PADI Power!

After a good night's sleep I woke up bright and early (5.45am), pottering around quietly so as not to wake Richard, getting ready for another day of diving!

Steve and Donna collected me at 6.30am - this time boat was already in tow! At the marina, we were joined by the 4 photographers from yesterday, plus Heath, Ros, Buzz and Paul (friends of Steve). As they got the boat ready, I spent time dowsing myself in factor 30 sun cream, the sun's hot rays already beating down on my already scarlet skin!

Donna told us that she'd just heard that the whole of the East Coast was on official 'tsunami alert'! Apparently there had been an earthquake somewhere and so the warning was out for a possible tsunami at 9.45am! This freaked me out somewhat, but Buzz pointed out that if we were out to sea on a boat, we would be in a better situation than most! This eased my mind, a little! I had been worried about the danger of sharks, the idea of tsunamis hadn't even occurred to me!

We set sail and headed to a dive site called 'Snapper Grounds'. This time, I tried something new - a backward roll entry into the water. It was scary tipping yourself off the boat, but it was ok (apparently even some Advanced divers won't do it, so I felt dead chuffed that I did it!). The viz was slightly better (6-8metres) and I descended slowly in the strong current. At the bottom, I was tested on some more skills and then we went for a swim. This time, Steve let me follow him, without holding hands and even though it was a bit scary at first, very soon I felt really relaxed and well into it! Again, we saw many, many forms of sea life and fish of all types - seeing these beautiful sights really takes your mind off any panic you might have and the whole scuba thing suddenly becomes second nature, as you just concentrate on looking around at the marvellous scene before you. There was a massive shoal of long, yellow fish (names have long since escaped me) which followed and surrounded us like a massive cloud, but parting as we swam through them - very polite fish (they must be British!). I saw some large cod (seriously, these cod are massive - I'd say you'd get at least 50 boxes of fish fingers from one of them!) and an eagle ray (my instant thought at this 'OMG - Steve Irwin', but these ones just glide past and as long as you're not prodding them or pulling their tails, they're fine!). After what felt like an age, we rejoined the boat and once again I felt incredibly motivated for my next dive.

With everyone back on board we ventured to our last site - Kgara - an old wreck of a ship that used to transport the timber from Fraser Island to the mainland, back in the day when Fraser wasn't protected and was a massive source of timber. Again I went for a backward roll entry and this time did it even better than the first (I never thought I would be remotely confident with anything when I first started the PADI!). Steve tested me on my last couple of skills and then we went for a swim, again, he let me follow him and very quickly I felt very comfortable in the water, as I marvelled at the sights before me.

The Kgara was a very large ship indeed - not that surprising I suppose, seeing as it used to transport timber and the trees they used to log on Fraser grow to 45-70 metres tall, so the boat needed to be big. We swam the whole way around the base of the ship and then up and over the side, across the top and back down. There was much sealife around the darker, hidden bits and at several points, Steve stopped me and got me to look through what would once have been some portholes and after my eyes had adjusted themselves to the lower light conditions, I could see thousands of fish, all in little shoals with their friends, hovering in the darkness, added to the mix, the odd random huge fish. At one porthole, just as I started peering in, a huge pair of fish lips came at me - he had started to peer out as I was peering in, so we made each other jump!

Satisfied that I was confident with my skills and doing ok, Steve left me to buddy with Buzz, so that he could return to the boat and be observer, meaning that Donna could have a quick dive herself. Buzz took me around the boat and amongst the beautiful parrot fish, cod, stripys and other fish that shall remain nameless, we saw a shoal of mackerel - I'm still a bit confused because the peppered mackerel fillets I like from Sainsbury's are about 5 inches long and the mackerel I saw swimming around were about 4 feet long - we're definitely being hard done by in Sainsbury's!

He then took me back to the boat and through some of the open doors which led through to the other side. That was pretty amazing, passing through the boat itself, going past a couple of doorways which I guess would, at some point before its demise, have housed some people doing their day to day business - this thought gave me a bit of a 'wow-factor'. We came across Heath, who beckoned us over - he had found a woobegong shark (aka a carpet shark), it was flat and brown and sat, hidden on the bottom. It didn't look remotely 'sharky' so I wasn't scared of it, although it was a good 6 feet long! The guys stroked it but I didn't fancy that - I was worried I might lose my balance and fall on it or something, at which point I figured it might become more 'sharky' and give me a bit of a nip (with a mouth as wide as that, I'd certainly have felt that!)! After a final swim about, we ascended and I felt on top of the world! It was so satisfying having completed these dives and seen so much! I must have jibber-jabbered on for ages, but everyone was really pleased that I saw so much and had enjoyed it so much! We also noticed that the time of the predicted tsunami had passed without event, so we headed back to the mainland.

On arrival, Steve & Donna, Heath, Buzz and I went back to Steve's and sorted out the kit, cleaning it and putting it away. Then Steve sorted out my paperwork and officially passed me off as a certified PADI Open Water Diver! Hurrah! Only bad bit is that he had to take a photo to send off to PADI to put on my license, which means I will forevermore remember the day I passed my PADI on account of my rather burnt nose! It was WELL worth it though!

Steve brought me back to the YHA at about 3.00, whereon I had a shower and did some impromptu washing - taking some of my dirty clothes into the shower with me and giving them a wash in shampoo and shower gel (I'm sure it will work fine!), before heading to Woolies for a well deserved iced coffee and then returning to the YHA to chill out and wait for JJ and Nikki to return. Hurrah!