I have a list of things I want to do and places I want to go to before I die. I know many of you have one too.
Although I love a good list, this one is not written on paper; it’s in my head and there are things that have been there for a long time (probably too long). That’s the case of scuba diving. I have been planning on getting the Open Water Diver certificate since I was 16, but lack of time and money always got in the way.
Last year my sister was very ill by the time my birthday arrived. I “celebrated” my day blowing some candles and crying in a restaurant in London while she was in the ICU. Have to say it was the worst birthday ever – she past away 5 days later.
This year was going to be a tough one; I had to make up for the sadness that was going to surround my first birthday without my big sis. Learning how to scuba dive before our honeymoon (we are planning a 5-day stop in Bora Bora) suddenly became the best plan ever and Victor bought us the course as a birthday present. Isn’t he the best? I know my sister would encourage me to continue living my best life – no need to say she was my first thought when I was at 18 meters deep in the sea. She loved my sense of adventure, so she would have loved seeing the videos I have recorded with my GoPro Hero 5.
This post goes to her, my sister, Pilar. I will continue to embrace life and enjoy the beautiful things in the world.
La Herradura is on the tropical cost of Granada, one of the most famous areas of Spain for the beauty of its seabed and sea life, and its climate throughout the year. We drove from Seville; it took us about 3 hours to arrive at our hotel Peña Parda Bay.
This hotel, which opened in 2017, has 18 rooms. The location is very convenient: opposite to the beach and 6min walk to the diving center. The minibar, wifi and parking are included in the room price.
The hotel has two restaurants, The Bench (where breakfast is served) and Mercato. I cannot comment on the Mercato, as we did not eat here.
Credits. Pictures taken from Peña Parda Bay website.
The bathroom was a complete surprise; the shower had a glass wall and I could see Victor having a shower from the bed. 😂
Quite an experience.
Although we were pretty tired, I couldn’t sleep. I woke up every hour. I guess it was the excitement!
The alarm was set at 8am and by 8:30 we were having a light breakfast. The lessons started at 9am.
First day
At Open Water La Herradura, we met our instructor, Jose or Indio as they usually call him. He has been diving for over 14 years and is originally from Argentina.
The Open Water Diver course is PADI certified and the world’s most popular and widely recognised scuba course.
We spent the morning going through the theory to understand the basic principles of scuba diving and how to use basic scuba gear, including a mask, snorkel, fins, regulator, buoyancy control device and a tank. The equipment you wear varies depending upon whether you’re diving in tropical, temperate or cold waters. In September, the water is usually temperate in La Herradura and it did not disappoint (20°C). Once we learned how to ensemble everything ourselves, we practice and moved to confined waters.
In the afternoon we continued with the video and theory lessons.
Second day
I was VERY excited for our second day. We were going to have our first two immersions. We were given our gear and put everything together like we were taught on day one.
At first, it took me a little to understand that when you take a deep breath you go up and if you slowly breath out the air in your lungs you actually go to the bottom. We practice our neutral boyancy, how to take your mask off underwater and empty the water inside them when you put them back on, how to take off your jacket, secure the tank and put it back, how to communicate you have 100bar (half tank) or 50bar (when you should be initiating the security stop), etc. I felt more confident during our second dive.
During the course, you also learn how to communicate simple things underwater: How much oxygen do you have left? How are you? Not feeling very well and pointing out the issue, or the life-saving “I have no air, please share your oxygen”.
Our instructor was very happy with our improvements and our low consumption of oxigen which allowed us to experience longer dives.
We studied more that afternoon, even when we were back at the hotel. On our second day we took the exam and only failed 3/50. We passed the exam! We were done with the theory and excited to go down on our last day and practice with a dive computer of our own. The computer looks like a big watch. It is a personal decompression device used to measure the time and depth of a dive so that a safe ascent profile can be calculated and displayed to avoid decompression sickness. It is very rare to have decompression sickness when you dive to a maximum of 18 meters but it is important when you are an advance diver.
I was checking how deep we were in the computer: 17.1m deep.
Third day
Our last two immersions. We already passed our exam the day before so we could 100% focus on improving the technique and doing additional exercises under water, e.g. simulating not having oxygen and borrowing the alternative air source from your partner or cleaning our mask whilst diving.
As you can see, I have become a natural diver and I am able to pose at the bottom of the sea.
I have not edited this video, because I wanted you to see and hear what we see and hear underwater. So here it is, raw in its pure essence. Enjoy!
We saw two octopuses, an eel, a godiva, and different types of fish such as doncellas, mojarras and sargos. I have only good things to say about this course. We really enjoyed it! I can only think about when it is going to be our next one. We are thinking about taking 5 additional dives during winter season and jump straight into the Advance Open Water course so we are fully prepared for Bora Bora. Maybe I should write this down in my letter to Santa rather than “my mental list of things I want to do”.
If you want to plan your stay in La Herradura, see the list of places where we ate. We’ll give you our honest opinion of the things we tried.
Chiringuito La Cúpula
The service was good but the grilled octopus we ordered was overcooked and dry. We also order espetos, which are similar to grilled sardines but smaller. We don’t like to give a negative review based on one visit only, but let’s say I would not suggest to go back very soon.
Restaurantes El Salón.
The night we came there was only one waiter and I still have no idea how he managed to keep the service up and running with everyone happy (football match in the background so you can imagine the bar was packed). Oustanding service! In Granada is very common to order a drink and you get a tapa for free. We order two beers and he brought us some complimentary boquerones fritos (fried anchovies) and carne en salsa de vino blanco (meat in white wine sauce). The fish was so good we ordered more!
Don’t expect a fancy decoration, but who cares when you can only think about having another bite at those boquerones.
Nuevo Arenas
The service was very polite and quick. We had the lunch menu. As a starter, pisto con atún (see picture below) and as a main cod with tomato and black pepper sauce. I would recommend this restaurant for lunch time: seaview, nice food and a good menu at an affordable price.
MarDela
We ordered piquillo pepper salad with nuts vinaigrette and goat cheese. Delicious. I would have included a picture of the pumpkin risotto with king prawns we ate afterwards, but we finished it without taking any photos…that level of good you forget about blogging! Would definitely go back for dinner; the setting was very romantic with candles.
El Camping
Before our departure as qualified Open Water Divers, we had more espetos, a tomato and bonito salad with avocado and two beers at bar El Camping , which you can guess is at the local camping site. I should have noticed they had puchero (soup made with chicken and pork bones and meat typically found in Andalusia)…because it looked like heaven. Cheap and a good recommendation from our instructor.
Hope you have enjoyed this post and maybe it had encouraged you to take upon this diving course.
As a final though, let me say: don’t let the tears from your eyes stop you from seeing the rainbow. There is so much beauty in the world…
Lots of love,
Angela