After a long journey from Thailand to Malapascua it was great to arrive again on this beautiful island to conduct my second PADI IDC with Thresher Shark Divers. Again, I received a really warm welcome, especially from the local dive and restaurant staff, although this time, it might have had something to do with the gifts that I bought for them!
May is a great time to be on Malapascua, because there are good opportunities to see Hammerhead Sharks, the weather is generally great and it is the time for the annual Fiesta. This means lots of people coming from the mainland, delicious food, the island buzzing with excitement and parties that continue until dawn…. So it was definitely worth rearranging the scheduled Rest Day during the IDC so that we could all relax and enjoy the festivities.
Like my first PADI IDC on Malapascua back in January, this IDC was a lot of fun with a nice mix of different nationalities. Everybody worked extremely hard and made excellent progress throughout the course. Thanks to the TSD team, everything was organised really well, despite a few last minute schedule changes, so I’m very grateful to Amy and Dino for fitting in with my requests.
As for our candidates….
Jake and Lee, the terrible twins, are friends from Canada who came to Thresher Shark Divers way back in January as very new divers, and completed their Divemaster Internship on Malapascua. After a few weeks in Thailand, they found they missed TSD so much they came back to complete their IDC! It has been great for the TSD team to see them progress all the way from newbie Open Water through to Instructor level.
Nik also came to complete her diving internship with her partner Neal, both from the UK, arriving as Advanced and Open Water respectively. Although Neal completed the EFR Instructor program, he chose to focus on Divemaster and PADI Specialty Ratings.
And arriving just in time for the PADI IDC, we had Karin from Switzerland, Johnny from the Netherlands and Dani from Spain.
As usual, when the PADI Examiner, Marc, arrived and it was time for the PADI IE, I was probably more nervous than most of the candidates. But due to the extremely hard work put in by all, the IE was a great success. We now have 6 more PADI Open Water Scuba Instructors ready to unleash on the busy diving industry both here and in the rest of S.E. Asia. So I would like to congratulate Karin Scheidegger, Nik Macve, Lee Gallant, Jake Mugridge, Dani Nunez and Johnny Hurkmans for passing the Instructor Exams. I wish all of you the best of success for the future. Jake and Lee have already found work on Malapascua, so that’s a great start!
If you’re going to come all the way to Malapascua to do your IDC, you definitely need to make time to dive some of Malapscua’s great dive sites, and I am no different! So once the IE was over and we had moved onto Specialty Instructor ratings, I squeezed in a few fun dives. I had a great time with the local dive crew and really excellent dives, particularly on the Dona Marilyn Wreck and Gato Island which are definitely big favourites of mine.
Thanks again to all the staff at Thresher Shark Divers, I look forward to working with you again soon.
More photos on Facebook.