The problem with diving…mmm…no “problem” is not the right word. The “driving force” behind my diving is a genuine buzz, an almighty high from diving in places that give me those “Oh…my…god…” moments. Sheer vertical walls that rise above me or drop off below me, large wrecks and caverns, history sat there while I float around it completely and utterly mesmerised. It’s not an adrenaline rush, although I can certainly vouch for having a few, it’s actually a peacefulness…we each have our own reasons for it and I would digress so I’ll leave it there.

Diving in quarries and scenic dives off the coast of just about anywhere are just stepping stones, little training opportunities for me to practise a DSMB deployment or shutdowns or any other number of things that I have learnt along the way. Things that require continual practise as even when I feel I have got them “right”, I need to keep the skills fresh.

I “over learn”. If I can feel comfortable in 20 metres in an overhead environment then in 10 metres in open water I’ll be very much enjoying myself in a relaxed manner. Not over-confident….noooo….just comfortable. Scale that theory up and it works for many depths and situations. Whatever, practise makes perfect. Or at least helps me to perfect, so that’s also an excuse to get wet.

Sports Diver was no easier or harder than Ocean diver. It was just another set of skills and tests of my abilities. Some things I find easier than others. Some people can do things I find difficult without a second thought and vice-versa. That’s just the way it is but one thing that is very much true is that whatever level your diving is at, you cannot beat time in the water. So at every chance that so much as glances my way in a beckoning manner (truth be known, the beckoning is all me I think), I have filled the cylinders and booked my diary for a dive, or two.

Once you start to set targets, which is something I do continually, then plans form out of those targets and things begin to happen with only a little encouragement. In fact, I can probably encourage myself with enough vigour to make it happen by thinking about it for, Mmm…I don’t know, a few seconds? There are people reading this that can relate to that I am sure. Time and money are all that stops us and we strive to remove those barriers constantly.

So what was the driving force or more specifically what destination? Well this can be summed up in two words. Wreck Penetration. Going inside wrecks is cool. Not cool from a “look at me, I’m cool” perspective. The audience is kinda limited. But cool from a “wow, this is cool” inside your own head perspective. It’s also dangerous and can be very. If you are going to do this kind of diving then you need to practise a lot and get proper training.

With me so far? Hope so. My wife was (who also dives). She sanctioned the “just nipping over to Dahab for a spot of training…” excuse that saw us landing in Sharm one late evening in early May ’08.

Minus the understanding wife but plus my friend and diving buddy Paul and 25Kg of weight in the hold baggage and 17Kg (good job they didn’t check) in the small rucksack which I did my best to look nice and comfortable with, despite it drawing a trench in my shoulder.

We needed to dive on air to 180ft (technically to 54M) and decompress on rich Nitrox mixes and the depth limit meant stepping away from our BSAC training blanket. We have picked destinations where that matters, so only TDI or IANTD courses could provide us with the qualification (BSAC limit to 50M on air). Sure you can dive deeper on Normoxic or Trimix but not on air. A Trimix diver is not typically qualified to more than 50M on air. I have no wish to discuss the merits of one gas and limits of another, I have no such credentials. I just know that if I was to dive to 50+ metres on air, I would need to be qualified and comfortable. Right, best get on with it then and decide after if it’s for me.

The next morning after arriving the previous night in Dahab, we met up with the instructor, Kevin Evans of Deco Warriors www.decowarriors.co.uk. We went through all the normal paperwork and checks and then began the theory lessons that would be scattered between diving for the next few days. Twinsets, stages, decompression planning. All the complicated calculations you hate and a nice, suitably difficult exam to chew on at the end. Now to the diving.

The first dive was a “check out” dive to 30M where we would be shown and then would repeat, multiple skills that were the backbone of the course.

Shutdowns. More shutdowns. Swapping regulators and shutting cylinders down to simulate air loss scenarios. We did them every dive, many times. It was easier than I thought it would be to be honest but “easier” is relative.

Out of air, prepping stage cylinders, diver recovery (in twins and stages) were just some of the skills shown and repeated. We did them all and more. It was warm (not yet quite unbearably hot but never cold, even at night) and the water was 23 degrees, which seems warm, but isn’t when you have dive times of 90 minutes plus.

It was a mixture of lazy breakfasts and informal theory lessons under the shade of the café with divers all doing different levels of training. We would then go to the technical centre (behind the hotel) and check gases, check kit, load it up onto the 4x4’s and off to the dive sites. It was, as planned, a diving holiday and the group of people at the hotel and instructors were an exceptionally nice bunch of people from different nationalities who all had that zest for the sea and diving. We spent many an evening in the bars or local restaurants and were accepted instantly into the local diving crowd. It was an enjoyable social time as well as a diving break in the sun.

Doing this level of course we were expected to be planning our own dives (or at least trying) and fundamental skills should be sorted. Problems with mask clearing or buoyancy would not really be carried here and I was happy we had mastered these skills long ago (although taking your mask off, correction: having your mask taken off at 55M while dealing with a free flow is a little beyond what I was used to). The main idea was to be introduced to the skills on every dive and then do them at greater depths. This meant that we got to dive the Lighthouse off Dahab’s beach front a couple of times but also the fantastic Canyon where a split in the coral drops to 50M and the final and “qualifying” dive was for us to plan and execute a dive together with Kevin basically standing off with a holding brief, the notorious blue hole and its 54M deep, 30M “tunnelled” arch.

So we dived and we did theory, we dived and rechecked kit after our cylinders had been filled. We had twin 12’s on our backs (fully manifolded) and every dive we took 2 x 12 litre stages, one for each side, which had mixes of Nitrox for the decompression. At times, it was a bit of a handful managing the stops, switches and keeping to the dive plan but we continued to learn and improve. We did out of air scenarios that were a little more acute to my past experiences. Kevin would show us everything before we had to do it and if we looked at him quizzically or didn’t provide an OK, he would do it again. Out of air was hilarious as it went like so.

Signal to your buddy to begin finning away at normal pace, take out your regulator (the one in your mouth). Blow out bubbles until there are no more bubbles. Congratulations, you have now got no air in your lungs and your air is finning away from you. Your body requests air. You swim off towards your buddy suddenly realising that twins and 2 stages creates significant drag and catching them up is a big and immediate issue. My buddy Paul was dragged back by fin and then I clambered up his body and pulled his regulator from his mouth to suck in the sweet air. Another lesson was learned and wouldn’t be forgotten. Paul returned the favour shortly afterwards.

We also had continual “problems” thrown at us from free flows to leaks in the manifold all of which we had to deal with in situ. The final one being mask removal by Kevin while I was part way through shutting down a leaking manifold at 55M dead, narcosis fogging my decision making processes.

Kit removal was also interesting, taking full kit off while keeping hold of it for obvious reasons and then putting it all back on again and my favourite was as we rose out of the blue after exiting Canyon at 50M+ and there was a group of a dozen or so divers doing some basic skills and generally enjoying a nice dive. We knelt on the bottom at about 25M and then removed masks, took off stages and laid them in front of us while Kevin handed them back and then we had to find, from feel which one had the higher content of oxygen and mount it back on correctly. A wrong choice in reality could lead to oxygen toxicity and convulsions so it was an excellent lesson but the picture embedded on my brain is of the group of divers’ eyes all widening as they watched Paul rip of his mask and begin to de-kit before them.

Then the apprehension of the final dive at the Blue Hole. My weight belt deciding to fail moments before we descended and having to swap it and then the descent and the jaw dropping moment as we entered the arch and swam through to the open sea and the abyss beyond. An incredible dive that we executed without issue and took a moment on the shore to take in the previous 5 days of diving.

Kevin was an excellent instructor and I have been lucky enough to have been taught by a few exceptional ones and he ranks right up there. Totally comfortable but leaving you to sort out your own problems if you could and only intervening when he needed to plus excellent knowledge and passion for the theory lessons. Highly recommended.

We then changed to single cylinder plus 3 litre pony and re-jigged all of our equipment to suit, did a short dive off the hotel where we saw a Sting Ray to test the kit and then had a final night out in Dahab before a 4am bus ride to Sharm and a day boat that took us all the way across to the wrecks of the Giannis D and Carnatic at Sha’ab Abu Nuhas. The trip across the sea was a little on the rough side but sturgeron prevailed and we had an incredible penetration dive through every nook and cranny of the Giannis D.

What went wrong? We were meant to dive the Thistlegorm but a screw up on the bookings meant we had to settle for the above mentioned wrecks. We can dive the Thistlegorm again another day so it wasn’t too much of a problem and the dives we did do on the wrecks were exceptional.

I left my fins and prescription mask (yes really, I did) in Dahab and Kevin and the dive centre at the hotel had these sent over that evening to our hotel in Sharm. That is surely going the extra mile and I can’t praise the instructor and the dive centre at the hotel enough.

We dived with www.decowarriors.co.uk as mentioned. We stayed at the Coral Coast hotel (look it up on Travel Advisor) and while not a 5 star resort, it was perfect for our needs and the food was excellent! The whole trip was organised via www.hiddendepthsdivetours.com in the UK and was very efficient and cracking value for money.

It was a perfect time to go (May), the diving was great and the cost overall was similar to what it would have been had we stayed in a UK hotel and done the course doing 90 minutes dives in rather cooler waters. The course completed was “Technical Diver” with IANTD.

Darren Astles