What Is The Difference Between Freediving and Snorkeling?

What Is The Difference Between Freediving and Snorkeling?

Diving into the water with the fins, snorkel, and the mask is the similarity among snorkeling and freediving. There are three varies ways through which you can enjoy the water, and at the same time using the least number of equipment. They include freediving, skin diving, and snorkeling. However, what are the differences between these three?

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Snorkeling

This is in the real sense the simplest method. For one to enjoy snorkeling, they should have the fins, the snorkel, and a mask. Without carrying along with the three equipment, it is referred to as swimming. You require the mask to help you see underwater. The snorkel, on the other hand, makes it easy for you to breathe inside the water without having to lift the head. The different equipment is optional for snorkeling. Some other equipment that you may bring along to enjoy the practice to maximum include:

• Full-foot fins for comfortability.
• The wetsuit or a rash guard to help you protect yourself from getting cold, the sun, abrasions, and stings.
• The snorkeling vest to help increase floatation and visibility on the surface.

Anyone can enjoy hours of snorkeling even with minimal training. A perfect place to start up is at the SDI (Scuba Diving International). The practice of snorkeling is just like swimming on the surface while breathing using the snorkel. The dives made in practice are usually shallow and brief. The dives do not go more than 16 feet and last less than five minutes. The courses for the practice are available almost anywhere the practice is common. The training programs help to make the practice of snorkeling an enjoyable and safer experience.

Skin Diving

This is the next level of diving without the scuba that comes after snorkeling. Skin diving gained popularity in the 1940s to 1950s, mostly among the sailors and the soldiers coming home from overseas. Skin diving is essentially more involving the practice of snorkeling. It uses mainly the same approach, but in this case, without the snorkel vest. The skin divers stay somehow longer and go much deeper than the snorkelers go. They hit the depth of 16 to 33 feet. The dives, in this case, last for about 20 to 30 seconds. They are short dives to catch fish perhaps or snap pictures of the fish.

Freediving

Freediving will represent the other end of a spectrum if snorkeling defines one end. It is more complicated in terms of risk and skill. People free dive for sustenance and commerce. For instance, the Ama of Japan performs freediving for cash for years now. There are numerous notable freediving experts, including the US Navy instructor Mr. Robert Croft, Enzo Majorca, and Jacques Mayol. The practice of breath-hold diving has played a considerable role in the Second World War in countries that employed special diving troops, for instance, the UK, Italy, and the USA.
Jacques-Ives Cousteau was a legendary free-diver before he invented the scuba together with Emile Gagnan. Therefore, modern freediving practice traced its origin in 1949. This describes the time when a Hungarian Italian Airforce captain, Mr. Raimondo Bucher won 50,000 lire for diving to the depth of 100 feet.
In modern society, freediving is rated among the top water sports. However, freediving has a competitive side. In other words, not all the freedivers compete, some spearfish. Others enjoy the activity. The modern diving involves lots of highly specialized equipment.

• The long and bladed fins that offer exceptional propulsion.
• The low volume masks that make the process of equalizing to be simple.
• The special wetsuits. They are more flexible and generally warmer.

Instead of using the inflatable buoyancy equipment that the scuba divers use, the free divers weight themselves for the more neutral buoyancy at 33 to 66 feet. By doing so, they can control their buoyancy much easily. This also helps to make sure they return to the surface safely. The threshold for the freediving is usually the depth of 33 feet, and they stay beneath the water for 30 or more seconds. The dangers that are involved with freediving are considerable. For that reason, apart from using the right type of equipment, it is essential to pass through proper training.

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