The Incidental Daddy – Going Underwater

Dawn Jorgensen - 18 February 2011

The Incidental Daddy bravely took exploring to a new level this past month and I encourage you to do the same while lingering in Cape Town. As a water baby and wannabe-adventurer of note, I’ve just completed my PADI Open Water Scuba Diving Course with Dive Action. For me this was two things: The fulfilment of a long standing dream and a really awesome Christmas present.

This particular course takes place over five days and includes five pool dives, four ocean dives and a whole load of theory, and has left me qualified to dive anywhere in the world up to a depth of 18 metres. I lucked out with Antony Martin as my dive instructor, a man of patience who taught me all about buoyancy, water pressure and navigation. The pool dives are very much to practise the skills in a calm and safe environment viz getting used to the gear, clearing the mask, on and off of the weight belt and more.

Pool dives: practising buddy breathing, mask removal and other rather important things

With this achieved, Antony and I set dates for my open water dives. These were a couple of weeks ago from Long Beach in Simon’s Town, the waters were clear and I got my first taste of the wondrous underwater world. There are a couple of little wrecks there and we ventured across to look at them. My next two dives were on Friday, from Windmill Beach, also Simon’s Town. The delay between the dives is not ideal, and I would recommend keeping them closer together, but the weather had played rough and this was the first opportunity that we had.

Antony pre-dive at Windmill Beach

Windmill Beach gave us a perfect day with a calm ocean and excellent visibility. Below the surface the boulders are covered in anenomies, urchins and starfish of every shape and colour. It’s so exciting to move through the kelp forests and take a closer look at the seaweed, and I can’t explain the thrill I felt when a school of nonchalant fish swam by ...

I am now officially PADI qualified and hope to get back into the water as soon as possible. Best thing is that for me the adventure only begins here. Dive Action offers numerous courses, and next on my wish list is the Advanced Open Water Course which will take me to new depths, literally ...

Exploring the underwater world – exciting! Note to self to remember <em>not to touch</em>

Exploring the underwater world – exciting! Note to self to remember not to touch

Do have a look at the Dive Action website for more info, and know that not only the Maldives and Mozambique islands serve well as good diving locations. The Cape of Good Hope with its amazing coastline and loads of shipwrecks is a fabulous place to be learning to dive, and be diving.

That’s the Incidental Daddy, going under (water) for the week, and encouraging you to do the same. Oh, and make a note to ask for Antony Martin, the man is a master and a saint!