Diving Queen - Rhonda Dives in!

Our Marketing Co-ordinator Rhonda Martin has recently fulfilled a life long dream and has become a certified diver. We hope you’ll enjoy reading about her experience.

I’ve lived in the north most my live and have known a number of divers. It was always something that I was going to do ‘one day’. That ‘one day’ happened last week. I signed myself up for the Pro Dive’s 5 day PADI “Open Water” course.

The course starts in the classroom where I met my fellow students and dive instructor Alex. With a class of 8 it’s just the right size, and you all quickly become friends. The course starts with two days of theory and pool work. On day one after a couple of water safety exercises it was time to kit up for the first time. After a few confused looks and a couple of OH! light bulb moments we all managed to kit up.

After the buddy check and some shuffling over to the pool’s edge it was a relief to enter the water where the kit suddenly doesn’t feel quite so awkward. In the pool a couple of hours later you become very thankful that the pool is heated to a nice 28 degrees.

Day two starts with a talk on the various types of basic equipment that divers carry and you learn what I think is one of the most important lessons everyone diver or not should know, how it fit a mask. Back into the pool we go to try out various types of equipment from masks and snorkels to fins, later at the Pro Dive shop we kit up for the 3 day / 2 night boat cruise to the Barrier Reef and the testing in the morning becomes all that more valuable.

The second half of the course starts early as everyone is quickly shuttled down the marina and onto Scubapro II, which will be our home for the next 3 days. What I quickly realised about Scubapro II was the amazing use of every available space on the vessel without it feeling crowded. By mid morning we had reached our first dive site and if some of us less seaworthy individuals felt a little queasy, that quickly disappeared with the excitement of our first dive in the open ocean. After a couple of false starts we all got down to the ocean floor and discovered what a different watery world we had just entered, once we were all safely back on board we were fed some yummy cake and this is soon became a pattern - Dive - Eat - Dive - Eat - seemed to be the motto of the boat as every time we exited the water there was some temping creation from the galley to devour.

At this stage I feel I have to make special mention of our instructor Alex, as it seemed that every time we entered the water over the next 3 dives there was some issue that he had to sort for each us all at one stage whether it be equalisation on the decent or being too buoyant and just sort of floating around the surface unable to descend. So Alex, a really big thank you as you really do have the patience of a saint and we are all very grateful for the time you spend with all of us with all our ‘issues’.

After the fourth open water dive everyone on the course became certified open water divers - mission accomplished! For the rest of the trip we all took our time exploring the amazing new world just waiting to be discovered below the surface with a night dive one of the more memorable moments. I would like to thank everyone on Scupapro II - Zack, Lindsay, Murat, Digby, Alex & Lucy for making this experience so memorable and I recommend to everyone who is even thinking about it to sign up with Pro Dive Cairns, you will be in the best hands possible to make diving a life long adventure.