Our tribute to a great dive shop and a good friend.

The end of an era in Long Island diving has arrived with the closing of Diver’s Way, the iconic dive shop located in Bay Shore, New York.

For 41 years, Diver’s Way has been a fixture on Long Island, servicing diver’s needs for equipment, training and air fills. The true home of the "Gorilla Diver", Diver’s Way is familiar to all who dive on Long Island, both past and present. For four decades, divers have taken comfort as they passed the distinctive building with its "Giant" dive flag paint on its roof. Everybody passing by either by land or by air saw this distinct red-and-white beacon on Sunrise Highway near the Robert Moses Causeway knowing that the dive shop remained alive and well. 

Bob DiBona, the owner of Diver’s Way, sure has earned his retirement. Through all these years, as part of the trailblazing vanguard of diver shop owners in this area, he has seen the dive community change from a rugged group of hard core cold water divers to an explosion of divers traveling the world in search of adventure. Bob always had the broadest selection and largest inventory of dive equipment anywhere. If you were a beginner or had years of experience, Diver's Way always had the right training and best equipment. He has witnessed the emergence of various dive certification programs and weathered the growth of the internet, a difficult competitor for dive shop owners trying to compete in a difficult business world.

As Bob always said "SCUBA is a hands-on activity. Online shopping may promise low prices and convenience, but it's not the way to go for diving equipment. With SCUBA, getting the right product in the right size is serious business. It's not so convenient when you get the wrong size or the item isn't what you thought it was. That takes a trip to post office and all of delays and other hassles of returning the item. And diving with equipment that doesn't quite fit, isn't a comfortable or safe choice."

This winter, Bob and Diver’s Way are retiring, leaving the industry in the hands of others. Certified to dive in 1978, we have been customers of Bob’s for 26 years. A visit to Diver’s Way was always a journey through time for us as we would recall how the facility has expanded since its early days into the sprawling complex, complete with pool and training facility that it is today. This journey is especially sentimental today as we see the preparations for the shop to close its doors forever.

We have long considered Diver’s Way our base of operations for Eco-Photo Explorers. Whether it was a last minute air fill, a replacement set of fins or the complete equipment outfitting in preparation for our Antarctic journey, Diver’s Way has always been there for us. Equipment maintenance, annual tank inspections, emergency repairs to regulators and the cleansing of oil-damaged tanks contaminated by bad air fills from a different dive shop were all just part of the routine for Bob, who cared for our equipment and safety as if it was his own.

There was no better dive shop on Long Island than Diver's Way.

We want to wish Bob DiBona the very best in his retirement while expressing our deep and profound sorrow at the loss of this institution in the Long Island dive community. Thank you for all you’ve done for us over the years. Good luck and keep diving! We will miss you.