We woke nice and early and were waiting in the road for Herbert to collect us and take us to the 'Deep Blue I' in the harbour. While we were waiting there were piglets and dogs roaming around and playing, some inquisitive as to what Ian and I were doing. Herbert arrived, 20 minutes later, at 06:50 and we set off on the boat at 07:15 bound for 'Eua. Onboard were two Germans, one Swiss, Canadian Chad and an American lady, Pat.
We set off and the ocean was like a lake, so still. Less than an hour into our journey the ocean got rough, rough enough for me to feel and dislike the swells. I felt pretty horrible as the boat was thrown from side to side. The swells were big enough for the boat to fit in between them. Chad, Pat and I struggled to sit comfortably on the deck of the boat while Ian sat at the stern trying to keep from getting wet. The back of the boat was so low, barely a foot out of the water, so every time the boat crashed in to waves water was thrown in to the boat which had Ian move his feet out of the way at supersonic speed! All the time the boat was rocking to and fro... Pat kindly offered me some motion sickness pills and I gladly chewed a couple. Within minutes I felt better and found my sense of humour again.
Our journey to 'Eua took 3 hours. It was a long 3 hours. After bobbing around for a while at our first dive site, whereby Ian and I both began to feel really quite queasy, we began to kit up, which was entertaining given the large swells.
Well, the first thing to note is that Ian and I received our BCDs (it would turn out that mine was very small, the strap didn't reach across my chest and the clip only just reached across me) and we began to attach our BCDs to our tanks. Well, Ian and I undone the strap that was fastened on the BCD and Herbert yelled to Ian 'No! Don't undo that. Do you know how it goes back together?' which, frankly, took us by surprise as we were taught how to kit up on our first confined water training session by DTS. 'Yeh,' Ian replied, 'we were taught how to use the strap.' 'Well, you're one of the few' Herbert exclaimed. Right, okay. Having successfully put my BCD, tank and regulator together I checked my pressure guage. It was in imperial measurements. I'm used to metric. I asked Herbert what the conversion rate was and then had to calculate what 100 bar and 50 bar would equate to in pounds per square inch. The depth guage was scratched so badly it couldn't be viewed and it had an amount of water in it anyway. My confidence began to fade. Next came the wetboots and wetsuit, all of an obvious age and all of the equipment worn in some way. Then the fins and mask.
We got ready and before everyone had got kitted up Ian and I quickly ran through a buddy check, or at least I learned that Ian's alternate air source was stashed in his jacket pocket because his jacket didn't have a clip for it. The Germans had jumped in to the ocean and everyone followed suit. I immediately panicked, the swell was huge and less than 20 metres away the waves were really crashing on to the rockshelf that surrounds the island. It felt like I couldn't take air from my regulator, despite it feeling fine when I checked it on the boat, and I had Ian check it when he entered the ocean. He said it was okay. It felt so tight to me, perhaps it was the jacket that was too small for me that was restricting my air intake.
We started to descend, well I tried to but I couldn't break the surface tension and my breathing was terrible. I heard myself making a whimpering sound rather than exhaling. Herbert took me to the surface and told me to really exhale and then not inhale for a while. Again I tried and broke the surface tension and descended. I had equalising problems which I cleared and then checked my depth guage as we descended further. I was so shocked when I read 56, then 60, then 66 on my computer. I panicked again not realising that the depth guage reading was imperial not metric. Herbert hadn't told me that and the computer, that Ian and I were supposed to be sharing - a classic bad idea, didn't have any indicator on it. Had I been more comfortable and relaxed I would have soon realised it must be feet, not metres.
The dive in to the Coliseum was good. The visibility was an excellent 30 metres and it made a pleasant change to see across an entire expanse of water to the other reef. The water was so blue, a real marine blue. Every surface underwater was covered with beautiful soft corals. It was amazing, yet there were hardly any fish.
Upon ascending I was pleased to see that I wasn't the first to run low on air, at least two other divers were already on the boat having removed their kit.
We all sat on the boat during our surface interval, bobbing around in the giant swell, all feeling pretty rough and refusing chicken soup.
As we kitted up for our second dive I told Ian that I wasn't enjoying it and I was feeling ill, but I was already thinking about making this dive my last in Tongan waters. Again we kitted up and one by one we entered the water, this time Herbert was firts, and we all drifted away quickly. Ian was well out of my reach and I panicked again and worried that I would lose everyone as the swell continued. I tried really hard to swim with the two Germans and luckily came into contact with Ian. We descended a few metres and I had huge problems equalising my ears. I patiently ascended slightly and eventually managed to clear my ears. We entered the Cathedral, which was stunning, it was so big and still the visibility was good. After the Cathedral we surfaced within a cave and could look over the crashing waves out of the cave mouth to the Pacific ocean. Then we descended again to make our exit. Pat and I couldn't descend and I felt that we were getting too close to the cave entrance. I had further problems equalising. With help from Pat and Chad I managed to descend and made my exit out of the Cathedral, holding Ian's hand for comfort. As we exited the Cathedral we saw a lionfish swimming next to us which was great.
I was running low on air and indicated to Herbert that I hadn't got much air. He acknowledged my communication and carried on. A little further on I checked my air again and it was less than 50 bar. As I drew a breath the needle moved and it was then that I prepared myself to locate Ian's alternate air source. He was well in reach of me despite the large swell we were encountering and I made sure I could grab his alternate regulator at any moment. I signalled to Herbert again that I was low on air and again he acknowledged it but continued the dive. Ian and I were both confused as to why he let me continue when I obviously didn't have much air. Finally we were close to the surface and I struggled to keep submerged so I decided to surface and exit the water, far from happy.
As I climbed the steps, with my fins still on as instructed by Herbert, I vowed to myself that I wouldn't dive any more with this group. Words that my instructors from DTS had spoken to me came immediately back to me and I was grateful for them: 'you will have bad dive experiences' and 'if you're not comfortable or don't like the situation you're in, indicate that there is something wrong with your ears and discontinue the dive'. Very wise words.
We bobbed around for a while longer, most of us sleeping, then the Germans and the Swiss went in for a third dive. After their dive the boat docked in 'Eua harbour and we were taken to Maxi's Motel for a huge Tongan feast, a cold Tongan lager and a good nights rest.
I finished off the day with a cold shower to rinse the saltwater from my skin.
On a positive note I have now logged twenty five dives.
Copyright 2002 Helen Fuller. All rights reserved.