I could not believe it when I received another last minute call, this time Friday around 3pm. Mike a SIA pilot had completed the PADI Discover Scuba Course, recently in Redang and decided that diving was way cool and wanted to learn. His son Mark also joined and he commences his Singapore National Service next week too.
After another round of quick calls it was all sorted. I sent the guys the SDI Online Theory Codes to complete their online studies over the weekend.
Monday morning we were at Mana Mana pool bright and early to complete all the confined water dives. Then Tuesday morning, at 6am we met at the Golden Mile Complex (at Beach Road) to catch the bus to Mersing and then the ferry to Tioman.
Upon arrival, we completed two shores dives at the house reef, where I was amazed at Mike and Mark’s awesome air consumption. It is not very often that I get to enjoy a 50 minute dive with Open Water Students.
Wednesday we joined the boat and headed to Malang rock, where we did another 50 minute dive. I had warned the boys about trigger fish and they did not believe such a small cute fish would harm anyone, so when I saw a mid size trigger I decided to get a little close to see what it would do (don’t try this at home folks). As I swam closer I got the surprise of my life – another trigger the size of a small car swam from behind a rock and went straight for me. Luckily I could do a quick reverse keeping my fins between me and the massive, big teeth scary trigger. Neither trigger got close enough to harm us and it was all a good laugh once the initial panic was over. I looked at the boys who where also finning in reverse and they had a big smiles on there faces……now they believe me.
The next dive was at Fan Canyon. This site is very nice with large rocks covered in soft coral and loads of colorful nudi’s. The boys had not seen nudi’s before, so they were very happy when I pointed a few out. We also saw barracuda and blue spotted ribbon tails.
Congratulations to Mike and Mark for joining the GS-DIVING Hall of Fame