Suppose I should keep up with the now yearly update. It’s already Oct. 1 as I write this in Japan, but still Sept. 30 back in my home of Texas, so I count this as making the cutoff.

Earlier this year I took a trip to Okinawa and received a PADI Open Water scuba certification. Means I’ve been trained to safely dive down to a depth of 18 meters, or 60 feet, as long as nothing is above me. That is, no going into caves or wreckage where there is no way to swim straight up to the surface.

I first did a scuba dive in Maui, Hawaii, in February 2022 just as the covid-19 pandemic was beginning to spread. The experience was wonderful and decided to get the certification. But the aforementioned pandemic took off and I put the plans on hold.

So in March of this year I made the trip to the island prefecture of Okinawa and spent three days getting a certification.

There was quite a bit to remember, and it was physically exhausting, but a good time.

Yesterday, Friday, Sept. 30, I did my first dives since then down in Kanagawa in the area of 小田原 (Odawara). Woke up at 6 a.m., got on the train at 7:15, arrived around 8:50. Got home around 4:30 p.m. It was a long day.

The dives themselves were all right. The water was a bit choppy, so visibility was pretty low (2 – 4 meters) most of the time, but it was nice to be able to just enjoy the dive and not have to do various exercises and practice maneuvers needed for a certification.