What are some recommendations on cleaning your camera in-between shore dives without going back to a dive shop to rinse? Bring extra bottled water and rinse at the beach?

Any helpful suggestions appreciated!! Thanks and only two days till we're Bonaire bound!

Shelia, you do not want to clean as much as making sure it does not dry out. Many people will throw it in an ice chest with a wet towel or wrap a wet wet suit around it. Avoid leaving it in a bucket of water bouncing around in a truck or a boat. My camera is small enough, I just leave it in my BCD pocket and it stays wet.

The big thing is to avoid salt crystals from forming.

Bring a cheap cooler (or collapsible bucket) along, fill it with sea water, and keep the camera wet. The problems occur if the camera dries out without being rinsed, then sharp-edged salt crystals attack your seals. Less good is cover it with a soaked towel to prevent the drying out.

Cecil types faster than I do. Glad to see we agree!

Thanks Mel & Cecil for your suggestions. We have a new camera, and thought we had to rinse & clean between shore dives, so appreciate your help in this matter. Sounds like it will be easier than we anticipated! That's always a good thing!

I bought a dry bag from local outdoors store. I figured if they were made to keep water out, they should be able to keep water in too.

We've always wrapped our cameras in a wet (salt water) towel until we could get it back to the room to clean. That was the way we were taught by Southern Nikonos (way back when).

I love the "dry" bag idea....very clever! Consider that idea stolen!

Never thought of the dry bag becoming a "wet" bag. Great idea. That will become an item in my underwater photo class syllabus.

a very collapsible sixpack cooler does the trick too if you have a camera small enough to fit in it

Great ideas, thanks. I too will steal the "dry" bag idea since we have several extra, as well as keeping it wrapped in a towel if we need to. Thanks to the BT'ers, helpful as always!

Isn't there a problem with leaving anything in a truck while you shore dive. It will "disappear". I wear glasses and put them in a small water proof case and bury the case near my truck to keep them from "walking" away. My understanding that anything let in a vacant truck can vanish. You leave the windows down and nothing in the truck while you dive.

My husband asked the same question after I told him the dry bag idea. Any other comments from those who dive more frequently on Bonaire?? Would it be safe to leave towels, a dry bag, some food/water in the truck while diving??

I use a gallon-size plastic bag half filled with fresh water before we leave for the dive. After the dive, in goes the camera, seal the bag and leave it on the floor of the truck until we get home. Works well for a small point & shoot camera, with a second bag for the strobe. Alternative is leave the bag empty and then just fill it with sea water. Same concept as the dry bag suggested above, but less expensive.

We just fill some empty coke bottles with water, toss them in the back of the truck. One is used for my camera, dive computer rinse, and another for a shower with nice hot water. The camera then gets a full rinse back at the hotel.

Sheila, what you may not realize, the normal drill on Bonaire is to return to the resort after diving. There's no good reason to stay at the dive site, most are less than 10 minutes from any of the resorts. It just easier to go home after diving. This makes packing easy, all that stays in the truck is a ratty teeshirt, old sunglasses, old sandles, some drinking water, and some rinse water.

Sheila, I may "Jinx" myself here but...while I leave nothing valuable in the truck, I always have a bag, towels sunglasses and such in the truck.
So FAR...nothing has walked. While I do believe there is a fair amount of petty theft because it is so easy to walk up to a truck and help yourself...I wonder if it is as common as is harped on. I have some very pretty towels

Could be I am just a very blessed person..wait, well YES I am!
haha

We do it along the lines of Gord's idea - all our drinking water (maybe 6 apiece) bottles get refilled every night - these become the source for fw rinse-offs of cameras and people... been doing this for 12 Bonaire trips and 8 Cayman Brac trips over the past 5 years.

We have been taking a sun shower with us for years. We place it on the room of the truck when we first get to the dive site so it's nice and toasty when we get out. It has NEVER disappeared.

I've been concerned about this issue as well, and I have a fairly large camera - it's a Canon 40D in an Ikelite housing, with two strobes on arms. My thought was that I would buy a bucket once I got to the island, fill it with fresh water at the hotel, and leave it in the back of the truck.

After reading this thread, I'm thinking about getting some of those really large ziploc or Hefty bags instead.

- Gus

I just did an experiment with an XL Ziploc Bag.

On the positive side, the entire housing will fit in there without much difficulty. It bruised the plastic a bit with the sharper bits, but it fit easily.

On the negative, it simply will not hold that much water against any force. It stays sealed only until you apply a little pressure. So while it could act as a tank for rinsing, you can't transport water in it.

- Gus