Bareboat charter and scuba diving

[Emason]

Hi,

My husband is 40 this year and for his birthday present I am thinking of purchasing his RYA Helmsman and Day Skipper qualifications so that once he is qualified he can fulfil his ambition of a bareboat charter of a motor cruiser and scuba diving holiday each year, and eventually purchasing a boat.

As we are relatively new to this I was wondering if this is even possible to do and whether anyone has experience of doing this. I can see plenty of places to arrange a bareboat charter providing you have RYA day skipper or higher, however I cannot see places that tie this in with scuba diving tank rental.

Is there any reason for this? Are there regulations preventing you from mooring up at a dive site and going scuba diving? Obviously we could charter a boat and then just go to a scuba diving shop and rent the tanks but before I purchase the courses and set the wheels in motion I thought it wise to ensure that this is not just a pipe dream and is actually possible.

We are qualified scuba divers to Master Scuba diver level with over 100 dives. The dream would be to have each of our holidays chartering a boat somewhere new and then going diving in the local sites. Initially this would probably be in the Mediterranean.

All advice would be very much appreciated.

Thank you

 

[Divemaster1]

Welcome !... this all depends on wehre you are planning to go for bareboat charter and scubadiving....

Each country have their own regulations for both and whils one is on competency (boat), the other (scubadiving) is on competency and health checks. Some of the places in the med, I believe you will have to provide lung x-ray certificate which is no-older than ?? years old in order to rent equipment / join a dive-trip... on top of your scubadiving certs.

Fully feasible in principle, but the smaller bareboat charters do not carry scuba gear, but once you get up to the larger ones, you may find both scuba-gear and compressors etc., onboard... but these usually come with skipper as a minimum. Some places in the med do not like bareboat charter as it is close to the African coast, which opens up for smuggeling ... and regulations there means that the owner of the vessel (onboard or not) is involved in smuggeling activities if vessel is caught...

We carry scuba gear onboard, but as it is our own boat in the UK, we do not have these issues to consider....

So if you can tell us where you plan to operate, and what kind of boats (size) you are considering chartering, we may be better placed to give you some more advise..

 

[Emason]

Thanks Alf! The plans are in their infancy at this stage. With the research I have done it is likely to be around the 10-15 metre options and we are looking in the Mediterranean with no particular bias to country.

 

[Divemaster1]

OK ... Bareboat MOBO charter in Southern Spain in that range is very rare.... Gibraltar to Alicante (at least) can virtually be ruled out due to proximity to Africa...

Someone else may be able of commenting on France, Italy & Greece ... but believe Croatia is a viable option...