It's our first weekend!
So this weekend just gone was our first weekend of dive activities here on Waiheke!
I just want to take this opportunity to say a massive THANK YOU to our first divers Danny, Ariane, Becky, Tegan and Greig who were all so much fun to dive with.
On Saturday Danny headed over to Waiheke to take part in the Peak Performance Buoyancy course. Danny has been keen to get involved with Waiheke Dive & Snorkel right from the beginning, patiently waiting for our Worksafe Adventure Activities Operator registration to go through so that we could go diving! This meant that he was lined up to be customer #1!
Danny is a super keen diver and is working his way towards the Master Scuba Diver rating. If you don’t know what that is, check out this link where PADI explains their highest ‘recreational diver’ rating and exactly what it entails. Danny’s enthusiasm and passion for diving came out right away, and his desire to learn was apparent right from the start with some thoughtful and considered questioning to put my theory knowledge to the test! What more could you want in a student?!
Over a day we combined theory, diving and in-water video footage review to work on his buoyancy, trim and technique. By the end of the course, he’d reduced the weight he was carrying substantially, increased his in-water comfort and was hovering beautifully in trim while performing skills like mask clearing. Well done Danny, all that hard work paid off and I'm genuinely proud of you mate!
On the Sunday morning a few of us headed off for a cheeky shore dive! Greig, Tegan and Becky came over on the ferry to play, while Ariane was spending the whole weekend on the Island. Despite a slightly drizzly morning, and some ‘interesting’ combinations of wind and swell, we found a nicely sheltered spot that, having dived before, I knew could be a little haven for a certain sea creature that forms part of our logo…
Just 7 mins into our dive, Tegan’s eagle eyes spotted a very pregnant male seahorse (that's right, with seahorses it's the males who become pregnant!) who had found himself a great little spot to anchor at. Before the dive we had a long conversation about ‘seahorse etiquette’ and how to behave around these fragile creatures, so I was stoked to see all of our divers behaving themselves! Keeping their distance, our divers carefully positioned themselves not to appear threatening or intimidating and, as a result, had a great encounter!
We then moved on for some more exploring and found loads of little critters including dozens of starfish, nudibranch, grey side-gilled sea slugs, and other tiny reef fish!
We also had some local enquiries here on Waiheke from divers after some new dive toys or even just air fills. It's great to be able to help facilitate so many people getting in the water!
All in all, it was a great first weekend for us here at Waiheke Dive & Snorkel, and we can’t wait to see all these divers back for more adventures!
