I have almost completed everything for my Open Water Scuba certification. I have a final dive tomorrow morning to do and turn in all my book work. Hopefully I will pass! I’m guessing they pass everyone who doesn’t end up as fish food.
We did stuff in the pool first which was a lot like doing the discover scuba class, I recommend doing those especially if you are at an all-inclusive that has a PADI shop and scuba is included. Sometimes it’s not. After the pool we went out into the ocean to do the skills there. We did a two tank dive there so technically they count us as having done 3 dives today, but I only went out once. We had to switch tanks which meant we got out of the water did the swap and got right back in. I should have brought my little camera, I seen one puffer fish and five lion fish. I think that Richard or English as his Jamaican friends call him for some reason, would have liked to been spearfishing. He only gave the explanation that if you are Jamaican then you have a nickname as well as a regular name. He also has a few more variants on Richard as well. He was a good instructor and was knowledgeable.
I’m excited about get my certification card! I will need to start logging my dives and I will probably have to do some specialty classes as well. Maybe I will do the lion fish hunter class. I hear they are tasty and since they are invasive they need removed from the reef here.
There was one other student in my class, he had a few problems but he had never done any scuba in the past.
There is a fair amount of people who come here for diving. The all-inclusive with diving is a cheap way to do it. There is more places to dive here for scuba than for just snorkeling.
Without rain we ended up having a day with more outside time which was nice. We do sit on the balcony or in the lobby’s swinging chairs when it rains but there’s also more inside time. That’s usually a good time for getting posts started, today I’m behind and Emily will have to post it Tuesday. She went to bed early.
While we waited to kneeboard we sat and talked with a guy who lives in Chicago as a travel agent, he covers the Midwest. He was interesting. He reminded me of Serge from the Beverly Hills Cop movies, the way he talked a some of the mannerisms. He represents Jamaica or works with their tourism board. He helped get the nonstop flight to and from St. Louis that flys Saturday and Sunday, we will get to use that for our return. He was excited when Emily told him that we fly out of there. He also talked about resort vacations and that they tend to trap you on the property.
He tried skiing, he got up once for a short time before face planting. I think next time he will knee board, he cheered us on when Emily and I took our turns.
He told us that Sandals is higher end than Couples and that they offer more island options. He wasn’t able to give us a must do next place to go. He had some good information though.
I think Emily was able to get up and strapped in faster than me on the kneeboard. I was able to get up though and then move back and forth over the wake, maybe in a few more I could do some jumps off the wake! We will have to see what all we have time for. Ten days seems like a long time but then the next thing you know it’s over.
The resort does some special dining nights here that change the flow and times for dining. I think that I like having a constant option, same bat time same bat location (this is a TV show reference – does anyone recognize it?) and just mix up the offerings. Three of the places they do made to order and it flows like a restaurant. Not a fast restaurant. One of those three moves the location where you sit to a deck with a canopy roof and curtains for when it blows rain, by the ocean which is nice. The rest the time they call it a grill and will feed you in your swimsuit inside a more permanent structure though it has no doors or windows. Tonight was one of those special nights and they made our normal dining area into made to order only and they try to make it a dining experience. I like the buffet type option with the carving station and made to order station. They also used one restaurant to do a dinner for returning guests, one was closed and the asian one had the same menu as last night. I found it to be an odd choice mostly because I didn’t like it.
There really is a wide range of ages here. I seen a old guy with a walker this morning and there are several couples that are probably close to 18.
I need to get up early tomorrow and finish up my dive. Hopefully I can get some good pictures during my dive!
Emily will have some from today to add to this post.
Traveling with Emily! 