Happy Birthday to me..... :)

The third week of the internship has gone down, and here's a summary of all the exciting experiences, we've had.

On Monday Theiss met in at 10 am; Malene went to Abades with Trigger, Alice, Melissa and Cat, as part of the latter's Advanced course. They all had a couple of good dives, though with a rough entry and exit due to windy conditions, and despite of the not very impressive visibility, they saw a lot of cool stuff including a stingray and Malene enjoyed helping and buddying up with Cat.

Meanwhile, Theiss was helping Eric out with his epic rack-project, and to put it mildly, it turned out to be the most beautiful and solid rack we've ever put our eyes on...

In the afternoon, Malene did the monthly equipment check with Alice, and she enjoyed having a peek at how the equipment, we use every day, actually works and what it consists of.

Theiss went to Abades later that day together with Melissa, Hannah, Eric, Cassandra and Will. The conditions were way better in the afternoon and we had some very recreational recreational dives that both included skipping as well as limboing on a deserted rope stuck in the seabed in the company of the usual suspects of the Tenerifean aquatic life.

The next day we both went on a shore dive again, this time closer to "home":  And the site simply provided all you could wish for. With Alice as the leader we, together with Casandra and Trigger, went along the left side of the small bay that encloses the beach, with the marina wall on the right hand side. Amongst the all-time present fish species, we saw a beautiful sea nettle anemone, black moray eels, a spiny fan-mussel, an annulated brittle star, cuttlefishes, octopuses and a big stingray - simply an abundance of interesting marine life, big as well as small!

In the afternoon, Theiss went to the hotel pool with Alice and Eric. There was a decent amount of interest, but it's always hard to tell whether or not it is serious. Theiss acted out the salesman-role, which he enjoys a lot. At the same time, Malene went to the marina beach once again, this time joined by Will, Trigger, Hannah and Cassandra in the hopes of replicating our excellent morning dives, but alas, that was not the way it was supposed to go. All points of interest from earlier that day weren't that interesting anymore, and all luck seemed to have let them down, so they were bitterly disappointed, especially Hannah and Will, who weren't around for the morning spoils.

Wednesday and Thursday were pretty similar in terms of our activity around the place. The days were packed with exciting fish quizzes, monthly/weekly duties, skill set sessions in the pool, with focus on the spoken skills, stamina tests and we got to familiarize ourselves really well with the content of the stack of magazines on the shop table.

On Friday we went with our snorkel equipment to a small beach nearby together with Cassandra and Trigger to do some urchin stabbing, but the conditions didn't allow that to happen. Instead of just heading home, we decided to conduct a 100% Project AWARE behavior by cleaning up the beach, and we managed to collect a decent amount of rubbish. The beach is situated near a frequented path, and is a popular place to go for moonlight and sunset sightings, so a lot of trash had piled up there.

Friday evening, Nemo and Bruce (aka. Will and Alister), two of the new interns, joined the rest of the crew for a very casual and chillaxing night out at an Indian curry place in San Blas.

The following day it was Malene's birthday, and what a blast it was! She finally went out to see the turtles in El Purtito, together with Melissa, James, Matt, Cassandra and Kathy, and the dives exceeded everyone's expectations. On their second dive while enjoying the gentle company of the "local inhabitants", meaning the beautiful turtles, a simply massive butterfly ray suddenly appeared from the sand just underneath the small group, and the sight was stunning - what a birthday present from Mother Nature!

In the afternoon Theiss went to the hotel pool with Alice and Trigger. The high season is quite clearly picking up and hence there was a lot of positive interest in our free Try Dive offer. It was very busy, and we actually had to disappoint some people, because we simply didn't have the time for everyone to try. Hopefully some of the holiday guests that did get to do it have now got taste for diving, so we hope to see some of them again.

In the evening we gathered in the shop for a piece of cake and a glass of sparkling wine, which was a perfect start to a lovely night out. We started out in a delicious tapas place very originally (and ingeniously) called "Tapas". Afterwards we hit a couple of the many bars in San Blas and ended up having an awesome time in a place called Taboo's for some games of pool, one liter pitchers of beer and a lot of dancing.
The Divemaster skill set was warmly embraced as a rich source of inspiration for an entire list of new dances, and especially the dance of the Five Point Descend might turn out to be the new theme dance of the Dive and Sea Tenerife.

Theiss and Malene

Gnasher the Diving Wonder Dog, aka Andreas

Hey yall

Now it's time for another exciting blog from the very one and only Andreas, Perry, Poochie, Gnasher and 'erry, or any other Nickname the Team keep giving me!
Due to Melissa, Pete and common Dutch language I've had the pleasure of getting four new names in only a week and a half. Personally Gnasher sounds the coolest, but it's probably due to the fact that I don't know who the real Gnasher is. 
Except for the obvious confusion I meet whenever somebody calls one of my names, I really start to get the hang of it at this place of hard work, learning, wonders, adventures, downsides and upsides. 
The work is getting easier because of the growing knowledge and confidence in what I'm doing is right. 
Like assembling a customers kit, or even worse, Pete or Alice's kits.

I really feel I'm learning a lot and having some great experiences both on dives and off work. The last dive I had previous to this blog was a dive at Poco Naufragio which was incredible. We sat on the bottom playing with a Common Ray while  surrounded by fish of all sizes and shapes. 
From Ornate Wrasse and Zebra Bream, to Barracudas and Parrot fish. After a while playing with the ray, we got further away and Alice fed Black Morays and FangTooths while we were watching  Simply Incredible. 
Next dive that day were at Starfish Bay. A site normally known for the massive amount of, yeah you guessed it, Starfish. 
Well we saw a lot of starfish, but due to the amount of Black Sea urchins there ain't that many any more.
Well not to bother because me and Dennis brought our knives and have a 'Confirmed Sea Urchin Kill Scoreboard' on our fridge and he's in pole position, so we had a little bit of fun "cleaning" and watching all the different fish that comes with. 
Though it took a bit of convincing myself into doing this, since I have no previous history of genocide or anything like that, and spend a year before coming here working for Greenpeace, But still the Black Sea Urchins are a plague here and have no natural enemies. The rest of the dive we were looking at all the beautiful and funny small creatures.

This week I've also had my first shore dives with Melissa. I really like these dives because they are so different from the boat dives I've done the other days. I especially liked one dive we had at a site i don't remember the name of, I think Las Eras ,but there was a big pipeline going from shore to... Yeah well... Cambodia. 

Anyway, between every concrete block along the pipeline it was packed with fish, crabs and different kinds of critters. I saw some of the biggest Arrow Crabs I've ever seen, the biggest Trumpet fish ever ever seen and the biggest cuttlefish ever!

Apart from all the diving we got a day off on Saturday  despite being exhausted, hungover and just plain tired, both me and my roomy Dennis committed ourself (on our own initiative) to climb Red Rock, Punta Roja, with Mahmoud and Lydia. 
Mahmoud being prepared in a way that not even Indiana Jones or Mr. Dundee could have done better, Lydia turned up in flip flops and with a lunchbox consisting of ice cream.
In the end we made it to the top, and despite the fact that we were tired me and Mahmoud decided to the some real climbing on the cliffs facing the water. A real manly experience.

On a completely different topic, we all just passed our EFR (Emergency FirstResponse) course today. It was all in great fun with all of us interns trying to save each other from nearly every possible incident and injury we could get into, and Pete consistently educating us switching between the real first aid course and all of his stories from 'back in 'Nam' or whatever war he was in.

Well that must be all from me for this time.

Hasta luego - Andreas (Perry, Poochie, Gnasher 'Erry)

Mountain climbing and the arrival of Jesus!

I'm sitting in the shop with my laptop, doing this blog. I just got back from the pool where I did my 400 meters swim. I'm pretty tired and sore all over due to all the swimming.

I'm trying to reflect back on the last week; what went well, what went bad, and what went absolutely horribly wrong.

Right now I am at, this point of my internship, where Im beginning to understand why certain things are done the way they are. I'm really starting to see the bigger picture here!

I'm still a relatively inexperienced diver, which means that Im still enjoying every little bit of every dive I have, and everything I see, feel and experience under water, is a big deal to me - even in spite of strong currents, poor visibility and a 3mm. wetsuit (which provide pretty poor insulation from the relatively cold waters at 18 meters).

As long as I am under water, breathing from a regulator, Im as happy as can be.

Last week we went to a dive site called "Las Eras" where Sam was leading the dive. We had to fight some pretty strong currents, especially on the way back. 
Lydia, with whom I was buddy with for that dive, was struggling to keep up with the rest of the group (most likely due to her pewny muscles - oh them girls! :-) 
So I was towing her pretty much all the way back. I didn't mind at all, because that is what a buddy is there for, and I know that she would have done the same for me, had she had the strength.

One other dive that made a deep impact in my mind, was our dive at "StarfishBay". A site usually known for, yeah you guessed it, Starfish. Nowadays, however, the site is a vast underwater desert, nothing but sand and rocks, well almost, and... those damned sea urchins, who have taken over pretty much all of the site. 
I think during that dive, I saw two starfish, and to many sea urchins to count!

I have had some truly amazing dives for the past week, I think what stands out the most, is probably our encounter with a small "Common Ray".

I was surprised to find that a ray acts kinda like a friendly dog. The ray I socialized with, kept circling around us and bumping into my stomach.

Well, I conclude that it was friendly and attention seeking -  (who knows, after all it could mean that it was probing me for any soft spots, in which to lay eggs.:-)

Anyway (how do you continue a blog after a silly comment like the previous?) 
Right, we had a day off sometime last week and instead of resting, which would probably be the smart thing to do, we decided to go climb Montaña Roja (152 meters worth of cliff by the coast at El Medano).

Around 11 o'clock there was a knock on my door, and when I answered, I was meet by no one but our very own Egyptian  Moomin.
He was wearing a big leather cowboy hat, complete with fangtooths in real Indiana Jones style. The bar was set!

Andreas, Moomin and I went to Lydia's apartment to pick her up, all excited to see what kinda cool climbers outfit she would wear.

If Moomin looked somewhat professional in his crazy "(brokeback) mountain climbing hat", Lydia was his direct opposite wearing her flip flops eating a lollipop ready to go climb a freaking mounting!

A short taxi trip  later, we arrived at the bottom of Montaña Roja, ready to climb that badboy. Fifteen minutes later (and 20 meters up the mountain) I found out that my mountain climbing skills didn't really match the amount of bragging that I had been doing previous to the trip. 
However, my self esteem rose a bit when I saw Lydia trying to make her way up the mountain in her flip flops!

We had an amazing fun trip to the Red Mountain - but, more or less, the best part of our trip, was the fact that we had no one falling off the mountain smashing their bodies to a bloody pulp (being FUBAR).

Oh I almost forgot, - we have a brand spanking new room mate in our apartment  "The prince of peace, the son of god himself" Jesus Christ has blessed us with his divine presence. 
He has appeared before us in the form of a big cardboard figure, guarding the west wing of our apartment  
Him being there with us, is, obviously, the result of a wild night out in the town of San Miguel.

Tomorrow I do my first advanced dive (the deep one) so I'm looking very much forward to that!

The adventure continues, stay tuned ya´ll.

- Kevin out

How not to Map a dive site and Kit Exchanges

I finished last weeks Blog talking about locking myself out of my apartment and staying on another intern’s sofa, this is mistake number one.
However, it only got worse from there and it was a wonderful way to start my week. So for some reason I decided that I’d be more comfortable leaving the balcony doors open whilst I slept on the sofa, looking back on it, this was mistake number two.
Mistake three was not covering myself head to toe whilst I slept.
The combination of these three mistakes meant I was mauled by mosquitoes and it looked like severe chicken pox the next day.

Moving on from the torture that was Sunday night I came to work Monday morning hoping for more success, I was not going to find any.
I was going to be leading Moomin, Perry and Angela on a mapping dive. They were mapping Alien Rock and dive one went well. With some measurements missing we were going to head back in and go the same route. This dive was one I’d rather forget.
In my head I thought the group was going in the same direction as dive one, apparently not. We ended up very shallow and I didn’t have a clue how. In my defence I think it would be excessive to say we were lost as I knew where the boat was, just not the dive site. I ended up calling the dive off and admitting defeat at twenty-seven minutes.

New customers this week! Nick, Tony, Eileen, Linda and Mark joined us for a week of diving. The group’s first dive site was going to be LasEras, which was quickly becoming popular with me, as there is just so much to see. The first dive here you head left out of the bay and end up at around twenty meters, the first dive you tend to see lots of colourful fish such as Cuttlefish, Barracuda and Atlantic Damsels. This is the first time I’d been here with such an experienced dive group, which meant we managed to make it to a sunken nativity scene. Admittedly it was much better in my head, in reality it’s very small and damaged, but brilliant none the less to make it there.
The second dive here as I’ve mentioned before heads over to the pipeline where there is an abundance of Morays, Cleaner Shrimp and Rays hiding in all the crevices. 

My chance to redeem myself was upon me. The dive group’s second day was to Yellow Mountain and I was going to lead. Obviously, being practically perfect by this stage of my internship it all went off without a blip, on the first dive to Alien Rock I saw my first Canarian Lobster since I’ve been out here, as well as a small Common Ray.
The second dive I lead us all to Swim Through. Tony who had been recording a lot of the dives on his HD camera managed to get some brilliant shots of us all coming up through the swim through.

I was very close to completing the last few bits and pieces for my PADI Divemaster at this stage, and one of the two requirements left for me to fulfil was the kit exchange. I’d been worried about doing this for a fair amount of time, but when it came down to actually doing the skill, it was a piece of cake. The only real issue with the skill is when someone has medium fins on and I’m an extra large, and have to try and fit theirs on.

Back to diving, and it was a new dive site for me as well today, El Delfin, means something about Dolphins apparently. The dive itself was fairly impressive with Morays and large shoals of fish, but for me I was more excited about doing my deepest dive out here. All the way to 35 meter,s later on there is the opportunity to head to 40 but my air was low by this point so couldn't make it.
Dive two and we headed to good old PequeneValle, which always provides large shoals of Roncadore, Bream and others. However, this time, there was something even more exciting, a Butterfly Ray.
Or at least it would have been more exciting had it not have been so lazy. The Ray was quite happy to sit there and barely move even with all eight of us around it.

Last day diving for the week and it was to Poco Naufragio, the site we go to see all the Rays, the group had been earlier in the week and seen some massive Atlantic Rays so I was even more excited to get in and hopefully see some. Sure enough, as soon as we descended there was a couple little Rays, a Duckbill being one of them, and I’d never seen one so close but it is easy to see where they get their name from. Plus, it didn’t take long before the big boys decided to come, we ended up doing both dives here and the first one was definitely one of my best dives out here.

I was going to have beans on toast Sunday morning but discovered I had no bread and well that just leaves beans, so as an alternative I had cereal but quickly realised my milk had gone off, so I had sour milk and Special K, beautiful......... Just in case you are interested in my diet :-)

Sam (Popeye)

Dolphins , Flooded Masks and awesome diving

Yes, now I'm finally here. Now i've suffered from cold and boredom for such a long time and finally pulled myself together to go do something crazy.
What could give me more a change and more experience than to go doing a PADI Divemaster internship here at Dive And Sea Tenerife though i only tried diving twice before.

And did i got a change! Ten hour workday most days, and freaking hard work sometimes. Still a workday that involves multiple dives most days and 27 degrees in the shade could be worse.

Well I arrived on the 31'st of October together with my friend Dennis, completely exhausted from a 28 hour travel from Denmark to Golf Del Sur, involving sightseeing in London and a boys-night-out in the airport, only to get greeted by an always ecstatic Melissa informing us that there's Halloween party for all interns at Dive And Sea and that we are most welcome.

As the gentlemen both Dennis and I are, there's no declining on the first day. So off we go on a hazardous mission to get Halloween costumes for the upcoming party.
Great way of meeting the other interns though. There really a great group of people, with each and everyone's special flaws, talents, workforce and humor, but everyone's got their own place here.

After our night out, we started straight on to our first day with getting all the equipment in order and pool exercises with Pete and Alice, didn't take me long to get back into the feeling and find what I had missed the whole time since my last Discover Scuba Dive, which I actually performed with the same people in the same pool nearly two years ago.

Then it was finally time for the real dive experience on my second day here. Yellow Mountain. Me, Dennis, Pete and two other people taking a PADI Open Water course.The last thing Pete says before we leave the boat is, "Since this is your first time in the ocean, you probably shouldn't look down, since it looks very far for inexperienced diver".
When I get in the water the first thing I do is of course to look down. And what a sight. I just couldn't wait to get to swim down there.
It all went well, and though I was a bit weary about my completely flooded mask skill, nothing can get in the way of doing my courses. So of with the freaking mask (Turned out to be easier than in the pool) and doing and the skills to somewhat perfection.

Every other day has just gotten better and better, since I'm really getting into the rhythm in the morning (except the fact that it is really early in the morning) and the dives keep getting better and better.

It was kinda the best day of my life the day when all the kits got assembled in no time, compared to our normal level of confusion.

On the way to Yellow Mountain we stop and watch dolphins swimming around us in the sunrise. Later had a really fun dive with Sam, Angela and Mahmud,
Then we were really quick cleaning the kits so i got an hour lying in the sun at the marina, waiting for people getting back from their shore dive. All in all a really really good day.

I passed my PADI Open Water exam okay and got some kind words from Pete about my under water appearance, so that's at least the first stop.

Obviously I'm far from doing everything right around the shop, but I can't get any 'beer fines' at my first week so I'm good!

Well from tomorrow i'll of course do everything right 'cause my ability to get beer fines starts then, but i'm only trying to finish my adventure books and in the shop, so it's limited how many rules I can break and kits I can scramble.

That's my rhyme

Andreas

PADI Advanced course and more Dolphins

So, that was already my third week and I accomplished a lot this week.

Since this week I am a PADI Advanced Open Water Diver, I got my Navigation Specialty, my Fish Identification Specialty and I only need one more deep dive to get my Deep Diver Specialty.
I got my 60th dive this week, I saw dolphins and I was finally able to dive with the stingray.

Tuesday was actually my first time ever to have 3 dives in a day.
The first dive was Pequeño Valle and I saw a beautiful Common Eagle Ray. The second dive was at El Delphin, this dive site got this name because there is a Dolphin statue on the bottom of the sea. .  And the third dive was at Starfish Bay, and you all can guess how this dive site got its name.
And finally after searching and searching I found the Garden Eels, Sam told me about this eels and I didn’t see them on the dive where he saw them a few times. So it was really nice to finally see them, they’re really funny. They stick out of the sand and when you swim closer you can actually see their eyes and everything but when they notice you, they quickly hide in the sand.

The next day I had 2 very nice dives at Yellow Mountain and Crocodile Rock, at the first dive I was using natural references to sort of lead the dive with Pete. And we had a beautiful ending of those 2 dives. We saw the dolphins and it was awesome to see them, all the customers were very happy, and so were Pete, Alice, Sam and I.
That was a very special moment of the day. But unfortunately this day has a less good side as well, this day my mommy and stepdad went back to Holland and I was really sad to see my mommy leave, but I’m a big girl.

Thursday was a very, very, very nice day. We only had 1 customer Matt so we only had to prepare 4 kits and there were just 8 tanks and washing only 4 kits. We had 2 great dives at Abades, it was Sam’s first time to lead a dive so that was exiting, but it was sad that he got a bit lost. Lucky for him Melissa was there to point him the right direction and I’m sure next time will be better.

The dives themselves were great, we saw a Fangtooth Moray Eel and a Hermite Crab with a very big shell. We also saw a Frog fish, first I thought it was a crab but it was a fish. Unfortunately the Frog fish wasn’t really interested in being photographed. Melissa, Matt and Sam saw a lot more great things but I was focused on a very cute Pearly Razor fish. The dives really were very nice, I liked seeing the Cardinal fish because I don’t see them a lot and I always enjoy seeing Wide-eyed Flounders.

The next day wasn’t so easy, Sam and I had to draw a map of Crocodile Rock. My map really failed, if someone would ever use it they would get lost. They would probably end up in Cran Granaria. Sam's  map looked way better than mine, even though I wouldn’t use that one either!

But we did have a very funny pool session. Pete took Sam and me to the pool so that Hannah could practice her Discover Scuba Diver skills towards students. So we pretended to be students and we had never dived before. So Hannah was trying to teach us skills and Pete, who was behind her, signaled Sam or me to do the skill wrong. So we kept doing it wrong until Pete signaled ’OK’. Apparently there are really students like we pretended to be.
It was a lot of fun and it was very helpful as well.
Sam and I definitely saw a lot of water today because we also had to do an 800 meter swim.

Saturday we were diving at Poco Naufragio and this time I could go deeper than 18 meters, so I could look at the Stingray. It came really, really close and I could touch it very carefully. I specially took my gloves off so that I could feel the Stingray too.

And Sunday I had a day off again. I finished my Rescue book, made my Emergency Action Plan and I gave my map another try but that didn’t really work out.

Lyida

Urchin-killings and a new Dive Site ~ El Delphin

Week 3 of my internship has just passed, which means I only have 5 more days to go till it´s back to freezing Dutchieland. (Actually thinking about it, I don’t think it will make such a big difference whether your soaking wet because of the rain or soaking wet because your sweating like a pig all day!)

On Sunday we went to Las Eras for my and Geoffrey’s PADI Deep Speciality dive and my SMB Speciality dive. 

Las Eras is a really nice dive site, with a great underwater world. On our way out everything went really smooth, just bobbing around in the water, letting ourselves be carried away by a current, checking out the Needle fish, Octopus, Barracudas and all the little critters along the rocks. 

At around 30m. Gareth made us play a little game to check if we were effected by gas narcosis, writing our names backwards. No trouble for me there, Geoffrey on the other hand seemed pretty narced, having trouble remembering and writing the correct letters (although he did had some trouble spelling his name backwards at the surface as well, but we’ll blame the early morning for that!).
After our little play-time, it was time to return to shore. By then we realized that the current was quiet strong and we struggled to swim back.
To be honest we did really well, considering we did a 30m. dive for 43 minutes in a current that strong! Really cool detail is the Octopus we saw eating a big Trumpet fish (with the Trumpet fish still sticking half out of the Octopus….I’m realizing now without a picture this description is missing a bit of X-factor, not sounding half as exciting as it actually was, you should have been there…). 

A little less cool was the dead baby Turtle we saw, lying on the bottom, all white and with his head ripped off, starting to deteriorate (again, you should have been there for the visual effect with this description…or maybe not).

We also had some time this week to go exploring! Pete decided it was time to check if he still had it, so along with Gareth, Geoffrey and me, we went to a new dive site called El Delphin (named after a Dolphin statue we passed while descending) for another deep dive. 

Star of the day was the huge Atlantic Ray that swam towards us as soon as we arrived on the bottom. A beautiful start of the dive! 

Gareth also decided to take some breakfast food from his fridge to play yet another game. Playtime was over pretty fast (which is actually a good thing at that depth)…The boys were not able to crack the egg under water so I had to show them how (pretty pathetic guys that even under water the woman has to handle the food like in the kitchen) and Gareth didn’t really knew why he brought the tomatoes (other than they were mouldy anyway and taking up beer-space in the fridge) so we squeezed them all up and prepared a nice little breakfast for the Bream and Trumpet fish.

The second dive of that day was a project Aware dive. We went to Starfish bay to do some urchin-killing. Somehow everyone was really exciting about this dive, it didn’t bring up the best in all of us. 
In the beginning I felt a bit sorry for the urchins, especially the little one's, so I have to admit that in the beginning I did let the little once get off the hook.

When I looked to my left and right side, I saw my team-members who turned into psychopaths; tossing the urchins up in the water slicing them like Japenese sushi-chefs or Samurai soldiers. 
Some of them would put them on a rock, watch them walk away, toss them over, making them think they could escape the massacre and then give them the death sentence anyway. 
I just thought they were weird and British….UNTILL….I got stabbed by one of those sneaky bastards (talking about the urchins again not my team-members)! 
Then my finger hurt, a little drop of green blood dropped out of it, my mind went blank…. From that moment on it was Die Urchin Die!!

(Again for the people not familiar with the urchins, they are a pest in this area, not native to the area and are sucking the life out of this part of the ocean, they don’t have natural enemies so we need to kill them to protect the underwater life).

Also the past week, the All-stars turned into the All-blacks after they all became PADI Divemasters by completing the exams and kit-exchange, which makes me the odd one out in my red T-shirt. 

I did the kit-exchange together with Geoffrey. 

Before the exercise we had 5 minutes to practice in which we agreed / learned that:

1. We were just going to see what was going to happen

2. You should not clear your mask when you don’t have your reg. in your mouth because yes, you will run out of air and yes, you will try to breathe water.
3. We’re awesome anyway so this is going to be easy as!

The kit-exchange went really well, Geoffrey was in a bit of a rush which made it a challenge to keep up with him. Trying to take my fins off and put his "fins-fit-for-a-giant" on wasn’t that easy, made me tip over and sit on my backside at the bottom of the pool…..BUT….goal of the exercise was to make it look smooth and easy so I took my time (trying to fool the big boss that this was all part of mine and Geoffrey’s brilliant plan of preparation), and had a little moment for myself before Geoffrey helped me back up, proceeding the exercise in lightning-speed. In the end, like we expected, everything went awesome and we could be proud of ourselves.

I also had a go at doing a pre-dive safety check and the kit-set-up. Toughest part was to pronounce the word ‘Knurled Nut’ without laughing. I also need to remember to actually put on a weight belt when showing the student how to check for a weight belt and to actually turn the air on when I want to check my air!

At the end of the week, we went to a very informative presentation of Pro-sub, The Dive Centre's supplier of dive equipment otherwise known as Toy’s R Us for divers! 

Here we gained some useful information about the latest equipment and some sales- and business techniques.

Like I said in my intro, only 5 more days to go with hopefully a lot of beautiful diving!

Susanne

The week of the sore ass, the proud daddy and more diving!

Let´s start this week’s blog with a little quiz:
- Is your body starting to look like a female bodybuilder a little more every day??
- Do you find yourself suffering from muscle pains 24/7??
- Do you find yourself almost falling asleep during your 15 min. Float stamina test??
- Do you find it difficult to keep your eyes open after 4pm.??
- Do you find yourself ordering half a pint instead of a ‘big pint’??
- Do you find yourself ordering water instead of half a pint??
- Do you find yourself skipping the after work drinks for some nap-time??
- Do you find yourself on a boat at 9 in the morning, praying to god the day would end soon and you would not puke over or near any customers??

If the answer is yes to all of the above: CONGRATULATIONS, you just survived your second week of the DM-internship!!

Actually, my second week into the internship started pretty awesome: I had my well deserved day-off! After that, again, my life has known its ups and downs.

First day back to work, I decided to see if the stairs leading towards the pool were really that slippery when wet. And yes, I can confirm that now. After slipping down the stairs, the day only got worse. 

For the dives that day, I was scheduled on my first boat duty. With a lot of confidence and excitement, I loaded the gear on the boat, untied the mooring and rushed into my wetsuit….. so far all good. 

Once out of the harbor I started to realize that the waves were just a tiny-little bit bigger than the week before, which actually made the boat-ride out awesome, bumping around on the side of the RIB. 

Once we arrived at Yellow Mountain and all the divers were in the water, my staring contest started, looking at the horizon for 30 minutes, taking deep breaths, fighting the sea-sickness, asking myself out loud why I ever started this internship, swearing silently inside, and praying to god for the day to end, or the boat to sink (when you’re sick on the sea, there are only so little solutions)! 

Tuesday was course-day for myself, doing my fish-ID speciality dives at Alien Rock (Yellow Mountain). On the second dive I was able to take the camera, which is certainly a challenge in the beginning. The fish started to frustrate me by not sitting still, so the sea-urchins (who we normally kill) became my next models/victims, at least they were good for something. In the end I got the hang of it and really started to enjoy the dives and taking pics!

Talking about sea-urchins, I’m proudly to announce I killed my first two sea-urchins in the last week. I was a bit reluctant, but after you killed one, it’s easy as to become a serial killer (gives me actually a good insight in the minds of the boys at the juvenile prison I work at home….strangely we’ve got more in common than I thought!).

For the record, the black-long spined sea urchins are not native to the Tenerife waters and suck the life out of all the rocks and corals. They don’t have any natural enemies and are a threat to the underwater area, so killing them is a necessity for the preservation of these waters and the sea-life!

This week I also finished the first dive of my navigation specialty, which was pretty easy and fun to do, and also the first dive of my SMB-speciality. Thanks to our self claimed very-very-ill (not mentally) instructor Gareth (he can make a sore throat sound like he’s dying), that dive has to be repeated (but I’m not complaining! More diving and more practice sound good to me). 

Assisting Gareth on a couple of other dives and courses has been a very interesting learning experience (not only because we spotted tons of octopus this week). Every customer is different, which makes it a real challenge to provide the assistance they need to an awesome dive experience! It’s not just about the dive-skills, but a lot has to do with ‘reading’ your customers behaviour and actions.

The highlights of the week were the stamina tests that were all done on Tuesday and Wednesday. I’m very proud of myself and the All-Stars for getting awesome results and even getting compliments from the big boss himself, who was ‘very proud of his children’. We all had wobbly legs and trouble walking the stairs the next day, but we all scored fours on the tired-diver tow and the 800 m. snorkel, threes on the 400m. and fives on the float! We rock!!

Second highlight of the week was spotting the Dolphins on a boat ride out of the harbor towards dive sites Poco Naufragio and Pequeno Valle. It makes your day when it’s 8.30 am., your ass is still hurting from the fall down the stairs, your legs can’t carry you because of the tiring stamina tests and you can just sit on the boat, watch the sunrise and spot some Dolphins 3 m. away from you!

Summarizing: It’s been a busy week, with looooong working hours, but I was able to gain a lot of assisting-experience, finished my stamina tests, been to a lot of new (shore) dive sites and only gained 3 beer fines!!

Looking forward to next week!

Suzanne

Pete was right............ as always !

Well another great week here at Dive and Sea Tenerife, found a new Deep Dive site with loads of nice marine life.  Fang Toothed Moray Eels, Black Moray Eels, large Common Ray, big Painted Comber and a grumpy Angel Shark that didn’t  like been woken up by Pete, as it swam away it’s left side pectoral fins wasn’t  moving so understand why is was grumpy.

Aaron has done two PADI Specialty deep dives, Pete had him doing a bit of math and kid’s shape puzzle to show how Nitrogen affects us at depth, 8 minute safety stop on my alterenate air source which is great practice, learnt that it’s best if only one of you control buoyancy as we both was putting air in and out of our BCD’s going up and down like yo-yo’s.

We also did two of Aarons PADI Specialty navigation dives one to work out his kick cycles, navigate a square and triangle which went well and the second to navigate around Alien Rock.
All in all good dives and good refresher for me good to keep skills up to date and as they say use them or lose them.
Also this week Aaron has been completing More of his speciality dives he’s really charging through them all for his PADI Master Scuba Diver, Fish ID was great spent all my time looking under rocks, loved this dive one of the best dives I’ve ever done found loads of interesting invertebrates like Feather Star Fish, Squat Lobster, Gun Fighter Shrimp (Pistol Shrimp), Brown Cowries and File Shell’s (Flame Scallop’s) to name a few that you don’t normally see when just swimming around.

I would of loved to have stayed down all day, when I surfaced I was really excited, and couldn’t wait to get back to the shop to look at my pictures.
Adel and Karina had their last dive of their holiday with us and we took them to El Puertito to see the Turtle’s.  Was Great dive, the Turtles must have stayed with us for 20 minutes.  Adel and Karina will be back in September to dive with Dive and Sea but sadly I will be long gone.

We had Teide Divers down to do skills circuit Kepa and Aaron did well in the water and on their Predive Safety Check and kit assembly.  Then we were off to do more 800 Meters snorkel and got better score to my stamina is still getting better even though I smoke like a chimney, Kepa and Aaron did there 100 meter tired diver tow and both got good scores too.
Went for a nice breakfast at the Aberdeen was looking forward to it all morning.

Went over physics with Pete and now it is as clear as mud! Think I’ve got it now though, will find out soon enough as I’m sitting the old Divemaster exam so find out my week knowledge areas to brush up on for my Assistant Instructor exam which I will be sitting soon.
Passed it all except for RDP should know better to busy worrying about physics, which I was really pleased with.

End of a great week we had a Discover Scuba Diver a Scuba Tune Up and a snorkeler in, well to say I had a bad day in a bit of an understatement !
Every think that could have gone wrong did.  Pete said we would have a day like this and did.
Learned a lot from it though and will never have a day like that again (hopefully).

Our first American PADI Divemaster Intern.......

This is my first week in Tenerife and day one started with a great introduction to my PADI Divemaster internship and the Dive centre, I met Carl who will be with me for the first 6 weeks of my 8 week internship.

I arrived in Tenerife on Saturday after over 24 hours travel time from my home town of Calabasas in California, although I did tell everyone I was going to be in "TenerLife" not Tenerife easy mistake to make I thought but, Melissa has found this very amusing and has been telling everyone about it!

I am 19 years old and this is the first time I have travelled to Europe, I am really excited about my adventure!
I am here on an eight week internship where not only will I be studying for the PADI Divemaster certification 

I am also going to complete 5 specialities so that I can complete my PADI Master Scuba diver certification, and the plan is that I will become a PADI Assistant Instructor once all that is completed!

Seems along way off now, so watch this space.

On the first day I had my first two dive's of my internship. It was great to be diving on my first day a definitive bonus! I was very excited and nervous but it all turned out perfect.

The first dive Chris was my buddy on was my navigation dive, he explained how to use the compass to me, that was fun!!
I also learnt my first lesson about beer fines, I dropped my integrated weights down to the bottom of the sea when I was getting back to the boat DOH! ( last time I will use them).

My second dive was my first night dive which I was very excited about and it was amazing. I saw so many amazing fish and invertebrates.

It has been a little difficult getting past the 8 hour time change but eventually I got past it on day four thank goodness I finally feel alive again! Melissa has been teasing me this week as I have been alittle sleepy to say the least.

I have been really impressed with the dive sites I have visted this week and I was really happy to go to El Puertito to meet the Turtles that can mostly be found there. Nick, Josh, Elizabeth, Bungle, Melissa and I all had a great time watching the Turtle which followed us for the majority of our dive, can't wait to see the photos.

I also got to visit Tabaiba, which is in the north of the island, this was another shore dive, I went out with Pete, Carl and Nick and Josh, we completed the deep dive and wreck dive of my PADI Advanced Open Water course, only one more dive to go and then I will be an advanced diver and all in just a few days of arriving.which was very cool to see. We went about 30m deep and then found a sunken tugboat which we swam around checking all the windows into the ship.

To top my first week off, I got to see my first angel shark on a dive with Melissa, Karina, Adel, Aiden, Carl, and I at starfish bay. There were some very cool octopus that we got to see while we swam along the rocky shore. After that dive Carl and I went off to Yellow mountain.
I managed to fail my 800m and my 100m diver tow because I have some very bad split fins, hint to self, don't buy split fins.

I have been swimming twice a day every day, I am sure I must be getting better, I am going to continue with my swimming as next week I will do my timed assessment. Its been a great first week, but over so quickly. I cannot wait to see what the rest of my internship brings.

All the kit ALL the time!

Friday morning Karol and Monica were diving with us again, as well as a man who many people know as ‘Martin’ (mostly because that is his name). The first part of the morning was spent bundling kit and loading the car, then with Martin on board, he, Melissa and I were in the van and on our way to El Puertito via collecting Karol and Monica. The car journey was fun as we were so busy being interested by Martin telling us about his very interesting job (genuine), that we missed the turning for the Tank filling Station and almost got to the dive site with no full air cylinders. The mistake was quickly rectified and we arrived at El Puertito with everything we needed for some potentially Turtle spotting dives.

Turtle spot we did, also finding Octopus and a lot of other wonderful things along the way, much to the liking of our 3 customers. I led the first dive and managed some confusion with directions, but we easily made it back to the shore with the help of the dive sites resident expert, Melissa.

Note to self; Don’t get lost when there is people following you!

Saturday was Karol and Monica’s last 2 dives with us, but I unfortunately wasn’t there to see them through it. Zippy and Alice took them on a tour of Yellow Mountain, while I had the pleasure of leading a Snorkelling excursion for Hamish and his son, fish spotting and watching the divers from the surface. I really, really enjoy snorkeling anyway so this was a great day for me. Every body who was being showed round by us wonderful interns enjoyed their trips and headed off happy.

The afternoon was equipment maintenance time. We started with Alice and I washing all of the BCD’s thoroughly at the marina, then zippy and I tagging and recording the stock of the freshly cleaned jackets.

Note to self; Don’t be so sarcastic.

Sunday was a short day, a little more equipment preparation and cleaning was on the cards. We took all the booties and regulators down to the marina and gave them all a thorough clean. Zippy and I then had a scrubbing session on the boat and that was about that.

More reading of the ‘Encyclopedia Of Recreational Diving’ finished off the afternoon with style!

Monday morning and Pete, Melissa, Alice, Zippy, Our new intern Carl (who we are calling ‘Rodders’) and I were popping down to the pool to give demonstrating the required PADI Divemaster skills a go. I had done the skills before in my PADI Open Water Course, but not at this level before. It was very beneficial watching everybody else do the skills and having Pete there to talk about them with. I learned a lot about how to demonstrate and also what was expected.

Once out of the pool, Melissa was kind enough to take Zippy and I to Abades so we could do a couple of dives. We went out, didn’t get lost, saw lots of amazing things that we cant prove (an Angel Shark and 2 big Sting Rays) because we didn’t have a camera with us, had a bit of a laugh and found our way back. Great Success!!

Later on in the afternoon, Pete had all of us interns sit a final exam paper from our previous training. I got the easiest one which was the PADI Open Water Course final exam and managed a 49/50. I knew the answer to the lone question that I got wrong, but for some reason ticked a completely different box!

Note to self; Tick the right box!

Tuesday Melissa took us to Abades again. Rodders and Alice came too and we all went diving together. The first dive of the morning was great, with lots of cool things to see and some good conditions. The second dive wasn’t as successful, after swimming straight into a swarm of 1,000,000 Jelly Fish (that’s an approximate amount, I didn’t have time to count properly) and deciding to end the diver, rather than having someone get stung.

Not long after getting back, Pete had us at the pool for a timed 400m swim for the stamina test part of the course. Zippy and I were both disappointed with our times and performances, but having had a week off from training while being busy at the shop, it was almost expected. I had another pool skills session with Zippy and Rodders later in the afternoon, where we all demonstrated much better than before.

Wednesday we were joined by Andy and his girlfriend Becky, as well as Felipe. Andy was here for a PADI Scuba Review, Becky was doing a PADI Discover Scuba Diving course and Felipe is a certified diver, here for a couple of fun dives. Alice was leading the pool skills for the couple, with Zippy and I there for support. The pool skills went swimmingly (pun intended) and then it was time to get all of the equipment together, before heading out for a couple of dives.

I had the pleasure of boat duties, which is usually fine and nice and relaxing while waiting for those diving to surface. Today however, wasn’t. I had decided to go out in shorts and a T-shirt, as it was sunny and warm when we left the shop. 10 minutes into the second dive, the skies opened and I got very wet and very cold, very quickly. Pete was there on hand to laugh at my situation and offer me a plastic bucket to put on my head, which I did, much to his amusement. I learned today to always have something warm to wear on the boat, just in case.

I spent the afternoon in the wonderful company of Melissa, popping to various shops and places to do a variety of things and stuff. One of these stops was to see Dave at Pro-Sub, where I treated myself to some new booties and a shorty for extra warmth in the water.

Note to self; ALL THE GEAR, ALL THE TIME.

Thursday morning I was back in the water, nice and warm because of my nice new ice vest! Diving at Alien Rock, Swim Through and Crocodile Rock with Alice, Zippy, Rodders and 2 customers Alvaro and Livio. I led the first dive and found my way round Alien Rock well which was pleasing. We saw plenty of life including Moray Eels and Nudibranch. Alice claims she also saw a lobster, but doesn’t have photographic evidence. No piccy - No believey!!

The afternoon we spent watching a DVD on how to perform and demonstrate skills. It was beneficial to point out all the mistakes that the demonstrators were making, so when Zippy and I got into the pool afterwards we wouldn’t make the same errors. We spent an hour in the pool practicing and are definitely getting better, which is good as it is scoring time next week!!

More later

Bungle / Chris

Hello everyone, and welcome to the new Dive and Sea Tenerife Divemaster blog!

My name is Kim, I am 21 years old, and I am a Divemaster intern at Dive and Sea Tenerife.

I am from Holland, and I grew up in a big, cozy family of five children. Since I was little (well, I’m still little, but anyway) I have always loved animals and water.
At a very young age, it was already clear to me that I wanted to do a job that, ideally, involved both.

Therefore, I did everything I possibly could to become a sea mammal trainer. As soon as possible, I quit high school and started my education in Animal Care, directly followed by Animal Management.

I did many internships at companies like a zoo, a dog training school, a farm, a sea mammal research center and finally two internships at the dolphinariums in Belgium and Tenerife.

At the end of my internship in the dolphinarium in Belgium, they offered me a job in which I now work fulltime during summer, but it is only a seasonal job.
I quickly fell in love with the Dolphins and enjoy working with them very much. In wintertime, I had to find something else to do, and so I decided to do an education as a swimming teacher. Another job that involved water, and I loved doing it.

The second winter, again, I had to find something to keep me busy. This time, I decided that I’d like to learn more about Scuba Diving.
It would also be a very useful addition to my résumé. I started looking at the Internet and found a PADI dive center that seemed very interesting.
It was located in Tenerife, where I had lived before during my internship at Loro Parque. I booked my internship, along with many Scuba Diving certifications, and I’m looking forward to learn yet another job in an industry that involves water.

Thanks for reading,  I’ll keep you updated!

Love,

Kim