After having a fluffy ear after the last dive I was a bit anxious that I’d done some damage  to my inner ear. Luckily, as the day went on my hearing went back to normal and I embarked on equalisation exercises with the aim to make my ears pop on dry land. I had signed up for a dive the next day at 9am and didn’t want to hold anyone up.

We geared up and went out at 9am. There was JoJo, the dive master. I found out he had been diving since 2000 and had about 6000 dives under his belt. Another guy joined us who was a dive instructor and wanted to find work in the Philippines. The final couple were French and had about 93 dives under their belt including the Maldives and Madagascar. I was the least experienced, having only 6 dives completed over 10 years. These people knew what they doing. When we got to the dive point we geared up and rolled into the water. Luckily, JoJo helped me descend and held me so I could equalise. I am not sure whether I could have descended at the rate the others did plus I am not that confident at descending as yet. We arrived at the bottom and it was even more incredible than the day before. We were surrounded by coral and there were so many species of fish all over. The range of starfish you can see is also impressive including blue ones, purple ones and black ones. We saw a puffer fish, some miniscule crabs and lots of brightly coloured sea creatures. The coral was extraordinary! Nice and bright in a range of sizes including fan coral. The French lady had a camera and was taking lots of photos- maybe I’ll rent the camera tomorrow. We spent 44minutes diving and it was fantastic. If only I had some photos to show you all but if you Google coral reefs in the Philippines I’m sure you can get a good idea of what I’ve seen.

After 30minutes freezing on the boat, even in 25’c. We geared up again. This time I knew we were going straight in the water and down to about 12m and had a greater insight into what I was doing. I rolled in the water fine. Again I was helped with the descent. The water was murkier and there was a little less to see but we eventually arrived at the field of Giant Clams. They were approximately 4-5ft in length and had a blue membrane inside. We spent another 44minutes diving. At the end of each dive I struggled to stay under, instead I kept floating up – so much so that JoJo had to weigh me down with some rocks. I thought this was good until I recalled that fat floats!

I had a fantastic morning diving and plan to go tomorrow as well. Just a shame there is nothing else to do here after you’ve been diving.

Posted from Puerto Galera, MIMAROPA, Philippines.