Great group of Divers! My wife and I did our open water certification through Choo Choo and they have treated us like family ever since meeting them! If you need anything diving related in SouthEast TN or North GA, Choo Choo is the place to go! read more

Since Steve is no longer the owner I cannot recommend anyone service their gear at this Dive Shop. I overlooked one mishap a year before with this shop but this recent incident is unacceptable! I had my regulator serviced before my trip to the Seychelles, when they ( Choo Choo Dive Center) called telling me it was ready to be picked up, I asked what all did they do and was told replaced O rings and checked everything out. I replied great I will come and pick it up. I trusted them at their word and paid my bill. Being this is my life support having faith in who service's your equipment is a big deal. On my first dive I noticed one gage needed to be tightened and was leaking air if turned too much to the right on so of course I was cautious throughout that dive and showed my guide while under water so we could address leak back on land. The second dive is when everything went south. I dumped my air to descend and since I was a bit over weighted ( purposely due to a new 3 mm wetsuit ) I added a bit of air to level off and quickly noticed I had to dump air again and again I then felt my inflator vibrating and had to dump air constantly throughout the dive. I had the guide feel the hose to show what I was dealing with as watching my air I knew this was going to end my dive sooner than expected. When I got too low on air I called the dive. This was annoying especially on Nitrox as we had planned for much more bottom time. On the boat ride back we made certain to dump all the air out of the BC and left the tank on just to see how bad the leak was, by the time we were almost back to land the BC was about to burst. I then turned off the tank and was so embarrassed especially when I told everyone on the boat I had just taken my gear in for service before this trip. Anyway thank goodness for a well trained and equipped shop run by Blue Safari !!!!on Alphonse island. When we got back and rinsed everything I came back after lunch so we could examine my equipment. As we started looking at my regulator we immediately saw it was NEVER!!! Serviced!!!! In was so obvious by scraping my fingernail I could see a bit of goop on my nail and this was every connection. This is absolutely unacceptable!!! It it weren't for an absolute first rate dive shop and staff a trip that I had planned for for over a year could have gone much differently. I am posting this honest and severe review in hopes that Choo Choo dive center will never let this happen to anyone again. There's nothing more that I want to do than support my local dive shop sadly until they do better I will definitely be either going direct through the manufacturer or using Alpha Divers in Knoxville as they bent over backwards getting my children certified and are getting much better reviews. Grateful that my dive was saved and hope this posts saves someone else's dream vacation from ruin. read more

Best place to learn how to swim in the area! Can make someone who has feared swimming for a Lifetime comfortable with putting their face in the water within 5 minutes! And when you're done learning how to swim, you can move on to scuba! :) An Amazing place filled with Fabulous instructors that are very patient and make you feel very much at ease. Highly recommend bringing anyone who needs swim lessons to this location! Also recommend the Scuba lessons! It's an adventure you'll never forget! read more

So, I don't see a recent review and the older ones are... well, outdated. I know that the staff has changed a lot over the last few years. If you haven't been in a while and had a bad experience, you should give it a shot. I signed up for the open water class and was given dates for class/pool time this summer. I couldn't make it to the quarry date the week following and the future weekends were fairly booked. I made it to the quarry after about 3 weeks and that was too much time from the time I had class. I didn't come back the second day of quarry check out. So I spoke with Lee and Malu and they offered me more pool time just to get comfortable with the skills. I said abolutely. They both worked with me to get me comfortable doing the skills and breathing compressed air at a moderate depth. Mind you, I swim well and have grown up in the pool teaching, guarding, etc. But it took me a little extra work to wrap my brain around breathing under water. The thing is, they were cool with that. No rushing. They have obviously worked with hundreds of folks of all ages getting them comfortable in this underwater realm. It showed with how they took care of me. The patience of Job, I tell you. They were encouraging and also showed me a bunch of little pro-tips on how to manage your gear out in the water, mask clearing, etc. It couldn't have gone better. This weekend, I got my certification. I'm sure the folks in my original quarry class figured I was done. I might have thought so, too. But I didn't quit. And Choo Choo Dive didn't quit on me. I am so excited! Thank you Malu! Thank you Lee! Oh, and they didn't try to push equipment on me. They make great recommendations based on experience and if they have the gear you need, obviously they will tell you. They had a great package deal that included all the basics you need for the class. read more

This place is an absolute rip off. It cost me almost $1000 to get certified and no I don't have my own gear. They are pushy, high pressured sales people. They tell you one price, then say...oh you need this and you need this. I asked why they didn't have a price that included everything and was told "People don't like that". The only time these people will be nice to you is when you are buying something otherwise, you are an inconvenience. read more

Went to Choo Choo dive and they're very friendly and helpful about getting you where you want to go in your interests. The nitrox class was good. But they are lacking in the following thru department in giving your certs .they can get you in the SSI training system in seconds by a few strokes of the keyboard and it is just that easy to put you in the system and give you your certs. There was only 6 people in the class after all . I was told it would be only a day or two it's been almost a week. read more