David first
got interested in Scuba in the 60’s, and even studied some of the written
materials then, but never went on to take lessons. Our friends, Jill and Rod Hearnes, are avid
divers. They are even older than we are,
and their example showed us that it is never too late to get started. So we decided last spring that we would book
a Scuba course this season.
The course
is sponsored by an international organization called PADI. There are several groups that certify divers,
but PADI is one of the biggest. There is
quite a lot of book learning that you need before starting to dive, and you can
take an online course that covers this material. Both Gretchen and I completed the online
course while we were in Switzerland last fall.
When we got
to Bequia, we started the practical part of the training. First, you learn some basic skills in “confined
water,” which in this case means “shallow and relatively still.” I.e., a few yards off the beach in front of
the dive shop. Then you repeat these
exercises in “open water,” which translates to “deeper.” There are a total of 8 or so dives, counting
the confined water work.
We found the
practical training to be more difficult that we had imagined from the online
materials. The specific skills (e.g.
clearing water out of your mask, finding your mouthpiece after losing it,
sharing air with a buddy if you run out) are actually pretty
straightforward. What we found
challenging was even more basic:
controlling buoyancy and equalizing our ears.
When you are
diving, you have a weight belt to help you sink. You also have a jacket-like device that can
be inflated to help you float. It seemed
like all it would take to control buoyancy is to get the proper balance between
the two. But it was not so simple.
The other
thing that affects your buoyancy is your lungs.
If you take a deep breath, your lungs expand and this makes you float. If you exhale strongly, your lungs get
smaller and you sink. But of course, you
are inhaling and exhaling constantly. It
proved quite difficult for both Gretchen and David to control this. On our first couple of dives, we were bobbing
up and down in the water like yo-yos.
Well,
bobbing up and down just adds to the second problem: equalizing our ears. As you descend, you have to add air to your
inner ears, in order to balance the increasing pressure from the water outside. It’s kind of like the pressure on your ears
when you are on an airplane that is landing, except more intense. Equalizing your ears is a learned skill, and
becomes easier with practice. But of
course, on our first dives, we didn’t have much practice – and needed to
equalize a lot because of our constant descending and ascending. If you get this wrong, it hurts!
On the
second dive, Gretchen got so frustrated that she was crying into her mask. She couldn’t stay down on the bottom. Her ears hurt. David wasn’t in much better shape. We had to take a pause, and deal with these
two basic issues before we could continue.
The dive shop (DIVE BEQUIA) was extremely patient and
accommodating. We scheduled a dive where
we focused only on these two skills. By
the end of the dive, we both were feeling much more comfortable and relaxed.
We still
have two dives to go, but the skills in each of these dives should be learned
and demonstrated without too much trouble.
Then we will be certified divers!