My Experience Scuba Diving In Sydney From Shelly Beach

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I’m happy to say that I’ve finally had my first scuba diving experience; I learned to scuba dive in Sydney.

Of all the places in the world to learn, can you believe that Sydney was the place?

Australia is a country that’s all about the water. It’s an island nation, and it has some of the best dive sites and surfing beaches in the world.

I love the beach and I love getting active and out on the water, but I was always scared to try diving because of my slight fear of deep water and sharks.

I thought learning how to dive and get certified took forever, and it never crossed my mind that I could do it right here in Sydney.

Well, turns out, it doesn’t take forever to get certified and Sydney has a very cool dive location for beginners like me, Shelly Beach in Manly.

Here is how my experience went…

Scuba Diving From Shelly Beach, Sydney

I had my first diving lesson from Shelly Beach in Sydney, thanks to the guys at Pro Dive and a program called Priceless Sydney, which is a MasterCard initiative that allows all MasterCard holders to experience priceless offers and events including sport, dining, retail, hotels and entertainment.

Not only was it my first dive, but it was also my first visit to Shelly Beach. I didn’t even know this beach existed – I love discovering new places in Sydney – and on the clear winter’s day that we had, it was beautiful.

Shelly Beach is a popular shore diving location due to the fact it’s the only west-facing beach on the east coast of Australia – meaning it’s well protected – and it sits in the only Aquatic Reserve within Sydney, Cabbage Tree Bay.

My instructor for the day was Howard, an experienced diver originally from Leeds in the UK. Luckily for me, it was one-on-one instruction.

After a short pep talk on land about the technical aspects of diving, it was time to suit up and practice my safety hand signals and recovery drills under the water.

If there was one thing I was a little anxious about, it was the breathing and being able to equalise.

During my first lesson, we only went down in 3 metres of water. I struggled a getting my breathing right and equalising, but the clear vision I had of the surface above put me at ease.

Howard repeatedly reassured me, “It’s all about relaxing and just breathing naturally and once you start…