Scuba diving

Since my brat stages, I have always been fascinated and loved going under water, especially looking for all the life and treasures in the ocean. So taking the diving certification, have always been in my "must-do-list" in life.

Last time I tried to take the certification was in Vietnam, but we didn't have enough time to complete the course. However, this time, I am going to complete it! I am going to Check it out of the list!

Before arriving Patong we have informed my mum's friend about my wish of the certification, so while she waited for us, she have looked up 3 schools in advance. Today we are going to visit and get some more information from each of them.

In the end, I decided to go for All 4 Diving Academy. They were the most expensive one, but compared to the other two, this had a more professional impression of what they are doing. The instructor at All 4 Diving, spoke fluent English, and he took his time to answer our questions and explained in details.

He informed that they for the moment have instructors who can English, Chinese, France and Spanish available, and they can offer the textbook in many different languages, such as English, Norwegian, Chinese, Japanese, German, French, Italian and Spanish. And even more if we want the digital version.

We can choose between a 3 days course or a 4 days course. The different is the among of theory you have to go through. With 3 days you get all theory all at once, with 4 days they divide it up so you don't get stuffed with too much information at once. 

They are in partnership/organization with PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) who is the world's largest recreational diving membership and diver training organization. And they have their own swimming pool next to the venue for practices, so we don't need to travel to different places for theory and practice like the other two schools. 

The second school we visited had almost the same price, but lack of service and textbook. Despite the fact that school looked good, they didn't have the textbook in English and will take them 1-2 days to get a hold of one. The person we spoke to didn't give any interests to inform us, we had to dig out the answer out of her, and since her English wasn't good either, we had a little communication problem. 

The third school was super cheap, however the instructor couldn't speak English at all, and they didn't inform or show what partnership/organization they was part of. Skeptical. And bad communication already before we go down? Nope! No Thank You! Not gonna happen! 

So back to All 4 Diving, I choose the 3 days course, since I already have some experience from before. However if the instructor mean that I can not theory/practical good enough they won't let me try out in the ocean and I have to take one day extra for what I lack. I agree, with the terms.

With all signatures and payment done, I start next day with theory and video lecture from 0900-1500, and then going to the pool and try it out in practical. Then day 2 and 3, out to the sea, with 3 dives each day for practical. Between each dive we will practice 1-3 thing depend how quick I learn, after each dive I have to take a new theory test. For the trip out to the sea, they will come and pick me up at 0700 and we will be back at the hotel around 1800.

Since this is a important course for me, I didn't focus on taking pictures. So the only pictures I have of this whole course was when we was on the boat getting from A to B and back.

Morning

Afternoon

Evening