Day one of my advanced open water course, and I turned up first to the dive shop, with nobody else there. I grabbed a seat and waited, while everyone else arrived.
My instructer arrived and sorted me out with my kit, and I discovered that I was the only person on the course - which meant that it was going to be a fairly easy time, where the skills parts would be fast (only one person to test - me!), and the rest of the dive could be fun dive enjoying the corals and fishes.
We all got on the boat together (some were doing Rescue Dive course, and some were doing fun dives, and one was doing Introduction Dive).
My first dive was to be a skills refresh, since it had been a few months since my last dive, and the instructer wanted to confirm how able I was to manage the basic skills of retreiving my regulator, and clearing my mask.
This didn't take long at all, so we spent the remainder of the 30 minutes enjoying the view of the coral around Gaya island.
- Refresh dive 12
- Start 190
- End 110
- Max 16m
- 30 mins
- Time in 1030
- Come up 11am
- Notes: skills recap, reg out in free,clear mask, emergency air
Saw blue spot ray
Nudibranch like blue heaven logo Chromodus
Trumpet fish
Clown fish
The second dive was for underwater navigation, where I had to swim in a square of 20 fin kicks per side, starting with an initial bearing. It was made easier for me since I already knew about navigation and compasses on the hill - and even easier again since I was given an initial bearing of 0°rees;! The hardest part was keeping my concentration when I saw the blue spotted ray again, and had to keep navigating instead of following it!
- Navigation dive 13
- Start 190
- End 130
- Max 12.7m
- Time in 1144h
- Come up 1216h
- 32min
- Notes: lots of problems equalising
Navigation square start south 20 kicks per side
Saw blue spot ray but had to focus on navigating
Picked up discarded 2l bottle
After this dive we headed to the jetty on Gaya beach for lunch at the restoran there. I enjoyed Nasi Goreng Kampung Seafood and rested at the beach until 2.30 when we departed for the last dive of the day.
This next dive is for peak performance bouyancy. The instructer advised me that he felt my bouyancy was very good already so wasn't sure why I wanted to do this as one of my options, but I explained that I felt that the better my bouyancy control the better my air would last and the more I'd be able to enjoy dives of any depth, which he agreed with.
- Peak performance dive 14
- Start 210
- End 150
- Time in 329
- Time out 404
- Depth 9.4
- 35 min
- Notes: Weight check show too heavy
Bottom float reduced 3kg to 1kg
Recommended to dive with 2kg on dives where air goes to 50
Swim through square took 3 or 4 attempts
Different kick styles
- Std
- Frog
- Other, struggling to understand what other is or how to do it