After a pretty presentable nights sleep – rolled out to a bright sunny humid day with dang little breeze…. a bit stuffy, but from what I hear back in the states…. happy to have it versus weather that can still be described as a little bit ‘chilly’. Took a little longer to get my tired old touchas woke up to the point I wanted….. but I got my gear loaded into the truck, wolfed down a banana that is about 1 day past the point of good eatin’…. took my BP meds, had one last smoke with my Bride and boogied on out the door to my first day of ‘work’. I use the term ‘work’ VERY loosely. The task I agreed to was to document the next 2 weeks of 6 guys going through a Dive Master/Instructor course for SCUBA diving. I arrived about the same time as the students and settled into my routine of snapping pictures. I’m not sure what it is about being the ‘photog’ at an event like that, that I like, but I do~! Something about having ‘free reign’ to crawl, duck, walk and mosey around all through what is supposed to be a fairly serious event I guess. For the next 2.½ hours or so I watched, learned and listen to the Instructor doing his thing. He is a friend of mine and was comfortable with me doing my thing without disrupting his class. Something I take immense satisfaction in……. We broke for an immensely short lunch before donning gear and heading out into that beautiful, blue, cool water…… By that point – I was ready…. my shirt and trunks were soaked in sweat and I wanted to get wet and cool off~! I got to spend the next 1.½ hours [mostly] underwater…. documenting some fairly intensive training as these guys started into a course that is absolutely bound to change the course of their diving careers. We worked in shallow water (less than 15′) for all of it. There were uncounted trips to the surface so the instructor could talk to his class, before sinking back under the water for more hands on type stuff. Having never been through that particular training – it was interesting to watch. It is spooky similar to the training I went through as a Skydiving Jump Master/Instructor so I could relate on a lot of different levels. I guess the biggest difference – is, this sport moves at probably less than 1 MPH where as in skydiving – you’re up around 120 MPH and have a LOT less time to deal with ‘issues’. Still fun to note the similarities in the two sports. Training finally wrapped up around 4:00 p.m. and there was NO complaints from me…… I spent probably an hour and a half underwater (plus uncounted trips to the surface) and my tired old a$$ was worn out. Tomorrow was supposed to be a down day – but I have been invited by island Daughter to help document some of her family’s Discover SCUBA dives tomorrow. I have to alter some of my plans I had for the day – but oh so happy to do it and really looking forward to ‘shooting’ a fun family dive for her. For now – over my limit, mildly hammered and ready for a shower……..
Good Night Ya’ll # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # Thankx for stopping in~~!
