Well,
you could be fooled in thinking yeah, but It was an Adventure that I'll never
forget.
We started the Course on
Saturday morning at 7am. Yep, you heard right. I had to be at the diving
shop at 7am in the morning. If that wasn't
hard enough I hadn't slept well probably because I
hate boat rides in bad weather. So after not much sleep we turned up at
the shop to start to get ready for adventure Day 1.
We were going out to Broughton
Island somewhere. Yeah I know I've done that before, shouldn’t be a
drama, or so Mal kept telling me all morning. The first part of the trip
was no different than I'd done any other time, BUT the weather was
causing a lot of rather massive waves, there was rain and a lot of cloud.
The
trip was utter hell for me. I HATE boat rides in large swells. I curled up
against the dive bottles down the middle of the boat and hung on for grim death
for about an hour while we headed over to the island where we were going to
dive.
I'm not too sure but I must
have been so frightened that we were going to end up in the water
capsized. Our dive master, Rowan, tried to make me feel ok
about the trip by trying to make light of it all and trying to explain that
we'll get through it fine but this had no effect. Every time the
boat rolled or dropped I'd almost scream in tears. It
is my worst fear - boats and any sort of swell. Poor
Mal tried so hard telling me it's ok and we'll get there
fine. I knew we would but I was petrified and nothing was going
to change the feeling every-time it swayed, dropped or
pitched my heart jumped out of my throat.
We did eventually get there
fine and dropped anchor. And yep, it was better weather at the
island. They were all correct, but it still looked nasty for our trip
back.
We started to prepare for our
dive after a brief from Rowan. We geared up and headed off the
boat. We descended down a shot line off the back of the
boat. This was our first dive for the weekend and we had some serious
things to find. I had to concentrate on the life around me and
not the trip home. Once we were all on the bottom of ocean (the big deep
blue/green heaven ) I started to feel a lot better. I know I'm great at finding
life down there. I spot more stuff than Mal can. So, we followed Rowan
and started to look for the things we needed to find to pass the Naturalist
part of our course. We needed to find 5 vertebrae, 5 non vertebrae and 2
plants. This is the easy part - remembering them when I get back to Shore might
be a challenge though.
The dive was as usual,
brilliant, I do love being down there. It wasn't long before we'd seen
enough so we surfaced and headed back to the boat. By the time we were
all on board the swell was starting to pick up.
I was already aware of it
before we had even started the engines and found myself in much the same
position as before but, to my amazement, it was an easier trip back. Boy
I was glad to be back on land. We still had so much to do.
After a lunch break we were
told we'd be heading over to Shoal Bay for our Peak Buoyancy dive and
Navigation dive. Oh thank God is all I could think - no more boats. Yay.
We went through our Navigation
(using the compass) in the park to make sure we had it sorted before we
went into the water. I must say this is the most challenging of all the
course for me. I've never been rather good at orientation so if Mal had
to rely on me we'd probably get lost. It's something we'll be practicing
for years to come .
Our dive at Shoal Bay was
rather tiring, mentally and physically. Our buoyancy went as
well as expected, I knew I had that sorted. Mal was a little
over-weighted so he struggled a bit.
Then it was time for Rowan to
give us directions to follow reading compass headings that we
needed to complete under water. mmm no visibility this should be fun.
I was seriously starting to panic at one stage but this is Mal's strong area
and I knew if I struggled a bit he, being my buddy, would guide me in
the right direction and wouldn't you know it, he did.
So,
stage 2 of our course completed but bugger I was so tired. So tired that
when we eventually got home to the kids, I almost fell asleep listening to poor
little Emily explaining her day to me. We went almost straight to bed -
too pooped to care.
Day two, Oh My God what time
is it. Crap, the birds aren't even up. Mal woke me up at about 4.45am as we
needed to be at the dive shop by 5.45am. Noooo, I need sleep, not happy, too
early for me.
I was in a better mood by the
time we got there though, and rather glad as the day was turning out to be
great weather.
So what were we in for today,
mmmm, we were heading off to Halifax to complete our deep dive - YAY, no boat
dive. I couldn't be happier. I love the beach dives and we get to go a lot
deeper than we've ever been. So excited.
It was a great dive.
The visibility wasn't good but I'm really looking forward
to doing that dive again. I love the big Blue Gropers that are there and it's
so peaceful under the water. As for the depth, that
doesn't bother me any – I love to be down there anytime. I didn't notice a
lot of difference between 18 meters and the 26.1 meters we
did except that it was darker and we had to use
our torches more. The visibility was a little better than
the day before, but I didn't care either way. On the way back
to shore we encountered a bit of a strong current. It tested
our strength a bit. I didn't panic but swam against it rather well.
Mal struggled a bit but in the end we got back
to shore fine. The morning dive completed, so much fun, yay.
On our return to the shop we
got told we'd be going on a boat to Government Wharf (I've been there
before). A nice quick trip on the boat. It was easy as, no waves
and no bad weather. The dive was not as good as we did before but I
didn't care, that was our last dive for our course. Now we had to go over
the knowledge stuff to complete the rest of the course. That was a breeze but
I'm so tired I think I could sleep for a week.
I’m
pleased I've completed another course and come away with more confidence thanks
to our Master scuba trainer Rowan whom put us through our paces. He's tough but
fair, and a great, great instructor.
Now I have to figure out what
PADI course I should do next ...
1 comment:
Sooo proud of you Cin!!!
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