My name’s Mary Hale, I moved to St. John/St. Thomas in March with my family. It’s been a really awesome experience. One of the most memorable, so far anyway, was getting certified for Scuba Diving. It took a few weeks, but the end result was amazing. It started with my younger brother and I going out on a dive boat that my dad worked on as captain, just as Discover Scuba Divers: it turned out to be an amazing experience. I knew instantly that I definitely wanted to go again, which meant getting certified. Three of my siblings joined me and we all did the book work, then came the most awesome part, the actual dives. For the first ones we went out on the dive boat again, I remember it was a very wet and rocky ride out to the dive site, the weather was a little rough and we spent most of our time sitting down so we didn’t fall over. But then as we neared the dive site and got on the leeward side of the island it calmed considerably. We quickly got our gear ready, for the first time ever. The first time I picked up a tank I accidently opened the air valve, letting out a large amount of air, directly into my face. ? It was something my siblings teased me about for a while. ? When we finally got into the water it was exhilarating, there is nothing that quite compares to descending below the surface of the ocean and still being able to breathe. That day we only worked on skills, practicing them both above the surface and again while about 25 feet below it, but still the experience was amazing, while instructor Clauida and Divemaster John worked with my other siblings I was able to do a little bit of wondering, watching the fish and bouncing around a little. When we got back on the boat to leave none of us wanted to go, it had been such a great experience. For our last certification dives we were actually able to take our own boat out, a fifty foot sailing ketch. It was even better than the first one. This time it was only my family and our instructors, which made it a lot easier to just relax, the weather was also greatly improved. This time we worked on skills for one dive, then for the second only did a few of the last remaining skills, after that we were able to actually “go diving”, looking around at the wreck that we were by. We saw several awesome creatures, including an eel that had it’s home right in the wreck. We also saw a sea turtle, big enough that my youngest sister, about 12, could have curled up on it’s shell! Sadly there were no sharks, but it was an amazing experience. We sailed back to the harbor, getting a wonderful view of the sunset. I will always remember those dives, and every one I’ve made since and have yet to make, since I’ll definitely be going again! My family are still great friends with Instructor Clauida and Divemaster John, who now work at cruz bay watersports and I can’t wait to be able to advance even further in my Scuba Diving career.

Ps… here is a video of our certifiaction dives