I dragged my ass out of bed at some ungodly hour yesterday
in order to be ready in time for the van that picked me up at 7. Normally I
would just roll out of bed, brush my teeth, throw on some clean clothes, and
head out the door but since I was going to have a physically and mentally
challenging day ahead I figured I should probably have breakfast. The hotel has
breakfast buffet but it’s pretty terrible, the only western option is toast and
I am very seldom in the mood for noodles for breakfast.
I managed to sleep most of the way to the dive site. It was
about a 2.5-hour drive from the city so it would have been a pretty good nap if
I didn’t wake up every five minutes. When we finally arrived at our destination
I was pretty sure we were in paradise. We were at a restaurant surrounded by
palm trees, and were only a few feet from the ocean. We had a few minutes to
relax before briefing for our dive and suiting up.
After the horrible day I had in the pool I called my dad who
used to be a dive instructor and asked him for some advice and he gave me some
tips on how to equalize and suggestions on how to relax. I was feeling
apprehensive as we entered the water and as soon as I took my first breath
underwater I started to freak out and surfaced immediately. I told Koko I
wanted to quit but he convinced me to go back under, tell me he would hold my
hand the whole time and control my BCD so all I would have to do is breathe and
swim.
We spent approximately 29 minutes under water reaching a
maximum depth of 12 meters and while the shipwreck was one of the most stunning
things I have ever seen I was praying the dive would hurry up and end the
entire time. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad Koko convinced me to go but breathing
underwater goes against your instincts and I was uncomfortable the entire time.
That being said I was amazed by almost everything I saw. The wreck was
completely covered in coral and there were so many different kinds of fish. I
wasn’t able to find Nemo but I did find Dory, if diving weren’t so scary I probably
would have followed her to P. Sherman’s place in Sydney.
Luckily we didn’t need to demonstrate any skills during the
first dive so after a short safety stop at 5meters we ascended to the surface
and ended the dive. We took a break for lunch and to relax a little. I tried to
calm my nerves but when we briefed for dive number two and I learned that I was
going to have to remove the regulator from my mouth three different times while
at a depth my stress levels skyrocketed.
I wasn’t able to calm my nerves during the dive and was even
more uneasy than I was during the first dive, the opposite of what you would
expect. We finally found Nemo and when we crossed paths with a stingray my
heart pretty much jumped out of my chest. We made it down to 18 meters during
this dive and were under water for 33 of the longest minutes I have ever
experienced. Looking at beautiful things and exploring new spaces has never
been so frightening for me.
When we finally made it to our safety stop I had worked
myself into a frenzy and opted not to demonstrate any of the required skills
because panicking only causes things to go wrong and I was beyond panic by this
point. I was ecstatic to breathe fresh air again when we reached the surface. I
had been breathing so heavily during the entire dive that I used almost twice
as much air as everyone else, definitely not a good sign!
After changing out of our wetsuits and into some dry clothes
we loaded back into the van and started the journey home. I managed to stay
awake for most of the drive and Bali really is a beautiful place. We passed
rolling hills covered in palm trees and other greenery as well as a volcano
that I am pretty sure is partly responsible for the location of the wreck we
explored today.
I went for dinner after I got back to the hotel and finished
filling out the knowledge checks in my diving manual. It was a pretty boring
night, complete with a pity party I threw for myself because I felt like an
epic failure.
Today I got to sleep in a bit later as my scheduled pick up
time was 7:30. When no one had arrived by 7:45 I thought maybe they forgot to
pick me up and I was secretly wishing they had. I’m pretty sure I had
nightmares about diving last night because I was even more apprehensive about
getting in the water than I was yesterday.
Instead of driving to the dive site we took a cruise with a
bunch of tourists looking to snorkel and explore some islands. The boat ride
was about an hour and a half and was a little too rocky for my liking. I felt
like I was going to puke most of the way and the lady sat next to us who tossed
her cookies the entire way wasn’t helping matters. I had Gravol in my bag but
since it has a sedative in it I figured it was probably best not to take one
before diving. The boat ride wasn’t all bad though, Koko suggested that since
the first dive today would be far more challenging than the one yesterday that
I work towards a scuba certification rather than my open water certification. I
was pretty stoked with this suggestion because I was growing less comfortable
with the water with every minute I spent in it and I really didn’t see myself
demonstrating all the necessary skills required for certification anyway. Plus
I really have no intention of diving ever again after this course so I don’t
mind the fact that I would need an instructor if I do decide to dive again in
the future.
When we got to the pontoon boat where the day’s activities
were based from Koko took Jasper and Dely on a small boat to their dive site
while I remained on the pontoon boat awaiting a dive with a different
instructor. There were a variety of activities to participate in on the pontoon
boat but I was still feeling sick from the cruise so I just relaxed for a while
until someone told me my dive time had actually been pushed back by at least
half an hour. I decided to go for a banana ride (like tubing but instead of an
inner tube for one person it’s a long banana shaped inflatable that sits about
6 people), which was much calmer than I was expecting, before heading back to
the pontoon to relax until dive time.
My new instructor (I didn’t catch his name) held my hand the
whole time and did everything for me except breathe and swim. I felt calmer
than yesterday but still found myself wishing the dive would hurry up an end.
The fact that the scenery wasn’t nearly as picturesque as yesterday didn’t help
much either. A lot of the fish looked pretty cool but it just wasn’t as
fascinating as the wreck, and the colours seemed less vivid for some reason.
After the dive I met up with the rest of my group for a
buffet lunch and to complete a quiz required for certification. We had tried to
do the quiz on the cruise but trying to read while bobbing up and down is a
recipe for disaster. After we had eaten and completed the quiz we briefed for
our final dive. Jasper and Dely were going to need to demonstrate multiple
skills but I was just going to explore.
We suited up and entered the water straight from the pontoon
boat. Within five minutes of being underwater I could feel the panic sinking in
and since I wasn’t going to have to demonstrate any skills I signaled to Koko
that I wanted to surface. He swam me over to another instructor who already had
a diver with them and the two exchanged some hand signals I didn’t understand
before I was handed off to a complete stranger. My new instructor kept
signaling asking if I was ok and I kept responding with the signal for up
because I felt like we were swimming away from the boat and that was not ok.
Eventually he was able to communicate that we were going up but needed to know
if I was ok, so I signaled that I was even though I was more or less
hyperventilating by this point.
The rest of my team surfaced only a few meters after me,
turns out they didn’t do any exploring at all the just demonstrated some skills,
I didn’t need to do a fourth dive for my certification so I’m not sure how I
even ended up underwater in the first place. We changed into dry clothes and
completed the final exam.
I got a 95% on the exam so I am now officially a certified
scuba diver. I have to say I’m pretty proud of myself. Over the past few weeks
I have traveled to several new countries all by my lonesome, spooned some
tigers, and even let an elephant step on my back but none of those things come
even close to comparing to how terrifying this experience was. They all pale in
comparison. In addition to being frightening, learning this new skill has
probably been one of the most challenging things I have done in years, so while
I didn’t achieve my original goal I gave it my all and didn’t walk away empty
handed.
I took a Gravol before the cruise home and ended up passing
out for most of it. I have been laid in bed for a few hours now, trying to find
the motivation to go for dinner but I have no energy at all. I am really
looking forward to a good nights sleep tonight and hopefully I get one, I don’t
need to wake up until 10am and I’m not stressed about anything at the moment
now I that I’m done with this course so hopefully I will be nice and refreshed
for some laid back exploring tomorrow.
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