Northwest Dive Club

So when I qualified with PADI, we made a point of doing dive logs after every dive. You record salient details about the dive (primarily related to nitrogen loading), then buddies sign each others' logs for verification. Personally, I like to take some notes on the dive to track things like gear changes, skills I worked on (and how I did), critter sightings, and so on.

Since I've started diving in the PNW this summer, I have seen a grand total of 2 other divers with logs. Is everyone just using their computers as their dive logs now? Or is logging the dive just passé? Does anyone ever check the verification signatures? Is it just useless paperwork that I'm forcing myself to do for no compelling reason?

Interested in everyone's thoughts on this.


Dan

Personally, I don't think it's needed. I've never been asked to see dive logs when I travel so I just don't do it.

I do recall doing some dives on a Jamaica trip where they ask to see a dive log. Pretty sure they are just trying to determine that you have dived in the last year or whatever,

I ended up printing out an excel sheet of mine (no signatures) and they were fine with that. I can just download from dive computer. Some people log their dives, many don't. I think I stopped paying attention at about 500 dives, and even well before then I certainly didn't write them down, simply let my computer do the tracking.

To each their own.

djmcmath wrote: ... Is everyone just using their computers as their dive logs now? Or is logging the dive just passé?

I mostly use my computer as the log. And I download the log to my home computer too.

djmcmath wrote: Does anyone ever check the verification signatures?

Some dive operators might.... (think dive boats, etc.). Also, some dive shops too until they get familiar with you.

djmcmath wrote: Is it just useless paperwork that I'm forcing myself to do for no compelling reason?

No, I dont think so. The point is to allow you to really think about your dives before and after....and have a reference.
I used to do paper logs for about my first 50 or so dives. From time to time I will go back and look at them.

Cool, that checks with chart. I've started transferring all of my computer-logged dives to my desktop as well, and duplicating (cleaning up) my handwritten notes from the paper log into the computer. I'll keep doing what I'm doing and not worry about it.

Thanks,
Dan

A dive log is for your own benefit and enjoyment. How you log is up to you.

Years ago a few resorts asked to see my log, but it's a stupid request... They'll still let you dive even if you don't have one.

My first 300 dives were works of art in my log book... Now I use an Excel spreadsheet.

I have over 1100 dives, log them all computer and written.

Love to log!

I do REEF surveys on every dive and record the fish and inverts I see. I have designed my own pages with the REEF info on the back.

Logging is a delightful part of my post dive ritual. I record weight and equipment config and any dive highlights, conditions, how we did hitting slack, etc. Fun AND useful.

Practical and fun!

(BTW, if you don't log, and care, anyone who tells you how many dives they have has no idea. Making up numbers is fun!!!)

But of course, YMMV. No requirement other than the occasional resort request. I do it because I enjoy... that's enough to do it or not do it.

I havent logged a dive in 5 years now.

Except for diving away in special locations, I haven't bothered to log my dives for over a year. Yeah, there's data in my wrist computer, but I don't look at that much either. The only dives that I log by hand would be ones that I want remember the specifics. I have a waterproof journal for that, and it gets my cave dives in Mexico and notes on the colorful reef dives in other tropical locations.
When away on a liveaboard or at a resort, there's always a checkout dive of some sort on the first day. After that we get grouped by demonstrated skill level. No log book required.


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I log. Didn't do it for a couple of years while in Texas. Mostly the same lake, over and over and over again. Always fun though. I would log special trips though. Now that I'm back in the great PNW, every dive is special!

I have all 831 dives logged in excel and several hundred of those are also in a travel journal. I keep them to catalog / remember my photographs and for my kids. Just my MO.


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I log. still. More just the factual points, and they are written until I manage to land a new perdix ai!
I also use them with my photographs, to help catalog them

I've kept one since day 1 and plan to as long as I dive. Its the only sort "diary" I keep and should be pretty epic like 40 years.

I like seeing my dive profiles after a dive, so they are automatically saved and clouded in Subsurface. But I'm not going to waste people's time asking them to sign my logbook.

I log my dives via Subsurface as well. It's handy when folks ask me where I've dived, I can pull up the logs on my phone and just start listing every thing

theonly_JT wrote: ......should be pretty epic like 40 years.

This.

No really, think about it. Pretty cool, actually.

Steiger wrote: But I'm not going to waste people's time asking them to sign my logbook.

Definitely not.

But again... however I've had milestone dives, or epic trips / dives where I've been asked to sign a log book page and it was kind of cool, and for a few special pages I've asked some to sign that particular one as a memory.

Plus cool stickers from away trips, certain charters, etc.

Again, NONE of this says anyone HAS to keep a log book, only that if you choose to there are some fun reasons and unexpected bennies that can come from it.

One of the things I use my logs for all the time is weighting configs. I dive 100's, 119's and 130's. I've also lost a ton of bioprene. Remembering what I used, how it worked, etc has been hugely helpful as I adjust to a new reality. Are there other ways to do that? Of course. And so, do what you will, and have fun with it!

I like using the log to keep track of the dive (good-bad), how I felt during and more importantly, gear changes and what effect they had on the dive. However I usually log a day or two after the dive.
Rarely ask anyone to sign my log these days.

FWIW I have 887 dives in 17 paper log books the last 338 logged on computer. I do backup my computer to SD cards but still, my paper log books are my ultimate backup. But that's just me.

all my dives are logged on my shearwater computer , then downloaded to my Laptop... easy stuff



not sure why anyone would Log dives still on paper or a Note book, but some still roll like that

I still roll like that. I like the documentation as a reference especially for dive trips.

Another excel dive logger here, switched to that boring but reliable method after a couple bad meltdowns/disappointments with dive logging software that lost me a bunch of data. Still love logging the soft info after dives (e.g., "knocked back a half rack with so and so after a great dive at X")

Twenty four years later, I still log my dives on paper on a three ring binder. I copied it from a log dive book (I'm not mentioning the brand, but there are many and way too expensive). Like JT said, it's like my diary, and perhaps when I'm gray and old (well I'm already there), my grandkids can just flip the pages and I can tell them stories about it. To each, his own.