Getting aquainted with the sea in Nha Trang . . .

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After being ushered from possibly the worst overnight bus journey of our lives at 5am our first point of call was to find somewhere to stay, have a quick bite to eat and get a few hours shut-eye before getting up to explore Nha Trang.

As a few of the other guys we have been travelling with had left Hoi An a few days before us, we had a good idea of the area we wanted to stay in and had soon secured a nice guesthouse with balcony for $9 a night. When we finally got up, we headed down to the beach for a while before walking around the area and checking out what there was to see and do.

For as long as I can remember and after doing a few previous 'instructed fun dives' in the past, I was keen to take and complete my PADI diving course, so after a bit of online research and finding out the Sailing Club were running an amazing promotion as it was deemed low season, I quickly signed up for the three day course (along with Luke one of the guys we had been travelling with), starting early the next morning.

What should have happened that evening was a bit of dinner, followed by the homework we had been set (I tell you it was like being back at school) and an early night. However, after eating dinner we had arranged to meet a few of the others at the Sailing Club for a couple of beers during it's happy hour (at all other times of the day it would be way too pricey for a travellers budget) - it didn't take long before we moved onto the bucket type jam jars, and inevetiably one bucket led to two which led to three and before we knew it it was 2:00am. At this point we called it a night due to the course starting earling the following morning and vowing I wouldn't be drinking again until the end of the course.

Early the next morning, I struggled up and made my way down to the dive centre to begin the first lesson whilst Vic's stayed in bed until about 11 and leisurely made her way to the beach. This pattern would be repeated over the next three days.

The structure of the course was explained to us and we were introduced to our instructors.

Day 1 - This day consisted of watching about 2.5 hours of DVD's in the morning followed by a few multiple choice tests. In the afternoon we had our confined water dives, this took place in the resorts swimming pool and consisted of learning various diving techniques, being taught what to do if we run out of air and how to assemble equipment etc etc, It was pretty hard going taking everything in and went on much longer than I anticipated spending a full 4 hours in the pool. When we got back, we were told to read around 100 pages of the large text book we had been given and to complete the homework set that evening.

That evening, we popped out for a quick curry at our new favourite restaurant chain before heading back to the room exhausted but having to complete around 2 hours homework before bed.

Day 2 – This was the day I had been most looking forward to, my first 2 open water dives. We met early doors at the Sailing Club and were transported to the Dive warehouse to pick up and prep our equipment before being taken to the harbour to board our dive boat for the day.

As we were sailing out to our first dive spot we were prepped on what the day would consist of, given our wet suits and made to demonstrate how to set-up the Scuba cylinders, BCD jackets , weights system and check that the air flow of both our own and buddy’s system was working correctly.

The first dive was to be pretty much a fun dive and to get used to equalising and breathing under water at a location called South Bay, about a 45 minute sail from Nha Trang harbour.

The minute you descend, it is like entering a new world, at times it felt like everything in your body is screaming at you not to breathe as it goes against all that you know and unless I had just morphed into a fish, I shouldn’t be able to breathe underwater, but keeping calm and decending deeper I really begun to enjoy it and after finally getting the hang of the buoyancy we started floating around just above the surface like we were in space. On the first dive we were lucky enough to spot a rare lion fish, loads of clown (nemo) fish and plenty of other marine life. When we got back to the surface we had to practice taking our scuba kit and weights belt of in the water before re-boarding our boat and having a lunch of masaman curry and rice whilst heading to the next dive site at Mooray Beach.

Dive 2 consisted of practicing a few of the skills we had learnt at the previous days confined water dives, this included flooding the mask underwater, doing an ascent sharing somone elses water supply and 'sipping air' using an overflowing regulator, all good fun but scary at times. We then swam around for about 20 minutes and managed to spot a couple of cray fish and a huge puffer fish which was really cool.

We got back on the boat and spent a while messing about and diving off the top deck before heading back to the dive resort where we had a few hours of lessons before being set another load of homework to be completed for the next day. That evening pretty much followed the same pattern as the night before and after a quick bite to eat I headed back to the room and pretty much collapsed into bed the minute I had finished reading - Diving really takes it out of you.

Day 3 - This was probably the most challenging of the 3 days, again it consisted of two more dives where we would practice some of the more difficult skills and at the end of the day we had to take a 50 question examination scoring at least 78%. During dive 3, we practiced compass navigation and an emergency ascent from 8m with your air supply turned off which was pretty scary. The visibillity wasn't great but we did get to spot a snapping Mooray Eel. Back on the boat we learnt about pressure tables, the effects nitrogen has on the body and how to calculate the length of time you need to stay out of water before your net dive depending on depth, time, etc etc.

Dive 4 was probably the most difficult, we had to remove our mask for a full minute underwater which is such a bizzare sensation and quite freaky but after this was complete we got to enjoy the last 30 minutes just swimming about. When we got back to the Sailing Club, we were told to go back that evening at 5pm for our exam so I spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach with Vic's and revised.

Although slightly nervous before hand, the exam was nothing to be worried about and I managed to pass with 100% and become qualified - It was a great experience with a very professional dive company who I whole heartedly reccomend. I cannot wait to now dive throughout the rest of the trip.

That evening, as Luke had also passed his PADI and a few of the other guys had a few days prior to our arrival, we had a fairly big night out which ended on the beach at about 3.30am eating lobster (for the equivalent of about £1.50) and swimming in the sea.

The next day was to be our last in Nha Trang and after seeing it was fairly overcast we pretty much spent the whole day in bed, only getting up to go out for lunch/dinner and to book onto a bus for the following morning heading to the Central Highlands to the town of Da'Lat, our next destination...



S&V's Travel Info & Tips:

General Info: Approx 33,000 VND to £1 / 21,000 VND to $1. Nha Trang is a typical tourist resort which can be both good and bad depending what you want - For a few days relaxing, partying and diving it's good.

Transportation: We arrived to Nha Trang by overnight bus from Hoi An (eventually) which cost us $11. In Nha Trang itself, everywhere can be accessed by foot.

Food: We found a great little restaurant called Veranda which was on the main beach street - it served decent western/asian fusion food at very low prices, albeit portion sizes were a little small. Ganesh, the Indian food we loved from Hoi An, also had a branch here and to be honest we couldn't resist going back on a couple of occasions as the food was just so good. Fresh fruit smoothies and Bahn Mi baguettes can be found on most street corners and were with-out doubt some of the best we have had in Vietnam. The East Rock cafe also serves nice food at good prices (look out for daily specials).

Accomodation: We stayed in a little alley way off of the main beach street called 64 Tran Phu -There were several guesthouses to choose from here but we really liked our room at Nang Bien - Seabreeze Hotel for $9 a night.

Other observations:

x) The constant hassle from touts, moto drivers, book swap ladies, and genrally anyone selling junk became too much at points.

xx) I really don't like to generalise but most of the Russian package tourists found in Nha Trang (of which visit in their thousands) were quite rude towards the local people (and other tourists) and are not our favourite people.

xxx) I cannot reccomend Sailing Club highly enough, both for their very professional dive school and the bar on the beach for a night out.

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Comments

[Anastasia78]

Once again...
Perfect!