KATE'S TRAVELS: If you can float…

You can scuba dive.

If you can fall out of a boat

You can scuba dive.

If you can just let go of some preconceived notions (sharks)

You can scuba dive!

Believe me…I never thought I would be this person.

I credit my entrance into diving completely to Corey. He is the hand on my back, urging (shoving?) me into situations I would never put myself in.

In all honesty, to truly enjoy diving, you must be comfortable in the water. The advancement of equipment for scuba diving has opened up this incredible experience to the masses.

IF you are going to try this you MUST find a great shop to help. Look for 5-Star PADI shops…as these locations have gone through some pretty strenuous vetting. We have learned the hard way to use these shops as their standards are high and safety is at the top of the list.

You can do your book learning on line so you don’t spend your precious vacation time in a class room. Then, when you get to your destination, you can do your test dives.

Our diving adventures started back in 2004, when our friends starting diving and told us how fabulous it was. We were slated to go to Hawaii in January for our first “vacation” (that’s a trip w/o children) since the kids came along.

We went on an “intro” dive with Tropical Divers. (Sadly, run out of business by the greed of Kaanapoli developers). Intro dives are terrific because they let you check out diving before investing a whole lot of time, energy and yes, money.

We spent quite a bit of time going over breathing (pretty important), equipment, descending, ascending safely, and signals. Soon it was time to saddle up (as it were).

Our first dive lasted about 35 minutes. We saw a relatively rare Hawksbill Turtle. After we moved around, we surfaced, and with our Buoyancy Control Devices (BCDs) inflated, we took the leap to continue and get certified. First though, Eric made us pass one test. With our masks off, we had to put our face in the water and breath through the Regulator. This part we passed no problem, and were then given our books and assignments.

We spent the next few days reading and diving and testing in the beautiful waters above Lahaina. Our learning area was a sandy area right off shore in 25 feet of water. We would do our required activities, then do more searching for neat sea creatures (it was nice having a class size of TWO!) Corey and I were most skeptical of taking off our masks and NOT having our contacts fly out of our eyes…but they didn’t (just as Eric said).

We dove again in summer of 2004, and then not again until 2008. We did reintroduction dives with Shaka Doug Corbin (coolest shore dives in Maui). http://www.shakadivers.com/

Since then Corey and I have logged 100 dives and with this move to Hong Kong have been able to dive in Cebu and Bali (he has done Thailand also!).

Many of our dives are also with Maui Dreams http://www.mauidreamsdiveco.com/ (did many of our advanced certifications here) AND their boat The Maui Diamond II http://www.mauidiamond.com/ . We literally plan our time in Maui around how many dives we want to do. We only want to go out with the best .

Diving has given me a MUCH larger appreciation of our oceans. I am more aware of the issues facing the world with over fishing, shark finning, pollution, heck…I won’t eat Octopus anymore now that I’ve held one! (too cute and fuzzy)

Lastly, diving has allowed me to see things close up I NEVER thought I would see:

Lobsters and sharks living together