Day 4: Two Perfect Dives November 14, 2005
Posted by Martin in : Education, Health & Sport, Thailand , trackback
The effort of being up, bright and early by 7:30 was outweighed by the perfecticity of the water. It was so calm at times that it looked like some industrious bastard might have just paved over it. Zigor - our instructor was delighted that water visibility was at 30 metres and that in the past 4 years he’s only experienced such clarity half a dozen times.
Another person who took delight in this fact was Chantelle. Chantelle was destined to video our dives today so that she could produce a souvenir DVD for us all. We were encourage to goof about in the water and to just enjoy ourselves.
Both dives were spectacular. We entered the water down a rope line which made the descents relaxing and slow.
Our first (and best) dive was at South West Pinnacle - regarded as one of the best dive locations in Thailand. With perfect water clarity we could see the most awesome schools of fish, going about, living their little fishy lives completely oblivious to us. The site was to 30m depth however our PADI qualification allows us to only go as deep as 18m so we didn’t go to full depth.
Today I’d overcome my mastery over buoyancy where by inhaling and exhaling you determine whether you float skywards or bottomless-pit-wards. It’s a valuable skill to master seeing as yesterday I got a few memorable scratches on my legs as I intuitively went down onto the corals rather than soared majestically above them.
Our second dive was at Three Rocks, which I was unable to find a link to online. Visibility was only 10 metres here but the diving itself was still fun. We also got the opportunity to do some very simple practice with an underwater compass.
We had a lot of fun with the video, at one time being asked to remove our mask, replace it with sunglasses and do some aquatic dancing for the benefit of proving how stupid we all are.
It was as we sunbathed our way back to the coast I began to really appreciate just why many of the people I’d met in the past few days had lives solely on this island for year, to do nothing but dive 4-5 times a day. Inflating your buoyancy device as you enter the water feels like receiving a lovely warm hug and the wellbeing increases from the onward. There is something intensely relaxing about the slow deeper breathing underwater, the feeling of weightlessness, the euphoria of being able to swoop and soar at will, the distorion of sounds, the magification of seeing through your mask, the completely loss of orientation and inability to gauge time.
I was so pleased to have begun my diving course. It will open up significant opportunities for me wherever I go. I am so excited to receive a copy of our dive DVD so that my friends can begin to appreciate it. I can’t wait to do my advanced qualification next April, when Lisa comes to visit, and when Tik and I have a month to relax. Both Lisa and Tik will study their basic course together over 4 days, and I’ll be able to complete the advanced course in 2 days, and have 2 bonus days for fun dives.
I left Koh Tao at 3pm via catamaran to the coach at Chumporn and returned about 2am to Bangkok with a few more scratches, a deeper suntan and a greater sense of accomplishment than I’d left with.
Traveling solo, and being reluctant to get my camera wet, I don’t have many photos to publish yet. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to pull off some wonderful underwater shots from the DVD when it arrives in a week or two.
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