So this weekend and last weekend I took a scuba-diving course (along with Trevor & Denise), to get my PADI open-water certifcation. PADI is the most recognized scuba-diving organization in the world, which basically means that now I can go scuba-dive almost anywhere in the world without having someone watch over me. Wahoo, Shark Alley (in South Africa) here I come!!

So, there was actually not much exciting about it. The best part was supposed to be this last weekend when we did the four open-water dives in the ocean at a place called Goat Island Marine Reserve. This is a marine preserve, where the fish, coral, and marine life are all protected, so apparently the fish can grow quite large, and there is a ton to see.

Unfortunately though, the weather did not co-operate, and so it didn't work out the way it was supposed to. We did not end up diving Goat Island at all, because there was a ton of rain up to and including Saturday morning. Sunday was actually a very nice, beautiful day, but because of all the rain the previous days the visibiliy was still very poor. The instructor also would not let me take a camera on my dives, so the pictures are all of Goat Island above land, which is the most we saw of it all weekend.

But, I should probably start with last weekend. That was the confined water dives (in a pool), and thoery part of the course. It all took place in a very small pool, behind the dive shop. It was actually not nearly as fun as I thought it would be. It was a little tiring, being almost 4 hours on Friday night (after full day of work), and then 9 hours on both Saturday and Sunday. But the worst part was the waiting around in the pool. There was 5 people in the course, and only one instructor. So, when you needed to demostrate skills to the instructor, it could only be done one at a time. In the meantime you could not do much but wait around for your turn. This was very boring, annoying, and frustrating for me being my ever impatient self. We also happened to have one very young kid, probably 13-14? in the class. And he was not able to learn things very quickly, so this made the waiting even longer, to the point that is was no fun anymore! Oh well, we got through it... finally.

So after that, I was really looking forward to the open water dives the next weekend. I figured that even if I had to wait around for people to finish, at least I would be in the open ocean and able to look around a bit at all the fish, coral, etc. Well, fate would prevent "that" from happening!

The first thing that went wrong was that on Wednesday night my left ear felt a little funny. Didn't think much of it, until I woke up on Thursday morning and knew there was definitely something wrong with it. Sticking a q-tip in my left ear, and feeling around, resulted in definite pain. Dammit!

The one thing that you need to have working properly for scuba-diving is your ears. This is because you need to be able to "equalize" them as you go down. For most of you to whom "equalizing your ears" probably means gibberish, it's like flying on an airplane and your ears pop. Well, you need to be able to "pop" your ears when you go scuba-diving as well. And if you can't pop your ears becuase of say a cold or an ear infection, then you can't go scuba diving.

Well, first thing, I was up and over to the doctors office. Luckily I knew there was one right beside my work because I had to take a physical exam in order to get a doctor's approval before I could take the scub-diving course. Oh and for that exam, I had to pee in a cup as well! Gross!! But I digress. So, I saw the doctor and sure enough, I had an ear infection. Double Dammit!!

The doctor called it "Swimmers Ear", and apparently it is a mild ear infection. I am sure it was from the very very dirty water that was in the pool the previous weekend. So he gave me both anti-biotics, and some ear drops to try and hopefully clear it up in the two days before my open water (on Saturday). So each day, I was all worried weather it was getting better or worse as Saturday quickly approached.

And on Friday morning it was worse than Thursday. Triple Dammit!!!

And on Saturday morning it was even worse that Friday. Quadruple Dammit!!!!

And it had spread to the other ear as well. Quintuple Damitt!!!!

So on Saturday, I was not sure what I should do. I was hoping that I could go and give it a try to figure out if I would be OK or not. The ear infection did not hurt, unless I stuck a q-tip in and swabed, in which case it was quite painful. But I also did not want to go and have the instructor tell me that I couldn't even try and then be stuck up an hour and half from Auckland all weekend with nothing to do. So Saturday morning, about 6am, I tried to call the instructor to find out if I would be allowed to try if I went. No answer. Sextuple Dammit!!!!!!

About an hour later I phone again, when I know for a fact she should be up and actually on the drive up to Goat Island to take the first class of the day (we were the second class at about 11am). No answer again. Septuple Dammit!!!!!!!

But then luckily Trevor and Denise called me around 8 am to see if I was ready to go. They had seen the instructor the previous day when they were picking up the equiptment, and had mentioned the ear infection. The instructor had said that "well, he can try and give it go and see what heppens, if it's painful that he can just stop". Thank goodness, that was all I needed. I still wasn't sure if it would be painful or anything, but if the instructor thought it was not serious and other people have obviously dived with ear infections, then I was willing to give it a try. I already had the weekend planned, hotel booked with Trevor and Denise, and all the other stuff, and it's very annoying to have to change all that because of something so stupid as a little ear problem.

So, about 8:30 and we were on the drive up to Goat Island. And here comes the next sour point. It rained the entire way there. Octuple Dammit!!!!!!!! OK, I am runing out doubling terms for my dammit's, but you are getting the point.

Any ways, Trevor and Denise received a text at some point that said because of the weather that we were not diving at Goat Island and instead a place called the Outpost a short ways away. Obviously a bad weather alternative spot. A little dissapointing, but not really a surprise at this point, considering the weather.

Luckily the rain had stopped by the time we got to Leigh, which is the little (and I mean very little) town about 3 km from Goat Island and where we were staying the night and diving from that day. Found our way to the dive sight and were out and diving about an hour later than expected (noon). Luckily I no problems what-so-ever with my ears. Unluckily the dive sight was pretty sparse in the way of... well anything!

The were a few starfish of varying sizes and one squid like creature that when the instructor pulled it out from under a rock it quickly scurried back inside, and some interesting kelp. But really no coral, and no tropical (or colored) fish. Quite boring. Oh well, we were really there to learn our skills any ways... I guess. I was just happy that I was able to dive and would not have to do it again! Oh, and the instructor pointed out some white squid eggs growing on the kelp that looked just like a white flower or plant. I didn't know at the time that they were squid eggs, and would have definitely looked a lot closer if I would have known they were squid eggs and not just a plant. At the time I just thought "Oh big deal, a white plant, just because all the other plants are boring brown kelp, doesn't automatically make a single white plant interesting"... Opps.

So 3 hours later we have completed our first of four open water dives. After that, we got all settled into the faboulous Leigh Motel, with friendly neighhood SPIDER, in the washroom. Yick! Then we went for dinner in the town 20min away, because there was not much in Leigh. And then, we were up early Sunday for the next two dives. Some early morning fog quickly burned off to a bright blue sky day! Very nice. So, we were all hopeful that perhaps we would get to Goat head that day. No such luck. Because it's so shallow at Goat Island, I guess because of all the rain it would take a few days before the bottom would settle down and it would be worth going there. Oh well.

So while Trevor and Denise had breakfast, I had a quick tour of the cliffs and beaches of Leigh, which were not all that exciting. Then we all went out to Goat Island for a little while just to see what we were missing. It was nice little area and there we a few die hard scuba and snorkler's out early. I wonder if they could see much? Oh well.

After that it was back to the dive site for dives 3 and 4. A little annoying as the boat was over and hour late, so we had to sit around in the hot sun for that long waiting, doing nothing, annoying. At least there was a cute German boy to look at to occupy my time... he joined our group for these last two dives... hmmm... of course, keeping with the theme of the weekend between the 3rd and 4th dives I learned he had a girlfriend and so of course lost interest. Oh well.

The 3rd dive was however the only one that was at least somewhat enjoyable. We went out to a different spot than the day before. This was because there was a ton of rain on Saturday night and visibility was very limited at the Outpost (where we had dived on Saturday).

So the spot for the 3rd dive was more out in the open ocean and there were tidal surges that were really very cool. They were so strong that they would push and pull you about 2-5 meters in each direction if you where just sitting still. At first they were a little frightning and hard to get used to, but then after you stopped fighting them and just let them toss you back and forth, they were really quite interesting. They were so strong, on my first decent with the instructor, that he actually lost sight of the boat and boat line because we got taken so far away. It took him at least 10 minutes to find the boat anchor again.

The bottom here was also more rocks than sand (the Outpost was all sand). And the rocks were of varying sizes, making some cracks, hills, caverns, lots more kelp forest, etc., basically a much more interesting bottom. And the visibility was really really good. There did not seem to be as many fish as the Outpost, but there was one school that went by that was cool to see even if they were all basically grey(ish). The real bad thing of course was the tide, and sure enough between our 3rd and 4th dive there was some !huge! tidal waves while we were in the boat and so the instructors determined that we couldn't do a 4th dive there and had to go back to the outpost for our last dive. Dammit!

So the forth dive was pretty much more of the 1st and 2nd, but only worse visiblity. One school of bigger fish than on the 3rd dive and a sleeping fish that the instructor pointed out, and that was about it. But at least at the end of it, I am now a certified scuba-diver! Wahoo! This means whenever I go somewhere tropical with much better marine coral and marine life, and then I can go out scuba-diving without training or supervision or anything else. Very cool!

So that was my last two weeks of scuba training. I am already looking forward to doing some dives with real big sharks now. Not Great White sharks mind you, what do you think I'm stupid... don't answer that. But, maybe I'll start with hammerheads, tigers, bull and whale sharks, who I think are quite docile? There is quite a bit of shark diving in South Africa, and it's very cheap too. I hope to get to do this in the next couple of years. Of course it probably means more training... well I'll think about that later. In the meantime, me and Trevor and Denise hope to dive Poor Knights Island, which is rated one of the top 10 dive sites in the world, and is only 2 hours from Auckland. Cool!