Today is day two, the final day of our Advanced Open Water certification, with three dives on deck. Bittersweetly our Italian Stallion instructor Maury had the day off, but we had the chance to connect with and learn from our new instructor, Robi. Robi was a local Indonesian dive instructor, and he was a jokester. The first dive would be the Nitrox specialty. In short, Nitrox is oxygen enriched air for breathing gas instead of typical compressed, filtered air that allows divers to stay underwater longer due to less nitrogen in the tank. Apart from the typical dive plan briefing, we had to test our cylinders for their oxygen levels and calculate our max depth for the dive. Nitrogen narcosis and decompression sickness are serious injuries that divers must monitor always, and while with Nitrox the risks of these may be reduced, divers must also account and plan for potential oxygen poisoning.
We did our planning and prep work, then set out for dive #3 of the advanced course. Dive #3 was the Nitrox specialty, at Shark Point site, 37min duration, max depth 28.2m, and avg. depth 18.6m. Wildlife observed includes a white tip reef shark (mother), sting rays, turtles, pufferfish, and the Gili gills (angelfish, butterfly fish, clownfish, surgeonfish, sweetlips, grunts, parrotfish, soldierfish, banner fish, and trumpetfish). 37 minutes wasn’t a significantly longer dive than normal because while the Nitrox helps extend time at maximum depth due to less nitrogen, it doesn’t affect the rate at which we breathe and run out of gas.
After a lunch break at Irish Bar with Solly, Liv, and Nicole, I was fueled up for dive #2. Back at Manta, I ran into Simon, my German digital nomad friend who I met yesterday and convinced to give diving another shot with Manta after he endured a traumatic experience diving. He had a positive and comfortable experience diving with Manta and was thrilled to be back into diving and over his fear. He was sitting at a table with new diving friends with whom he signed up for several more dives at Manta together. It truly makes me happy that he worked through his fear and past traumatic experience to reignite his love of diving. Way to go, Simon!
Dive #4 was the perfect buoyancy specialty, where we would focus on using our breath and lung capacity to ascend, descend, and hover. The dive site was Halik, 38min duration, and 21.6m max depth. The focus wasn’t on wildlife, so we didn’t see anything outside the typical Gili gills. Instead, we practiced several buoyancy exercises that were actually quite challenging, but also very helpful.
Later, we returned to Manta at 6:00PM for dive #5, the night dive specialty. In preparation of the night dive, we were prepared with an underwater torch and modified hand signals. This dive’s site was at Bounty Wreck, duration 35min, max depth 16.9m, and avg. depth of 10.4m. Wildlife observed includes turtles, moray eels, lion fish, pufferfish, baby sea horses, and the Gili gills. As soon as we did our boat backflip entry into the water and made our descent, it was quite spooky reaching the depths. During the daytime, scuba diving feels other worldly. At night, it feels like an entirely new dimension yet. I would compare it to the “Upside Down” from the TV show Stranger Things. You couldn’t see anything outside of arms reach, besides your fellow divers’ torches and everything cast under your torch’s light. In addition to it being at night, doing the dive at a wreck site too added additional elements of eeriness and spookiness. After getting settled in the first couple minutes, I absolutely loved it and would do it again. There’s new nocturnal underwater wildlife that comes out to play when the sun goes away. After our ascent, Nicole was laughing maniacally as a way to cope with the night dive. She had signed up to do scuba diving to get over her fear of the ocean and sharks in the first place (bravo). She had an immense fear of night diving as well, but with enough encouragement (or peer pressure) from Solly and I, she agreed. I’m proud of her for conquering her fears and for diving with sharks, during day and night.
To celebrate our recent Advanced Open Water Certifications, Solly and I, plus our friends Jessika (from our Open Water Cert. group), Jamie, and Nany went back to Lava Bar. Instead of musical bingo, Sundays are karaoke night. Here, we met up with some of our other Brazilian friends we met a couple nights earlier at Lava Bar, Giovanna, Lucas, Daniela, Gabriela, Lais, and Monica. We had quite a crew of predominantly Brazilians, and these Brazilians know how to have fun. It didn’t take much to get Solly and I on stage to sing a song. Since he’s from Australia, we thought it appropriate to pay homage and sing Down Under by Men at Work. The crowd sang along, showing support Solly and I appreciated. After Lava Bar, a few of us hopped around to a couple other bars and clubs I had to call it a night. Diving wasn’t through with me yet, tomorrow I had two more specialties to earn that would open up any recreational dive in the world to me. Trying to be be fresh(ish) for my two dives tomorrow that would take me deeper than ever before, I answered my beds call around 2:00AM. Maury doesn’t have to know I’m slightly pushing his party and diving guidelines.