Cairns (or “Canz” as it’s pronounced by a nation that seems to have a collective speech impediment when it comes to saying their r’s) was a shock to the senses after our week in the Outback. The stifling humidity and lush greenness of tropical Queensland was a stark contrast to the hot desert air and sparse vegetation of the Red Center. We stepped off the plane in Cairns and immediately began to sweat. But that was ok because the bush flies that had been the bane of our existence for a week were finally thousands of miles away. A little perspiration (or a lot, depending on which half of Lustin you’re talking about :) was a small price to pay for a “swat-free” lifestyle. (Check out our photos from our week in Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef.)

We arrived in Cairns with a pretty simple game plan: research the local dive schools, find one we like, and get scuba certified. For Dustin, this plan was not too intimidating — technically he was certified 12 years ago, but in the spirit of spousal solidarity, he was up for taking the full Open Water course with me again. He also hadn’t dived [dove? diven?] much after getting certified and felt he could probably use a refresher course.

As for me, well, I was a little more uneasy about the whole plan. My one and only experience with scuba occurred six years ago when I did what is commonly referred to as an “introductory dive” on the Great Barrier Reef. “Introductory” sounds innocuous enough, but what they really mean is that they throw you into the open ocean with about 10 minutes of training on the most basic elements of scuba (“breathing air is good, breathing water is bad”), and then down you go, praying to god your travel insurance will cover the emergency evacuation from the reef (which is more than 60 miles from land by the way) when you either hyperventilate and pass out underwater or get attacked by an octopus that can smell your fear. Needless to say, after that intro dive I was not in an especially big hurry to go back down there again.

But since I absolutely love the ocean — love being in it, love eating what comes out of it, love watching movies with Nemos and Dorys swimming around in it — I figured scuba was worth another shot. So, after doing our homework and talking with a bunch of dive schools in town, we settled on Pro Dive’s 5-day PADI Open Water class. The schedule had us spending two days in town doing classroom theory and confined drills in a swimming pool, then heading 100km offshore to the outer Great Barrier Reef to “live aboard” their boat for three days and do our four certification dives and, assuming we passed, as many as five “fun” dives after that.

The first two days in the pool and classroom went ok. I was definitely pretty anxious about breathing underwater (my body seemed to keep shouting at me while I was underwater, “YOU SHOULDN’T BE DOWN HERE!”), but by the end of the second day, my confidence had definitely grown. It helped that we had a really great instructor: Chris, or “Irish” as he’s known among the dive instructors, was extremely patient and seemed genuinely interested in making us all feel relaxed and confident in the water.

Team Lustin with Irish Chris

On Day 3 we were ready to get on the boat. Before we left the marina with 30 other students and certified divers, the skipper Mark gave us a pretty serious talking to about seasickness. He assured us that, due to the high winds that day and the three hour trip to the reef, most of us would be puking before lunchtime. Everyone was given the special brown paper bags that would be used and then discarded overboard, seasickness pills were handed out, and then we were off. Sure enough, within an hour more than half of the people onboard had their heads hanging over the edge of the boat. They were green. They looked like they wanted to be anywhere but there. (As one of the dive instructors drily noted: “There are two stages of seasickness: hoping that you don’t die and then hoping that you do.”) Even the crew and dive instructors looked like they could go at any minute. I’m not sure what was worse: the heaving and tossing of the boat (definitely the roughest seas I’ve ever been on) or being surrounded by a boat full of people who were actively engaged in my least favorite activity in the world. But somehow Dustin and I survived the trip out to the reef without getting sick. I’m proud of being a PADI certified diver now, but I’m think I’m even MORE proud of staying vomit-free on that crazy boat trip. It was like survival of the fittest out there, and we survived.

Once in the protection of the reef, the seas were thankfully a bit calmer. We suited up, and next thing I knew we were in the ocean, descending down a long rope to a sandy floor about 13 meters below the surface. The first couple of dives are a bit of a blur now, but somewhere between my third and fourth dives — somewhere between taking my mask off underwater and replacing it for what felt like the thirtieth time and pretending I’d run out of air and needed Dustin’s yet again — it all clicked. I was having fun. The visibility wasn’t great due to all of the chop and periodic rain, but it didn’t really matter. I was down there, swimming with the sea turtles, rays, sharks, eel, and yes, even little Nemo, not to mention some of the most beautiful colors I’ve ever seen, and it was just really, really cool.

All seven of us in our class passed, and by the time we did a guided night dive that evening, I was pretty amazed at how far we’d come. What started as near panic in the pool just a few days earlier had morphed into me swimming along the floor of a dark ocean, surrounded by sharks, miles and miles from shore — and I was having a blast. It’s a testament to Pro Dive’s (and especially Chris’s) teaching skills, the PADI curriculum, and most of all, to the awe-inspiring world below the surface of the ocean that I got there and had so much fun. It’s a week later now, my ears are still plugged (probably have to see a doctor tomorrow), but I can’t wait to go back under.

Our instructors feeding the sharks before our night dive (so they weren’t hungry for us!)