Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be an expert swimmer, a Navy SEAL or a triathlete to dive. Recreational diving is one of the safest sports around, and is suitable for everyone from the age of 10 to 65-plus. All you need is basic swimming capabilities, moderate fitness levels (ability to walk a kilometer or two without fatigue) and good health.

For those interested in learning to dive, we offer the Open Water Course.

The Open Water course consists of 3 sections:
– Academic development: Here, you learn the theory of diving. This is covered in a mix of video, self-study and instructor briefings
– Confined water training: here, you master the essential skills of scuba, starting from the simple (breathing underwater) and working your way up to complex (removing/replacing your equipment underwater)
– Open water dives: now you get a chance to apply everything that you have learned by actually diving. We do 4 dives in the open water, where you repeat some of the skills that you learned earlier, and where you also get a chance to dive, enjoy yourself and soak in the wonders of the underwater world.

At the successful completion of this course, you receive a certification card from PADI, NAUI or SSI.

A quick word on these agencies: these certification cards are universally accepted by dive operators worldwide, all are interchangeable (you can start with one and switch to another) and all allow you to rent equipment and dive anywhere, so regardless of which option you choose, you get a high-quality course. There are some differences in curriculum and pricing, and these, rather than brand, should form the basis of your decision. Our instructors will be happy to work with you in selecting the course that is just right for you – contact us for more info.

Typically, the Open Water course lasts 4 full days. However, we recognize that different people learn at different speeds – besides, you are on vacation and may want to spread out your training. So, the time to certification can be more or less. Two things are for sure: we will not rush you, and we will not compromise on your training.

As with our diving, we believe in small groups and personalized attention for training. With our large staff of instructors, we are able to keep our classes small – usually 4:1 or better student:professional ratio – ensuring that you get all the personal attention that you need.

If you have any health-related concerns about learning to dive, please download the Medical Statement form which goes over a medical checklist. If you answer “yes” to any of the questions there, please get medical clearance from your doctor prior to reaching Havelock. You will need one separate clearance for every question to which you answer “yes.”

We highly recommend you club the Open Water Course with the Advanced Open Water Course.

The Advanced Open Water course (also called Advanced Adventurer by SSI and Advanced Diver by NAUI)- This consists of 5 (PADI/SSI) / 6 (NAUI) dives- two are mandatory (Deep Dive and Underwater Navigation – Night is also required for NAUI). For the remainder, you can choose from 15 options, including Night, Multilevel & Computer, Underwater Naturalist, Peak Performance Buoyancy, Wreck, Boat, Underwater Photography and lots more.

This is a practical course (emphasis on in-water training) and is meant to give you experience in diving under different conditions, as well as provide you with a deeper understanding of dive theory, planning and techniques.

And the reason we suggest clubbing the two courses is because it has the following benefits:
– you learn more and become a significantly better diver when you do both the OW and the Advanced
– you retain your skills longer, as you are better able to internalize the diving skills
– you are able to dive to 30m and thereby visit some of the best sites of the Andamans
– our Open + Advanced combo works out to be very good value

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Are you interested in trying diving but do not have the time or desire to take a certification course? Or maybe you are not sure if this whole diving this is for you? Consider the Discover Scuba Diving experience.

This is a half-day program, where an instructor teaches you some basic theory and then takes you out for a proper dive, to give you a taste of diving and a chance to participate in the underwater world. It’s safe, it’s easy and it’s a lot of fun! If you like the experience (we are very certain you will!) you can go on to do the Open Water course. This dive (as well as the full fee for this program) can then be applied towards the Open Water course.

We offer both One-Day and Two-Day Experiences.
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