North Stradbroke Island

Well... this Thursday I should be holding my c-card in my hot clammy little hand. I passed woohoo!!!

After last weekend in the pool, I managed to catch a nasty, nasty flu. I was completely convinced that I would not be able to do the check-out dives. I was also way hesitant to book accommodation, just in case the flu really struck me.

Then... I found accommodation. $297 for 3 nights or $290 for two nights. I opted for the extra night and found myself alone on a big island with my baby boy - loving it. The weekend rolled around, my beautiful instructor was a bit confused with why we were staying elsewhere, but I think he held it together really, really well.

Dive 1
Amity Point Pier, NSI

This was a corker of a dive. Our assistant instructor was trying to convince me that there was a mild current, but God it hurt. We kept drifting towards the boat launch area and kids were dive-bombing us off the pier - pretty funny actually. I'm there trying to equalise/remembering to breathe/keep track of my buddy and feel the tap on the shoulder. Turn around to see a little kid giving me the thumbs up - lol! Didn't expect that one! My buddy had slight issues with his mask and eyes and things like that, but I was ok... just got exceptionally tired by the current. When it came to doing my CESA I was rooted, as was the instructor as I was the last in our group of 7. I aborted mid way through, then went to a depth of 5.8m for the real thing. I honestly hope I never have to do one for real!

Dive 2
Amity Point Pier, NSI

Lovely dive... I saw a starfish! I kicked the heck out of the sand, the dude behind me later said he was tempted to get his compass out, had he have been able to read it! Did the bulk of our surface skills, fin pivots, etc. Felt I was underweighted (which later turned out to be right!) because my fins just didn't like finding the sand. I did not enjoy mask clearing, I've never enjoyed salt water in my eyes. The thing is though, I got through these things that I disliked and feel that was huge step forward.

After the two dives we headed up for a walk on the gorge and saw a couple of dolphins and chatted to the people in our group a bit more. They are a really interesting bunch of individuals. Our AI is the baby at 21 and then me at 24, my partner at 25, a couple of girls at 26, our instructor at 27, then a couple at 28 and 33. I think as a group we worked well together, turns out that our lucky instructor had us as his first group post instructor exams. We are all very proud of him and the fact that we all survived - good work Benny Boy!

Dive 3
Shag Rock, NSI

Deeper water! I had felt a lot of trepidation going into deeper water, but found that I need not have worried. Because I had to concentrate on equalising, staying with my buddy and actually making sure I could get under the water, the depth kind of disappeared. I did need an extra 3pds of weight as my head got a foot underwater and that was it. I find it amazing what one weight can do! I sank like a sack of bricks to a depth of 14m. Amazing! There was surge, even at that depth which surprised me. And it was spectacular! There were little blue fishes and so many wobbegong sharks, lounging between the rocks everywhere you looked. My beloved partner is decidedly looking at underwater cameras now - I'm not going to stop him! We also experienced our first thermocline which was a real surprise to the system! Surfacing was a disappointment as I felt slightly seasick on a v. choppy day. I got myself together no probs in the end...

Dive 4
Shag Rock, NSI

Much of a muchness as Dive3... a tiny little bit shorter. We saw a crayfish and practiced our safety stop, I find it difficult to remain at the same depth. Much to work on.

The baby has awoken! Time to entertain him!

It has begun!!!!

Well last week - our gear arrived from the US

We decided to order from scubatoys.com and I don't regret it for a minute! The service was absolutely outstanding, the package arrived in less than 4 days (Dallas -> Fort Worth -> Louisville -> Hawaii -> Sydney -> Brisbane) and we are really, really pleased with what we selected. We picked:

1 x blue pair of Cressi Spacefrog fins
1 X Yellow pair of Cressi frog fins
1 X Mares opera mask
1 X PINK hyperdry snorkel

The damage (including EXPRESS postage): $237 Australian. Stoked.

Then we rock up to scuba school yesterday. I won't name names 'cause I haven't made my mind up about them yet. We picked these guys because we were informed that they are meant to be our city's premier dive agency. Some of the things that have occurred thus far, I am not entirely pleased about, but on the flip side: Our instructor is a sweetheart.

We did all our in class tests and I was so proud - I scored perfectly! I messed up the final exam - 47/50. Dom got 49/50. I made silly errors, as usual. Anyway.. on the first day we were late because we dropped the child at Circus school with Gran... then I parked the car in the wrong spot... then... yada... yada... yada. You get the idea. It was a morning where I felt I was doing everything wrong. Our class is small - there are 7 students, an instructor guinea pig and our instructor. The people are lovely and a nice diverse class.

Then we went in the shop. Eeep.

The Moth (Man of the house, of course) decided to purchase a new mask seeing as the mask ordered on ebay hadn't yet arrived. Cool. $130. Aqualung Mythos. Then an Aqualong snorkel - $40. Then the Safety sausages - they were out of the small pack, we needed the big ones - 27.95 X 2. Decided to get two mask straps 'cause of our longer hair 2 X 20. The damage (And it DID hurt) $265 - more than our fins.

I considered a new pair of fins because I feel my Cressi's are slightly too small. I'm thinking I will upgrade eventually to a pair of splitfins, but they will suffice for the moment. I don't want a pair of aqualung blades - It will be a pair of apollo bio fins most likely, atomic aquatics coming second. And guess who I will be buying from? LOL.

So then into the pool. For some reason, I felt uncomfortable this time in the water. The skills came easily enough, I think it may have been too many people in the pool or not having the confidence in my equipment being put together right - because I put it together. Silly I know and I feel I'll probably go the other direction next and refuse to wear equipment that I haven't put together. The instructor's teaching is good, he's very calm and very patient. I feel he's a little abrupt with me, but I am highly sensitive. I think he has a crush on one of the girls in the class, too :) So that makes for an interesting weekend away!!!!! The equipment worked brilliantly in the water, except my snorkel is heavy on my mask band and dom's mask is hurting his nose. We can't wait for the new mask to arrive and see if he likes it more.

I was particularly worried about mask clearing for some reason (probably read scubaboard too much) and was surprised how comfortable I found it in the water. I'm a total air hog too, with my air useage equalling MOTH's at times. I didn't drink enough water prior to the class and felt it by the end. After 4 hours in the pool we drove home to a hotel for the night and cuddles with our favourite baby boy.

Bright and early this morning we woke the little one to tell him that ma and pa were headed for a class. He waved bye-bye without a care in the world. We arrived late because I insisted on a stop to our friendly multinational for breakfast, then needed petrol. No probs. Did two more quizzes and then headed to the pool for the remaining three hours of modules 4 + 5 and a little of #3. I'm finding neutral buoyancy difficult to achieve, so that will be interesting in the water next week! I tried the skin diving and was pleased how I went! I bashed my shoulder on a hoop during the skin dive - duh! so the hoop just came with me - I was Out of air. Amusement at everyone's expense! The instructor said I caned to start off with then strangely slowed down with the hoop - funny that!

Are lewd jokes the norm when safety sausages come out to play? I think so... How can you resist?

I can't believe how cold the air is in a free-flowing reg, v.v.v.v. freezing. I was already cold in the pool and do you know what the temp was? 28c!!!! Eep! I hate cold water! (At this point of writing, my mother has wandered in to give me a vial of cool water by davidoff. Irony, huh?)

The moral of the story - I'm looking forward to the next weekend of diving. I am completely and utterly exhausted and cannot wait to collapse into my bed, next to the MOTH.

Ninite!

clubbin'

There's always good things being a University Student, maybe I've found some at last!

University of Queensland Scuba Club


Queensland University of Technology Scuba Club


Oooheeeeeooooh!

Only 1 month and 9 days to go!

Well....

We have booked our places to learn how to scuba dive! Yahoo! Wahooti fandango Baby!

The ocean won't know what has rocked it!!!!