What are my options for bad vision while surfing?

I have quite poor vision and I'm a keen surfer. I usually wear my spare glasses while surfing but lost them last I went during a wipe out.





I've heard you can't wear contact lenses in water. I don't want to loose my remaining last pair of glasses either.





Laser surgery is not an option.





Any ideas? Thanks!|||Talk to your optometrist about what they call 'reverse K' lenses--they're hard contact lenses that you wear during the day for a few months, then after that you only have to wear them at night when you're sleeping and you take them out during the day, and they keep your vision at around 20/20 all day long. They change the shape of your eye for about 18-36 hours depending on the person such that your vision will be excellent for that period of time, but you do have to remember to put them in every night. I've had them for more than 10 years, and they're awesome, but when I got them my optometrist told me that they don't work for all candidates.





Beyond that, you could wear glasses with one of those bands to keep them from falling off, but even those bands probably wouldn't help you much if you're in heavy surf. You could also just do the disposable lenses in the water and discard them at the end of your session; I was a competitive swimmer for a bit and I wore contact lenses before I did the reverse K lenses at night and I never lost my contacts in the water. Or you could look into the goggles for your prescription--if you got the tinted prescription goggles, they would also shield your eyes from the harmful UV rays while you're surfing and they would protect your eyes from anything in the water.|||Well, you can wear contacts in the water. I have been surfing with my contacts. I will tell you that I also lost one once!! But your eyes will be dry and scratchy when you are finished, so it is best to bring your solution and case to take them out when you are finished surfing! I totally understand the problem since my eyesight is also terrible. So I have not found a fail-proof system yet, but keeping my contacts in seems to work for the most part!|||I've had about 1000 days on the water (both surf and whitewater) since I've gotten my contacts and I've lost a total of one. So I'd say the odds of losing one are probably not as bad as losing a pair of glasses. I do almost always close my eyes underwater to keep the contacts from coming out, but I've also gotten sprayed directly in the eyes and they've stayed in.





The one concern I can think of is the risk of an infection if you spend a lot of time in contaminated water (then again, you'd probably be concerned even if you didn't have contacts). I've never had a problem though, and my eyes actually feel better after a day on the water than after a day in front of the computer.





Have a look at the various types of disposable lenses. Some are one-day use. Others last 30 days (if you take them out and clean them each night-- highly recommended). This way, if you lose one, it's not a big expense.





If you don't want to go with contacts, you could look at various sport goggles, for instance these: http://www.murrays.com/barz/barz.html