The weekend didn’t turn out quite as expected. We turned up at the dive center early to find it closed. 45 minutes later, we got a call from a friend of Philippe/Ana saying where the hell are you. It turns out that we were supposed to go round to the back of the center. They leave the front closed as there is no one to man the shop…

So for a good start we missed the first dive. As a form of compensation, the dive center offered us a special trip with two bottles to get a double dive in. Philippe and I snapped up the opportunity, taking Espe with us. Ana, sensibly, chose to go on the originally planned second dive so she could be with Natxo (who is friend and a very experienced diver). Unfortunately for us it wasn’t until we were loading the boat up that we found out that we were going out on our own with no guide and an uneven number to buddy with. Alarm bells were ringing, and I was annoyed that the dive center were even letting 3 people out with less than 30 dives between them, but… we still went anyway. This is one of my main flaws. Indecisiveness. I should have said no there and then. It would have meant no dives at all on the Saturday and left us on a low, but when safety is concerned that should not matter.

So, off we went. Espe, thought her tank was strapped on ok, but wanted a second opinion. I requested she asked someone with more experience as I was having trouble with faulty regulators and blown O rings. Someone changed Espe tank strap to how it “should be”. Out on the boat, Espe was not convinced how it had been changed and asked the “dive master” on the boat. He had no clue and spent 10 minutes faffing about with it. Eventually into the water the tank slipped loose. Thankfully another boat had turned up and someone jumped in to help. Espe by this point was quite exhausted and very annoyed.

We started the dive anyway. Now as the most experienced of the three I should have been glued to Espe, I should have kept a good eye on Philippe and I should have navigated / led the dive. Instead, I was not close enough to Espe and Philippe ended up leading. Philippe got a bit stressed when he started running low on air. Signaling that we go to the surface I suggested that we worked our way round to the buoy line, but Philippe’s air was a bit too low for that (besides, although I thought I knew where the buoy line was, I couldn’t be sure). At this point Espe started ascending, but without emptying her BCD of air she did her best impression of a submarine launched cruise missile. Well to be fair, she fought to try and come down, but with the air in the jacket expanding she could do little but slow the ascent and I was too far away to do anything about it.

Sunday was more successful, but not without problems. Espe had trouble breathing close to the start of the first dive, which in hindsight we can only put down to hyperventilation. All the same she kept her head, checking her pressure gauge then switching to her spare reg. Still struggling, she requested my spare. Natxo (who was leading this dive) took over, having seen what was happening, and surfaced with Espe.

The last dive, as Philippe points out was a lot more relaxed. Without having to worry so much for our buddies we were both able to concentrate more on our technique and see what was going on. I had more opportunity to take some pics as well. I’m getting a few good results, but I really think I need a strobe as the built in flash just isn’t up to the job.

So, all in all, not the greatest of diving weekend, but we all learnt a hell of a lot from it. The Islas Hormigas have a nice collection of dive sites, so I’m sure we will return. Away from the diving it was so refreshing just to be out of Madrid and as a bonus, on Saturday night Espe and I went on a two hour sail boat cruise at sunset.