Getting Wet in Sabang

Our second stop on the trip as Jen has mentioned was Sabang, a small town on the island of Mindoro. Although the better beach is definitely White Beach, we chose Sabang because it's the major hub for diving as it is closer to all of the sites. Having some of the Philippines best diving, I figured it would be a great place to start my diving career. After some price shopping, I settled on South Sea Divers to start my Open Water Certification. The instructor was an American guy who had been there for 28 years and co-owns the place with a Canadian hailing from Montreal. He was definitely an eccentric-hippy-type, but a great teacher and he made the whole experience as comfortable as possible.

We started off with an eye blurring amount of videos as they are required for the course on top of the 130 pages I crammed in the night before. We then headed off to the pool for my first time breathing under water. The deep end of the pool only came up to my chest when standing, and the water was cloudy and freezing, so I wasn't the biggest fan, but it did give me the confidence to head out to the ocean. My first dive was so much more than I expected. It was just off the beach in the bay, but still full of plenty to see and experience. It wasn't till the second dive that we headed out to one of Sabang's highlight dive spots Sanandigan Wall. The experience of diving was exhilerating. It was like being allowed to enter a world that wasn't your own and every part of it alien, even in it's similarities. Despite this, it was all very tranquil. It was very full of life and activity, but there was a calming about it all. A relaxing sensation as you float around in your own little world, watching their world happen around you. In the end, it was an amazing experience and I'm very much looking forward to my next dives in Boaracay and Palawan.