Busy week of training

We'd no sooner returned to lovely Boracay from our trip to Puerto Galera when Dave & Blanche arrived, ready to start their open water training. The class was an engagement gift from Dave to Blanche. My hat is off to these two. By the time that they were finished, both of them completed not only their open water certification, but also their advanced open water certification as well! All in about a week! We dove Angol Point, Lobster Rock, Friday's Rock, The Camia, a night dive on Friday's Rock and a rip roaring high voltage Channel Drift dive, just to name a few of the 10 dives (in addition to the training dives). Dave elected to do a photography adventure dive and took some really good pictures. That's a real challenge when you're brand new to the sport.

Along the way, I had some other guests as well: Ingrid from Queens -- we have a common friend in Rickie Cui, the head instructor at Mermaid Divers, one of our favorites shops in Sabang. I also got to know Jim from Oakland. Jim started out in the same open water class as Blanche & Dave, but finished on a different schedule. That's one of the advantages of training at Blue Mango Dive Center, we can custom tailor your dive experience to your individual needs. I also had the pleasure of teaching Tom & Nicole of Switzerland the Enriched Air Nitrox specialty. They learned how to extend their bottom time by using mixed gases. It's a surprisingly easy course to complete during your vacation. You can complete the classroom work in about half a day! Whew, I'm exhausted just writing about it all.

Maybe more later; there's a full-moon party at Red Pirates tonight. Gotta jet!