AquaMarine Diving - Bali Turns 23yo and Why YOU should learn to dive!
Growing up in the UK, learning to scuba dive never made it onto my To-Do list – too cold and not much to see, at least nothing that would interest me.
Then I did my career girl thing in London which was about as far removed from scuba diving as you could imagine 🙂
I spent several years backpacking, and also lived overseas (the USA 3 times, Australia for a year, Japan twice) but I never thought of learning to dive.
It wasn’t until March 1998 when I was living in Jakarta and someone I thought I knew pretty well told me that on her recent holiday in New Zealand, she’d dived the Rainbow Warrior shipwreck (the Greenpeace boat bombed by French intelligence operatives in Auckland harbour in 1985) that I had a “I want to do that!” moment!
So the next month I went up to Manado, North Sulawesi and got certified – it genuinely changed my life!
That May I spent two weeks diving in Bali, mainly around Menjangan Island in the NW, and Tulamben Bay, with a Day Trip to Nusa Penida to visit Manta Point.
I returned to Jakarta and resigned; moved to Bali in December, taking my PADI Divemaster in January, and becoming an Instructor in April. I received the licence for AquaMarine Diving – Bali on 18 September 1999, and I’ve never looked back!
No, it hasn’t been plain-sailing – but what in life ever is! – however I have an amazing team in AMD-B: Helpful, friendly, supportive. And some of the world’s greatest, and most diverse, diving right on my doorstep! I am ‘Living The Dream’.
Why am I writing this? Well partly because AMD-B turning 23yo has made me feel a bit introspective, a bit nostalgic 🙂
But mainly because I want to put this message in writing: Even if learning to scuba dive isn’t life-changing for you, it will benefit you in ways you’d never imagine –
– It improves your self-confidence and self-reliance.
– Scuba diving is The Most Relaxing pastime ever (very far from being an ‘Extreme Sport’!).
– As the saying goes: It’s a different kind of pressure underwater … no mobile phones, no social media, the incessant chatter is just the fish, the only sounds are your breathing. And we all need some respite from the 24/7 of the 21st century.
So, please, learn to dive – and then give the gift of scuba diving to your friends and loved-ones!