Diving day, today on the menu: Specialty Perfect Buoyancy.
As always, no camera on educational dives, so no pics, sorry
Packed my dive bag after a yoghurt muesli with warm coffee (I'll get them educated before I leave here, what I mean by "hot coffee, hot"! Even if I have to walk down the street to 7 eleven, get a coffee there, carry it back, and show them: that's a hot coffee..., it will still be hotter after 5 minutes walk than anything I got served there)
Finished the e-Learning and went to the class. One other participant, Tina, with 13 or 15 dives under her belt. Actually she is more interested in going deep, she wants to see the 40...
(For a short moment Dan and PJ flash through my mind with our running gag 4️⃣0️⃣🤢🚀😂, but this is a serious class, you clown, Stop it!)
Sabrina does a great job, secretly stopping me two times from answering,
she wants to see what Tina knows and says. I take myself back, no problem.
Mastering Buoyancy in my opinion is a cardinal skill, far too important to skip and neglect it.. I may have some more experience than my fellow student, but I am not perfect. That's why I take this course, anyway.
After class the two have lunch, I enjoy a Mango Shake.
Meeting for the afternoon boat is 1pm, my bag is packed, I'm booked and I gotta go
It's raining all the time, for days now, we enter the boat, off to dive site Buoyancy World, where else for this course? 😂
First dive is ok, doing skills, fin pivot, hovering etc and some exercising in the parcours. Feels good to repeat and concentrate on it.
At the surface we do a simple weight check, I have my regular 5.6 kg on, Sabrina suggest I change a kilo piece to 800 grams, that's 5.4.
On the boat I don't get warm again, chilly wind whips the rain across the deck like hail, the only cover you can take is at the stern, a small space between toilet, boat boy's cabin and kitchen, and the open engine room below. After 57 minutes surface time we enter the water again, I am still cold. everybody tries to convince me that it's going to be warmer in the water.
That lasts for 1 minute.
We descend, I get stinging headaches at 5-7 meters depth, but I don't want to cancel the educational dive after 1 minute. I didn't know it at that moment, but this was going to become one of the most uncomfortable dives of my short diving life. Had quite some demanding ones before...
We continue. After 3 minutes the headaches dissolve, I signal 👌 and we go for finning techniques.
Flutter, Frog, Backwards etc.
I freeze more and more, after 25 minutes I signal Sabrina "cold" and "cancel". Sabrina asks for 5 more minutes, 👌?
I agree to 5-10. Shivering my air supply away. Pumping. After 35 minutes I insist on going up. Current sets in. The customized fin starts to tear off of my stump with prosthesis and all. Safety stop. Dive time 40 minutes.
On the boat i am not able to prepare a coffee, cannot keep the cup still in my shaking hands and I am spilling the stuff all over the place. Blue lips. Never felt that cold, not even in Italy after 18 degree Celsius Water temp.
Sabrina and Lissy hand me two cups of warm water, which I pour into my Sharkskin top and head for the stern, to change from wet to damp clothes over the open engine room.
Back at the dive center I don't wash anything, hang up the BCD and Sharkskin, leave the dive bag as it is in my basket. Go to the restaurant for the final exam, concentrate one more time, passed, logbook, stamp, signature, ok, bye.
Straight to bed, wake up two hours later. In the bungalow everything is damp, did I mention it's raining for days now?
I desperately try to dry a hoody over the fan, so I can sweat it wet again
 |
| The notorious damp hoodie, creeping ot of the wall to get you... 👻 |
I go back to bed and don't get out of my bungalow for the next 20 hours.
fever, electrolytes, ACC, paracetamol, the bed is soaking wet every morning.
Everybody told me to take care, I agreed and went diving only every second day. But that was not enough. I arrived somehow sick on Koh Tao already, and until this Tuesday, it got only slightly better. Now it's getting worse.
I've gone beyond my limits for the moment.
I feel pity for my son who finished his advanced course today, and Daddy is knocked out for a day or two. And the weather doesn't allow a scooter tour, rain doesn't stop pouring down. We had plans to explore the island, would have loved to show him some places like Nang Yuan Terrace, Tao Thong at Cape Jeda Gang, Ban Chalok, Banana Rock driftwood bar and the like.
DAY 24, Wed April 5
Spent all wednesday in bed, now really taking care...
Got out only to give my laundry to the dive center, hoping it will return dry until friday, and cancel all diving and my favorite Specialty course Navigation scheduled for the day after.
I'd rather be of better health for The Junk next week.
No more diving on Koh Tao for me this year .
See you under water
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