28/9/9 Cairns (monday)

We got up nice and early and were collected for our dive course. We got to the dive school and were shown round the building and into the classroom. Ater signing the obligatory forms we had our medical exam. The disclaimer forms we have had to sign in Australia are unbelievable . They all say you have no right to sue even if the company or staff are negligent!!!! A couple of health care assistants checked our breathing, BP, ears and weight then we waited to see the Dr. Liz had called through to an Australian dive Dr before leaving the UK who said if she bought along a supportive letter from her cardiologist and a recent excercise tolerence test result she would be able to dive. unfortunately the dive centers' Dr wasn't so understanding and signed her permanently unfit to dive!!! Phil was only doing the course so he could dive with Liz and they could dive together for the rest of the trip. He is a qualified dive instructor in the UK nut didn't bring his log book and certificates as he hadn't dived for 10 years. There were lots of tears and frustration after calling several different Drs in Cairns with no success and then Liz had to leave. Phil was left at the course feeling really pissed off that our efforts in the UK hadn't paid off. It was made worse when one of the instructors said Liz would pass the test in NSW it was just Queensland that were so overly strict. It was really disappointing as we had booke dto do a live aboard dive trip for after the course too. Lizzies cardiologist is a diver and he thought she would be fine....all really annoying!!! Liz spent the rest of the day doing a few jobs in town .She went to research cameras at Cairns one camera shop and then went to the dive boat place to change her booking from diver to snorkeller. She had sometime on the internet then went to the hostel and sat by the pool for the afternoon until
Phil came back. Phils day was at school with the first hour watching the instruction video followed by a quiz. After lunch they went into the pool for some swimming tests which a couple of people failed. He had to swim 6 laps of the pool then tread water for 10 minutes. They did some underwater skills, taking off the mask and putting it back on and clearing the water. They retrieved their regulators and afterwards went back to the classroom for more video instruction. Once Phil got back ot the hostel we met up with friend Colin back from his first day too and went to town for our freebie dinner at the Rhino bar. We went to bed early as both lads had a test in the morning and Colin wanted to get back to do some reading.

29/9/9 Cairns (Tuesday)

Phil went off to dive school and watched another learning video then sat his exam...100% of course. It was 50 multiple choice questions but about 10 of the answers were on the board in front of the class. The foreign students were allowed to confer which defeats the object of the exam!!! After lunch there was another pool session where he had to swim a length with no mask, take all the dive equipmant off and put it back on again and practice bouyancy. A good diver is able to be neutrally bouyant under water having complete control of his movements. At the end of the second day phi had passed his closed water and thoery parts. Liz ahad areallly lazy 11 am start to her day. She spent the rest of the day buying a new camera and researching Thai dive options and sitting by the hostel pool. When Phi arrived back we saw Colin looking pretty uncomfortable. He had hurt his ear in the dive pool several hours before and was deaf in his ear and it was really painful. we thought he may have popped his ear drum and we all went down to the local clinic so he could get it checked out. After about an hour he saw a Dr who unfortunately signed him unfit for more diving for the next few weeks. He was really gutted as he'd been really enjoying the diving course and was also booked onto the dive boat with us which all ahd to be cancelled...gutted!!! Poor Colin returned to the hostel to get drugged up with painkillers and we headed off to a lacture on the barrier reef in town. The lecture was called Reef Teach na dwas two hours of looking at what we would see on the reef . we were shown all kinds od fish sand corals and were able to handle a few specimens they had. It was pretty good and we would know more about what we were looking at on the reef. we went to catch the bus via the Cairns night markets which are craft and tourist markets open late at night. We stopped and ate a chinese from a buffet stall in the markets foodhall before going back to bed.

30/9/9 Cairns (Wednesday)

Phil was collected at 7.30am and driven to Cairns marina to begin the open water part of the course. He borded Osprey V a fast catamaran and went to the outer reef where after 1hr and 15 mins they reached the Saxon Reef. they had a dive brief then had their first open water dive down to 12 meters where they did the pool excercises again. They retrieved the regulators and cleared their masks. They had an eploration dive where they saw loads of tropical fish including Nimos. The water was warm and the visibility was excellent. After surfacing Phi lsnorkelled for an hour then they all had a delicious barbecue lunch on the Osprey. The boat then moved to Hastings Reef where they had their second dive of the day. They did more excercises and another exploration dive before coming back to Cairns. Liz had spent the day learning to use her new camera, reading the SE Asia lonely planet and sitting by the pool. when Phil got back he logged his photos before we met up with Colin for dinner. colin had luckily got a refund on the rest of his course and the first two days are still valid for another month so he is going to try and complete it elsewhere on his trip , maybe NZ. We went for dinner at the Rhino bar again and had a few beers with some people we had met further down the coast on the Oz bus trips.

1/10/9 Cairns (Thursday)

Phil went out on the Osprey to comlete his open water section of the course. He went to Saxon Reef and the water was quite choppy and they did another exploration dive . they had BBQ m]lunch again and then moved to Hastings Reef to do a deepere dive with great visibility. All the students passed their open water course and they returned to Cairns. Phils instructoe asked him if he would like to join him on a boat he was going on for the weekend with his friends but we were booked on the other boat....bummer!!! Liz had a pretty unsuccessful day trying to get Phil some contact lenses and geting our videos put onto disc. The opticians here will only sell you contacts with a prescription from your own optician but the UK office claim they can't email it through so we weren't having much luck. also the camera shop said our videos aren't in a format compatable with their dvd writers!!! We are too illiterate on computers to change the format so we are a bit stuck. Might go back and see if they can help. Liz went and did the laundry at the hostel and waited for Phil to get back and packed her things for the trip out to the reef the next day. Phil uploaded the photos to the blog and then we ate a really yummy pizza before bed very tired.