice fun stuff, you can personalise your book as you desire! However, the nitty-gritty features such as depth and bottom time are the pieces of information you're going to want to keep a hold of! This is because you may want to reference this information in the future. For some courses, there may be a pre-requisite of a certain number of deeps dives, or you may need to prove how many hours you've dived on a certain piece of scuba equipment. Without logging this information, you're gonna miss out!

 

The different types of logbook

There are a few ways that you can record your dives, starting with a paper copy. This is probably in the form of a physical logbook which already has all of the headings of what to include making it suuuuuper easy for us! All you need to do is find the information from your dive and fill it out!

Next comes dive computers which is even easier because your computer records most of your information from your dives, awesome right?! Again, find the information from your computer, transfer it onto a dive log app and you're good to go! However, it is a good idea to write down a paper copy as sometimes technology isn't our buddy! 

Some people create their own diving log books. For example on excel. This is totally cool too, just remember to include all the essential information and you're sorted! 

Again, it should be noted that you should always record more than one log book to back up the original in case one goes missing! This is relevant for both if you're using a paper log book or if you're using your computer/ an app. 

 

How do you find the dive information to put in the log book?

The question on our minds, we want to record the information, but HOW???!! Where do I  find it? It's actually pretty simple to source our dive information, either use your computer, the dive schools computer (you may have to ‘fish’ out your specific dive... see what I did there?!) or if you dive with The Fifth Point, we have you sorted! Go on the blog section of our website and you will find all of our previous dives, along with the information such as time in/out, dive time, max/average depth, vis and temp. All you need is your air in/out information which is found by checking your gauge at the end of a dive. 

If you're not quite sure of your information, don't guess! This can create problems for you in the long-run. Ask your instructor for advice and you can find the information needed from the computer you used.

 

What should the perfect diving log book include?

Here is a list of essential information to include within your dive logs;

  • Time in and out
  • Air in and out
  • Bottom time
  • Maximum and average depth 

If you're feeling like you want to spice up your log, add features like;

  • The visibility
  • If the dive was a boat or shore dive
  • What exposure suit you wore (wetsuit, drysuit etc) 
  • Marine life (including drawings!) 
  • The PADI pro that guided you
  • Your buddy
  • Any achievements 

You can write or draw anything in your log book after you include the essential information. Your dive centre or instructor may also have a special stamp to use or signature to certify the dive! 

Hopefully you've taken some tips from this blog and are excited to write up your next dive log! See you when we're creating bubbles! 

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