Freediving

I got into freediving when I decided to go to Greece on a catamaran. And because it is an activity that can be done in the Czech Republic on the quarries and because I like to learn, I decided to take up freediving. In this article I will summarize my experiences so far and the locations I have visited in the Czech Republic.

What is freediving

Freediving, also called breath-hold diving, is diving without breathing apparatus, using only the air in your lungs that the diver takes in with a breath at the surface. It's a sport, but for many people it's also a lifestyle and a way to connect with nature and get to know their own body.

History and essence

Freediving is an ancient human skill that has been used for thousands of years for fishing and for gathering pearls and sea sponges. Modern freediving developed in the second half of the 20th century and became a sport with its own rules and records. The key to success is not just physical fitness, but above all the ability to relax, control your mind and master breathing technique. Regular training can strengthen the so-called mammalian dive reflex, which allows the body to use oxygen efficiently and stay underwater longer.

Disciplines

Freediving has several competitive disciplines, practiced either in a pool or outdoors in open water where there is enough depth.

• Pool disciplines:
  • Static apnea (STA): The competitor lies motionless on the surface and tries to hold their breath for as long as possible.
  • Dynamic apnea (DYN, DNF): The competitor swims underwater on a single breath for the greatest possible distance. There are variants with fins (DYN) and without fins (DNF).
• Depth disciplines:
  • Constant weight with fins (CWT): Considered the "royal" discipline. The diver descends to depth and ascends back using fins or a monofin. The ballast doesn't change during the dive.
  • Constant weight without fins (CNF): The diver descends and ascends without fins, using only their own strength, with a swimming stroke.
  • Free immersion (FIM): The diver pulls themselves along a guide rope and doesn't use fins.
  • Variable weight (VWT): The diver descends on a weighted sled and returns to the surface under their own power (by swimming or pulling themselves up the rope).

Safety

Freediving is a beautiful but also demanding sport. It's important to follow the safety rules and never dive alone. Ideally, take a freediving course, where you learn proper technique, the physiology of diving and rescue procedures.

Equipment

For recreational freediving you need very little:

• Mask: With a low internal volume.
• Snorkel: Simple, without valves, used only at the surface.
• Fins: Long fins that allow efficient movement.
• Wetsuit: Protects the body from the cold.
• Weight belt and weights: For buoyancy balance and easier descent.

How I got into freediving

When I decided to take part in a catamaran cruise in Greece, someone suggested we also do a freediving course. I love the water, so I did the freediving course. After the course I decided to buy equipment so that I'd be kitted out for Greece, and at the same time I figured that I could do this outdoor sport in the Czech Republic too, so for me buying the equipment was an investment.

In the end I was also able to do a bit of freediving in Thailand and Vietnam, where I spent the winter of 2024/2025. In Thailand I also did scuba diving courses: Open Water and Advanced Open Water. I plan to write about Thailand and Vietnam in separate articles.

Where to buy equipment

I bought my first wetsuit where I took the course. It was simply the easiest solution for me, and I was sure what I'd get in terms of size.
If you know what you want to buy, you can shop online.
Another option is specialized shops.
An interesting option is Decathlon, where you can return goods within 365 days if they are unused and still have their tags. So you can practically try a wetsuit out and return it if it doesn't suit you. What's more, Decathlon in coastal countries has a really wide and varied range. In a Greek Decathlon I also saw a wide range of spearfishing gear.
I bought one wetsuit online from a Danish e-shop when it was on sale. I had to measure myself carefully and study the size charts. Given that I wear a standard off-the-rack size, the result suits me, and the price of 101 EUR was very good.

Diving tips

To keep water from leaking into my mask, it's a good idea to shave the top of my moustache under my nose.
Since I wear glasses, it's a good idea to put in contact lenses so I can see better underwater; otherwise, of course, I can't see well at a distance.
If I have a wetsuit with a hood, the hood also covers my ears, and it's good to let some water in under the wetsuit to my ears from time to time, so that I can equalize the pressure in my ears more easily.

Which snorkel to choose? A snorkel should definitely be as simple as possible. The bottom part of the snorkel, i.e. the mouthpiece, should be rubber, so that it's soft and flexible. Personally, I prefer the tube itself to be made of some hard plastic. If the tube is rubber, the snorkel isn't completely rigid, so it doesn't stay in place as well in the water and can bend in various ways, which makes it more likely to let water in. Or it can kink, which narrows the airway and makes it harder to breathe. So: rubber at the bottom, hard plastic at the top.

I usually weight myself so that when snorkelling at 10 m I'm not pulled up much, but that means that below 10 m I'm pulled down a lot. So I'm overweighted. When I train deeper dives, I use less weight, about 0.5 kg less. Mostly I just snorkel and watch the fish, so I prefer to be rather overweighted. Likewise, if you do spearfishing, you want to stay neutrally buoyant rather than be pulled slightly towards the surface. When I go to train deep dives, I take off some weight and aim for positive buoyancy, i.e. so that down to 10 m I'm naturally pulled up.

I'm still experimenting quite a bit with how to attach the snorkel. Attaching the snorkel to the mask with a clip is the worst option in my view, because it's not flexible enough and it also keeps falling out. A better choice is to tie the snorkel to the mask with a short piece of string. Now I attach the snorkel with a figure-eight-shaped rubber keeper. I want to try attaching the snorkel with a long string threaded through a small hole in the top of the snorkel.

Locations

I decided to treat this part of the article as a notebook and a list of dive sites I have visited.

Greece

Greece is a European country on the sea, so it's easy to get to, and there are many spots for diving in clear water.

All GPS tracks of the routes I took in Greece.

Výkleky quarry

The Výkleky quarry has a maximum depth of 10 m and is popular with divers. An interesting feature of this site is that there are small freshwater jellyfish here:

GPS track of diving at the Výkleky quarry:

Details about the Výkleky quarry dive site. Access to this site is easy, and until 2024 it was free. Since 2025 there has been some kind of fee, because many members of the public came here to swim, made noise and left a mess behind.

Trhová Kamenice quarry

There are several quarries near the village of Trhová Kamenice. One of them is very well suited to diving. Here is one of the many footpaths leading to it:

GPS track of diving at the Trhová Kamenice quarry:

Video of a freshwater crayfish from the Trhová Kamenice quarry:

Miličín quarry

The quarry near the town of Miličín is halfway from Prague towards České Budějovice. The maximum depth is 10 m. The quarry is easy to reach from the car park by the cemetery, and getting into the water is easy. Access is open and free of charge.

Diving at the Miličín quarry:

Drone video of the quarry near the town of Miličín:

Borek quarry

The Borek quarry is south of the town of Čáslav and not too far from the Trhová Kamenice quarry. The water in the quarry is up to about 30 m deep, so you can train deep diving here. The water in the Borek quarry is very clear. The quarry is open to the public. Divers pay an entrance fee. And there are facilities for scuba divers. For a fee you can also camp overnight in a tent. Access on the side with the scuba diving facilities is easy. On the side of the quarry where swimmers usually go, and where it is also deep, so it makes sense to freedive there, getting in is difficult because it's steep.

Catfish in the Borek quarry:

Pike in the Borek quarry:

Žernovka quarry

The Žernovka quarry is not far from Prague, so people from Prague go there even on weekdays after work. To get in, you need to get the code for the gate lock. The maximum depth is about 16 m. The quarry is right by the road in the town and parking isn't ideal, but you can park there. There are good facilities for getting into the water.

Fish in the Žernovka quarry:

Štětkovice - Bořená Hora quarry

A quarry with very good facilities, including for scuba divers. Entry for two days and one night in a tent cost me 1400 CZK.

View from the surface of the Bořená Hora quarry:

Goldfish in the Bořená Hora quarry:

Thailand

In Thailand there was an opportunity to take a scuba diving course and then go diving there with a guide, so I took the opportunity and got an Advanced Open Water certification.

My equipment was:

• Shorty wetsuit, size 2XL
• Weights 4x1.5 kg = 6 kg. Sometimes just 5 kg was enough.

To be well balanced horizontally, I had to move the tank a long way up. Instead of two fingers, I had the strap moved up by a whole hand's width, so that the tank was closer to my head, making me heavier at the head end.
I started keeping a logbook, where I could record the sites, equipment and depth. In total I made 21 dives in the winter of 2024/2025.

We dived at the island of Ko Lan, which is near the city of Pattaya, and then went further south and dived at the island of Ko Samaesan.

I went freediving by taking a boat from Pattaya early in the morning for 30 THB to the island of Ko Lan, moving to a beach and then diving at the ends of the beaches. There's nothing on the beach itself, but at the ends there are reefs, and therefore marine life. There is often heavy boat traffic and lots of waves. Tourists also ride around on jet skis, so it can be quite dangerous. I definitely don't recommend "Haat Ta Yai" beach, for example. My favourite beaches were "Haad Samee" and "Haad Nua", and for safety I also got a spearfishing buoy.

Vietnam

When I was in the city of Da Nang in Vietnam, I found out that there is a dive centre in the town of Hoi An. But since January, February and March are outside the tourist season and the visibility isn't good, no diving trips are organized.

So I went freediving a little way outside the city, where I found a good entry into the water and there was something to see. That means there was a small sandy beach with various rocks around it, and around those there was at least some marine life.

Gear

My current freediving gear:

• In Thailand I used a full-body swimsuit + 1 kg of weight for freediving, and ordinary rubber fins that I originally bought for bodyboarding.
• Sopran ORCA MAN wetsuit - men's, 3 mm, size 7, price 3900 CZK + 2.5 kg of weight in fresh water.
• Cressi Apnea Pro 7mm wetsuit for about 101 EUR, weight 6 - 6.5 kg.
• Eagle mask, black and red - 1390 CZK, but in the end it doesn't fit me very well.
• A second mask and snorkel from Decathlon - good quality for a good price.
• I bought several masks from China and they fit me better: they have more room for the nose, seal better under the nose, and some are made of really flexible, soft rubber, so they're very comfortable.
• Jet snorkel, camo blue - 590 CZK - I've already lost it in Greece
• X-race fins, black, XL - 2190 CZK
• Belt from Decathlon 500 CZK
• Freediving buoy from China about 1500 CZK
• Spearfishing buoy with a 20 m rope
• 5mm gloves 24.55 € and socks, size XXL 12.86 € - the size is fine, no water gets in.
• 5mm socks and gloves from Decathlon - these are looser, so water gets in, and when diving into deep water the cold water flowing in is unpleasant
• Backpack for freediving gear, type "Taška STANDARD bez kapsy - modrá" (STANDARD bag without pocket - blue) 2890 CZK

I also tried wetsuits from Decathlon, but the top was always either too big or too tight across my chest. For example, a 7 mm open-cell wetsuit in size XL (price 7200 CZK) would have suited me fairly well, but it was very tight across my chest. I tried size XXL in 5 mm (price 5800 CZK): the trousers were too big and loose, and the top might have been OK. I also tried another model (sale price about 3500 CZK). The trousers were size XL, but what bothered me was that it wasn't open cell, and the XXL top was too loose, water got into it, so it was cold.

Freediving vs. scuba diving

With scuba diving you have much more time to look at the bottom and search for fish.
With scuba diving, the bubbles keep roaring as you breathe, whereas with freediving there is a beautiful silence in the water, a calm that's almost meditative.