What is Scuba Diving Like?

There is nothing like the feeling of freedom of your first dive as you swoop effortlessly through the water. Even your scuba equipment, so heavy and cumbersome on land, loses its weight and does not impede your movement.

Thousands of colourful fish swim past and as you look down to the rocks below you see moray eels gaping at you from their home in the crevices. Clown fish secure in their soft coral homes, whilst Parrot fish nip at the harder coral. Odd shaped box fish seem to look at you as they float by.

As you go deeper the sound of the waves breaking on the reef die down and all you can hear is the rumble of air passing your ears as you exhale, otherwise nothing, with a slow barrel roll you look up through the clear blue water to see the silvery surface above you.

Everywhere you look there are even more wonders, another beautiful thing to explore, another weird and wonderful creature to follow. Perhaps in the distance you see a turtle gliding down to the colder depths and dolphins that wish to play and wont take no for an answer. A flash of silver bubbles stream in front of you as a bird dives into the water in search of fish.

Beyond the reefs lies old ship wrecks both civilian and military, its wooden and steel beams sticking up from the sand, its cargo long plundered. You look at your pressure gauge and see its time to return to the surface. You signal your buddy, pointing to your watch and motioning upwards. You both return unwillingly to the surface, a steady stream of bubbles racing up as you breathe.

You break the surface once more and you are surrounded by sound, the birds screeching overhead, the water slapping against the sides of the boat and breaking on the shore. The sun blisteringly hot above, as you spit out your regulator and climb the side of the boat or make your way to shore, with your heavy and ungainly equipment, like a fish out of water. Even if this isn't always the reality of scuba diving, it's still pretty special.