Scuba Diving at Epcot DiveQuest

As a certified scuba diver, I dream of jumping into the ocean and being surrounded by sea creatures in perfect water visibility. In nature, this is a rare experience as there are so many factors that can influence a dive. However, there is one place where you can have this perfect dive any day of the year and that is at Walt Disney World’s Epcot DiveQuest. If you have ever been to the Seas With Nemo at Epcot, you know there’s a huge tank filled with turtles, rays, sharks and fish. There’s even a ride that goes through a tunnel surrounded by the water. Of course Disney World realized this is a great opportunity for people to scuba dive in a controlled environment and offer excursions to do so.

How to Experience Epcot DiveQuest

We had been wanting to experience Divequest for a couple of years, but kept putting it off because of the price. Then my sister’s friend, who is also a cast member, got scuba certified and asked if Andrew and I would do it with her. We were happy to have an excuse to finally go and even better- cast members and their friends can get half price! The full price is $189 per person, but we got it for $95. This includes all the gear and a wetsuit. It was obviously a great deal because that’s barely more than the price of a regular dive. This experience is offered multiple days a week at 4:30 or 5:30. We opted for a Saturday at 4:30 experience. It was completely full with around twenty people. We were able to book it a few weeks in advance easily though. You do not need a park ticket to scuba dive at Epcot, you simply just have to pay for the experience. We were instructed to meet outside the gates 15 minutes beforehand and we met up with a group off to the side.

The Behind The Scenes Tour

Besides scuba diving, another cool part is getting to see the backstage areas. The DiveQuest experience started with us being led backstage to the Living Seas for a tour of the facilities. It is crazy to see how big the aquarium is and what it takes to operate! We were able to see the areas where they care for the animals and learn about what goes on on a daily basis. There are over 6,000 sea creatures here and the tank is full of 5.7 million pounds of water so there’s clearly a lot going on on any given day! They have to do all sorts of tests for water quality. As a chemical engineer, I found this lab area to be very interesting. Then we saw the manatees that you can see from within the park. We learned some more facts about Lou and Little Jo and the dangers facing manatees and other sea life. The guide also gave some insight on caring for the animals including how they go through two tons of food a week feeding all the aquarium inhabitants!

Getting Ready for Epcot DiveQuest

After the hour long tour, it is time to dive! Everyone is given a wet suit. They only have shorty wet suits for adults and long wet suits for kids. The water is the perfect temperature though, so the shorty wet suit was adequate. They also supply BCD’s, masks and snorkels, and fins in all sizes. You are allowed to bring your own mask and snorkel if you are more comfortable, so I opted to do that. Other than that, no other foreign objects are allowed in the tank. Once everyone is changed we made our way up to the top of the aquarium. There are tons of assistants who help get tanks strapped on and make sure everyone’s gear is ready. I sometimes get nervous scuba diving, but there are zero reasons to be nervous here. Disney definitely has made sure this is a safe experience and had over five divers go down with us and watch for any issues. All the gear was high quality, top of the line Scubapro gear. Some people might be afraid of swimming with sharks, but these aquarium ones are perfectly harmless! They are fed with very long tongs so they do not even associate humans with food. You cannot touch any of the animals of course. As long as you don’t bother them, they definitely will not bother you.

The Epcot DiveQuest Experience

When it was time to dive, we all swam to the center of the aquarium and formed a circle. We were told to all descend together and then do a brief single file tour around the perimeter. The main reason for this was to get videos of us swimming around. The guide also said after the tour, if you wanted to get a picture of you and any family or friends watching from outside the tank, to go find them for a picture.

When they said picture though, they meant video and that is my only complaint. It was not clear to us at all that they were taking videos of us so we kept trying to stay still when the cameraman was filming. We would have moved around more if we knew! There was still some great footage though and we purchased one DVD at the end for $35. While descending, the dive guides help anyone having trouble. Once we were all at the bottom, we started swimming in a line and that’s when I realized how amazing this was. The environment at Divequest is unlike anything else and swimming aside rays and sharks without fear was an exhilarating experience! The weekend we did this was Mother’s Day weekend. We happened to have some family in town who could see us dive! We instantly found our group of seven looking for us in the window of the aquarium right after the tour. It was so fun seeing them through the glass and even cooler for them seeing us inside the aquarium. The photographer came over shortly and got a lot of great shots. The craziest part was when we were “posing” for what we thought was a picture. A turtle swam right up behind me and bumped into me. Since it was a video though, my whole family’s hilarious reaction was caught on film. I love turtles so I was super excited as well and we spent a few minutes admiring this one that came so close to me on either sides of the glass.

We hung out around my family for ten or so minutes and then decided to check out the rest of the tank. The dive lasts 40 minutes, and if you get close to running out of air, you can go up to the surface and they will switch it out for you. Most people won’t even come close and its only about 25 feet deep. You do not have to worry about safety stops or anything. They say there are shark teeth on the ground so we looked around for those but didn’t find any. Then we just followed around different fish and turtles. The aquarium is also connected to the Living Seas restaurant so you can actually see people eating there. I ended up finding a little kid in one window and playing peek-a-boo with her at one point. Seeing the reactions of people outside the aquarium is just priceless. The dive guide taps two rocks together when it is time to go up and this noise is heard throughout the aquarium. The dive time flies by as always, but at least we had time to see everything we wanted. When we got to the surface, literally every person had a big smile on their faces. The Epcot DiveQuest experience is really unbelievable.

After the Dive

From there they give you towels and soap for showering after the dive. I brought a hair dryer since we were going out to eat after, but they actually had plenty to use if needed. Once everyone is ready, they show you the video they have put together of your dive. The video lasts ten minutes and you can tell the photographer tries to get equal footage of everyone. From there you can buy it for $35. Since there were three of us, we only needed to buy one and then sent a digital copy to our friend. They also give you either a hat or a shirt and a DiveQuest ID card, a sticker for your dive log and a pin. Afterwards, they let you back into the park if you had a ticket or out through backstage if not. We met my family outside and so enjoyed finally getting to talk about it! It is weird seeing people through the glass but not being able tot talk to them! We were so so happy we did the Epcot DiveQuest experience and are seriously considering going again. It is expensive, but that is just the price of the perfect dive! If you are a certified scuba diver, I highly recommend it, especially if you are local to Central Florida.

Know Before You Go

• Call 407-WDW-TOUR to book the Epcot DiveQuest experience
• DiveQuest experciences happen at 4:30 and 5:30 most day
• It costs $179 plus tax
• All guests must be 10 years or older and participants ages 10-12 must be accompanied by someone 18 years or older
• All guests must be scuba certified and bring their proof of certification
• If friends and family want to watch, they should go to Seas with Nemo and Friends aquarium area an hour after your tour started

• You need to bring a swimsuit and can bring your own dive mask, all other items are prohibited in the tank
• You cannot take any photography backstage or underwater. The professional photographer will get videos of everyone for the $35 DVD.
• The Epcot DiveQuest experience lats 3 hours with 40 minutes of dive time
• Best of all – You are GUARANTEED to see sea turtles, sharks, stingrays and all the fish you can imagine!

Would you ever scuba dive at Epcot DiveQuest? I have had some great ocean dives, but I really have to say this is the best yet. I think we will being doing this one again at some point! If you would like to watch the whole video of our dive, check it out here!