I can honestly say that I have never really had a particular interest in scuba diving. It's something that I've noticed but never thought I would actually partake in...until this week. On Monday I started a four day full-time scuba course and today I am officially a licensed PADI Open Water Diver. What does this mean? Well it means that I can dive in waters up to 60 feet deep without instruction. The following is an account of how this all happened.
Despite my bank account looking more like a glass of water with a medium size whole in it (draining rapidly fast) I decided to take scuba lessons in order to get my license with Kim and Kristine. We are heading up to the edge of the Great Barrier Reef next week and I really wanted to be able to get the full experience. We registered for our course which we took out of the Bondi Dive Centre just outside Bondi Beach. We picked up our textbooks and some additional info from the centre on Saturday and we were instructed to read chapters 1-3. Of course I left this to almost the last minute assuming it was going to be about 50 pages of reading and it turned out to be 177. I powered through the readings and started class on Monday.
Monday was a full day in the classroom where we did a few quizzes and watched heaps of instructional videos. Our instructor was a lady named Noriko who was half Japanese and half Peruvian. She was a very interesting women and very much a free spirit. She has lived all over the world and when she gets bored she moves, the beauty of being a diving instructor I suppose.
Despite my bank account looking more like a glass of water with a medium size whole in it (draining rapidly fast) I decided to take scuba lessons in order to get my license with Kim and Kristine. We are heading up to the edge of the Great Barrier Reef next week and I really wanted to be able to get the full experience. We registered for our course which we took out of the Bondi Dive Centre just outside Bondi Beach. We picked up our textbooks and some additional info from the centre on Saturday and we were instructed to read chapters 1-3. Of course I left this to almost the last minute assuming it was going to be about 50 pages of reading and it turned out to be 177. I powered through the readings and started class on Monday.
Monday was a full day in the classroom where we did a few quizzes and watched heaps of instructional videos. Our instructor was a lady named Noriko who was half Japanese and half Peruvian. She was a very interesting women and very much a free spirit. She has lived all over the world and when she gets bored she moves, the beauty of being a diving instructor I suppose.
Tuesday was alot more fun. We spent the day at the Ian Thorpe Aquatic Centre trying out some skills in the water and got to give the full wetsuit a try. I felt a bit like Michael Phelps minus the muscles, gold medals and of course his latest accessory, the bong. Breathing underwater for the first time was really cool. It took a little while to get comfortable with it as your natural tendency is to believe that it's impossible but eventually you become relaxed and you get used to it.
Wednesday we did a bit more theory and then headed to Bare Island about 30 minutes from Bondi to do our first two open water ocean dives. After putting on all the equipment including tank, weight belts, fins, snorkel and mask you can't help but feel a tad ridiculous and with all this added weight it was kind of hard to believe that all of the equipment was actually going to help me in the water. Our first dive was a bit disappointing, I managed to stay in control for most of the dive but the visibility under the water was not great so we couldn't see much except for what was right in front of us (in most cases our instructor). The second dive actually ended up being worse than the first as I had troubles controlling my buoyancy and was all over the place. I ended up finally getting balanced but the visibility still wasn't great. We ran into a few fish but nothing really to get excited about. We packed up our stuff and headed back to Bondi. I considered the day a success in the sense that 1) I survived and 2) I was fairly confident in my skills after two dives. I went home looking forward to Thursday.
We started the day Thursday with our PADI Open Water Diver exam. I am happy to report that I scored a respectable 88%...too bad this doesn't count towards my GPA. After the exam we headed to Bare Island once again for our final two dives. During our dives we were required to complete a series of skills in order to earn our certification. Ascending from the water at a controlled speed without our regulator (piece of equipment that allows you to breathe underwater), removing and replacing our goggles and deflooding them and underwater navigation using our compass were a few of the exercises we completed on the final day. Today's dives were significantly better than the first two. The visibility still wasn't great but it was alot better than the day before and we were able to see schools of fish swimming by the hundreds, stingrays, jelly fish and shark eggs. Our instructor stopped at one point and picked up this unknown object off the ocean floor and wrote on her board "Shark Egg" then she proceeded to write "Is the mother near?". Not exactly what you want to nearly 30 feet underwater but I suppose it's a reality of diving. After completing the two dives we were officially licensed divers.
The experience as a whole was amazing. I got to step out of my box in a huge way and do something that I never really thought I would do. It is a different world under the sea and I am looking forward to seeing more of it next week. I don't know how much diving I will do while I am down here as it's an expensive sport but I do hope to get out a few times to keep it fresh and hopefully partake in some diving if I make it to Indonesia and Thailand.
Enjoy the photos below. Cheers!
kc
Anders, Kristine, Kim and I after our first dive on Thursday
Bare Island
Success!
4 comments:
you are adorable in your scuba gear.
i agree with minju, although you still look five with your baby face and spiky hair. don't tell me about sharks; we watched some shark movie the other week and all i kept thinking about was you in the open water.
Hi Kevin:
That is quite the outfit you have on! Congrats on getting your diving license, just stay away from the sharks!
From the desk of Debbie Huffman:
"Kathy and I went to Joey's for lunch. I took her there because it is her birthday on Sat. We sat in Melissa's section and had a bit of a chat with her. She asked if I had read Kevin's latest blog. He took scuba lessons. That must have been posted overnight because it wasn't there last night. He's quite the adventurous one. He looks cute in his scuba suit."
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