Under the Sea

This post is about my PADI Open Water Certification.

Part One

While this was not originally in my study abroad plans, I have always wanted to get scuba certified.  I love snorkeling, so why wouldn’t I love scuba?  So when I saw that my university in Costa Rica, Universidad Veritas, offered a program to get certified, I decided to go for it.  It cost $525 (not a cheap hobby to pick up, is it...) and included the online theoretical course through PADI, the practical course with a PADI Dive Instructor, transportation to and from a Dive Center, 2 nights stay by the Dive Center, 2 breakfasts and lunches, and dive gear rental.  Looking back on it, I definitely could have done it cheaper, but oh well.  What’s done is done, and if Veritas didn’t have the program, I may not have done it so I guess I’m paying for the convenience that got me to actually take the plunge ;)

I gave myself 2 weeks to complete the online course before the weekend I had set aside with another girl to go do the practical portion of the course when we actually do the dives.  She had already done the theory part of the course and the confined water dives at home, and just needed to do the open water dives.  Oddly, we were the only two getting certified this semester at Veritas, so she was my dive buddy.  As for the online course, I ended up cramming almost all of it in to the week before we were leaving due partially to internet troubles and power outages, but due mostly to procrastination.

Punta Uva Dive Center

The university works with two dive centers: one in Quepos and one in Punta Uva.  Due to the heavy rains that week that actually made it impossible to get to Quepos and closed down the dive center, we went to Punta Uva (just south of Puerto Viejo).  Looking back on it, while Frederick was nice and seemed qualified to be our instructor, it seemed that he was not following all the rules I had learned about in my online course.  Anyway, funny story, he was staying at the same hotel as us and came to talk to us the night before to go over when and where to meet in the morning.  Then the next morning at breakfast, he must not have recognized us because he and his friend asked to sit with us, introduced themselves, and then proceeded to tell us about how drunk they had been the night before and how he had not slept much because his friend kept him out late despite protests that he had work in the morning.  When he introduced himself, we thought he had just forgotten our names from the night before, but then when we told him where we were staying, he said, “Oh, I’ve got a student named Anna who is staying there too”.  That was when we realized he didn’t recognize us as his students and told him that yes, that was me, Hannah, and we were his students for the day.  Of course, this made him blush and apologize and appear quite embarrassed.

After breakfast, we agreed to meet at the beach right out front in a bit to do the confined water dives.  He sized us up and called someone from the dive center to bring gear for us.  The weather was not great and it was raining, but as he pointed out, rain doesn’t matter much for scuba.  Wind matters because it stirs up the water, but that was not an issue until later.  Anyway, we completed the required tasks that are mostly comprised of practicing what to do in case something goes wrong in water shallow enough that you can stand up if you freak out.  As I expected, the part that freaked me out the most (and it is the part that freaks everyone out the most) was when I had to remove my mask under water and then put it back on and clear it.  I have always had issues with water getting in my nose, and it was even harder when I had to keep breathing through my mouth.  However, after many tries, a break when we did the other tasks, and then coming back to it, I was able to do it without a problem.  Hear that out there?  If you think you can’t get certified because of having to do that, I was able to get it so you can too :)

Giving the "OK" sign

 After the confined dives, we drove to Punta Uva for our first Open Water Dive.  Unfortunately, it was too windy and the water was so stirred up that we could barely see each other from only a few feet away.  We decided after that dive that we were done for the day and would resume on Sunday.  That night, I started feeling sick.  I called my instructor who said that we were not deep enough for it to be related to the diving, so I just tried to rest and hope I felt better in the morning.  I wasn’t feeling great the next day, but my instructor said I could try if I wanted to, so I decided to go for it.  This dive we actually saw some stuff.  We took pictures with the instructor’s camera, which I am still waiting to receive from him via e-mail...  (*I have them now!)  I was fine for most of the dive, but near the end we did a safety stop, where you stay about 5 meters under for 3 minutes to make sure the nitrogen properly dissolves out of your body.  While there is not much movement of the water near the bottom, at 5 meters you are definitely moving up and down with the waves.  Since I do get seasick sometimes and I was already not feeling good, this did not help.  I was fine, but I decided I couldn’t do another dive that day and would just have to finish my certification some other time.  Turns out I made a good choice because the water was rougher when they went out for the second dive, and the other girl who went with them got sick on the boat.  Due to the weather and time constraints, neither of us finished our certification that weekend, but that’s ok because I had a great time in Bocas del Toro, where I did finish it two weeks later.

Part Two

Since I came down here early, my stay in total is over 90 days, which is the limit on a tourist Visa.  This meant that I needed to leave the country at some point so that I would get a new Visa upon reentry.  I have heard great things about Nicaragua, but the political situation between Nicaragua and Costa Rica right now is not that great so I decided to go for Panama.  I had also heard great things about Bocas del Toro, the closest Panamanian tourist destination to Costa Rica, and I knew that they had dive centers there so I looked into finishing my certification at Starfleet Scuba.  Starfleet was recommended in my Let’s Go travel book, as well as by an office member at my university who dives a lot, and I have to agree that it is a great dive center.  It felt a lot more professional than the center in Punta Uva, while still being very chill and friendly.  Since I had done two Open Water Dives in Punta Uva, I only needed two more to complete my certification, but the center gave me a deal on four dives so I took it.

Saturday morning, I completed my Open Water Certification, along with two others who had been working on theirs there.  I am happy to say that when it came time to remove and replace my mask under deeper water, I had absolutely no problems!  An interesting part was when we had to practice a kind of emergency ascent used to safely ascend if you run out of air and your buddy is not close enough to give you their alternate regulator.  He had us go in order of who had the most air left.  I seem to be good at not using up my air quickly, so I was last, but one of the girls had to do it twice so I started running low.  In the Confined Dives, one thing you have to do is feel what it is like to run out of air.  Your instructor closes the valve and you wait until you feel that there is no air left, then you signal that you are out of air, and the instructor opens the valve.  During this, the air cut off pretty quickly which I found surprising and a little disconcerting.  However, during this dive, I learned that you in fact have a decent amount of time in which only the second half of each breath feels labored, but you can still breathe fine.  It did make my ascent more realistic in that I was actually running out of air, but I was more comfortable knowing that you actually can tell at least 5 minutes in advance that you are running low on air.  I don’t know how much longer I could have kept breathing from my tank, but I think there was still more time left before it actually ran out.

About to make my first dive as a certified Open Water Diver

Anyway, after the two dives, I filled out a card so that they could submit it to PADI and get my certification processed.  Funnily enough, I saw a new kind of typo in my name in the confirmation e-mail they sent me so I will have two cards: one correct, one incorrect.  Then on Sunday, I did two dives just for fun, as a certified Open Water diver!  I realized during these dives that not only is scuba cool because you can stay under the water and get a closer look at the fish and other marine life, but it is a completely different world with different laws of physics.  It was interesting discovering new ways of moving around in the water, and feeling like a part of the underwater world around me.  Sebastian sure got it right when he sang, “We got no troubles, life is de bubbles, under the sea!”