Scuba San Diego — Local services in San Diego

My husband and I went diving with Scuba San Diego this July. He had called beforehand to get our gear settled and reserved. He specifically asked about my fins, as I dive split fins for a knee injury and their website mentioned strong current. We decided it was best just to rent their fins. We pull up at 6:30 because reviews have marked about timeliness. And wait. And wait. We saw La Jolla divers setting up their equipment, when their dive starts at 8. Our dive leader arrived 45 minutes late (from traffic/construction). But when he arrives, the fins that were in my bin were tiny snorkeling fins? So we have to wait another 30 minutes for the owner to deliver the correct equipment.The owner of the shop is incredibly rude and needs to learn some business management skills(I won’t even get into the BMI comments, but know I am a larger woman with many dives that handled this one just fine). He arrives and immediately makes a snide remark about how he’s never renting partial equipment again; either all or nothing. Made it seem like MY fault that the fins were incorrect.

The dive itself was incredible and we got to play with a sea lion. That’s the only reason I’m giving this 2 stars instead of 1. Our dive guide apparently is an independent contractor he said; was clearly an excellent diver but not necessarily a great guide. We ended up only doing 1 dive, as the guide was keeping track of our air but hadn’t turned around soon enough(?), resulting in a solid 20 minute surface swim in current. Of course there’s not a refund for that second dive, which we knew and didn’t fight. We want to come back here to dive again but will never use this...

Unprofessional snorkeling business.

Highly advise reading the reviews more in depth before booking. Rod changed the initial date of our snorkel session because of poor visibility, which is totally understandable. He stated he was changing the booking and that if the day was not optimal, he would issue a refund and we would talk about it the day of. The new booking day came and it was 50-60% chance rain and 55 degrees. I felt this wasn’t suitable conditions to go snorkeling in the ocean so I called to cancel the session for a refund. Rod claimed that I should’ve obtained the refund when he first called & that “no matter the weather, he still gets a paycheck” and that was a joke to him. All he promised was some voucher for future use but I don’t even know when I’d have the chance to go snorkeling again.

After reading more of the reviews, I dodged a bullet by going through with this company much less the man who runs this business. He’s money hungry and has no care if his guests are having a memorable experience. I got my money back from my credit card company but PLEASE don’t go through this company. Save yourself the negativity this man emits when you’re trying to have a nice vacation...

It took me some time to even write this review, because I'm still speechless about what happened with this company. I am not yet an advanced diver, but I have my certification and as I wasn't sure if I could do a guided scuba dive tour with this background I asked them in advance. I didn't get a concrete answer, it was just a question of whether I have a certification or not. As it was high tide it was definitely not a good setting for beginners. There was not a good briefing and even as the guide seemed worried, she took me to dive. It went out to be highly stressful and even if I got a glimpse of this beautiful area, I would never do it again with this company. I went out of air, had to swim a long way back to the beach, which was still hardly visible because of the waves. I had massive problems to get out of the water and two strangers had to come and rescue me, so that the waves wouldn't throw me against the walls. The guide was more annoyed than concerned. I had an exchange via mail with Rod after that. First he ignored me and than he answered rude and not one word of empathy I haven't had any experience like this before and would absolutely not recommend this...