I hold an active Master Scuba Diver Trainer’s Certificate and have over 3000 logged dives.
In 1978, I was lucky enough to travel to Isla Mujeres off the coast of Cancun to do some snorkelling for a few days. It was long enough ago that when we arrived, we were the only people on the island. The boat had 16 people on it from a day trip across from Cancun. Having been to Florida a few years earlier, where I had been amazed by the underwater life off Marathon Key – here I was dumbfounded at the sheer volume of life and the diversity when I put my face under the water that I promised myself I would learn to scuba dive.
A few years later I was in Martinique at the Buccaneers Creek Club Med (photo below) and decided to take a CMAS Certification with a group of Frenchmen, who spent a half hour with me onshore and then hauled me off on their boat, gave me a tank and took me down to 120 feet, where, upon doing my safety stop while ascending, I ran out of air and they had to throw me a tank over the side of the boat so I could breathe.
Undaunted, my fascination continued.
Buccaneers Creek, Martinique
In 1986, after moving to St. Martin, the perfect opportunity awaited me every weekend and over the next year, I completed my Open Water, Advanced Open Water and Rescue Diver certifications and had completed more than 60 logged dives.
In 1999, I completed my Divemaster course in Ontario. At this point, I had been diving in St. Martin, Belize, Saba, Nevis, St. Vincent, Grand Cayman Island, St. Kitts, the Bahamas, Bermuda and of course, almost constantly in the summers while I owned Blue Grace. I had well over 250 logged dives by this point in time.
While on vacation in Belize in 1998 with Yim, we purchased 2 acres of Caribbean beachfront property and promised myself I would build a small Eco Resort, which we named Ocean’s Edge, where I hoped to teach scuba diving.
In 2000, we moved to Vancouver Island and I completed my Instructor’s Certification.
Around this time, I had started clearing the land in Belize and had met the owner of The Inn at Roberts Grove, who was looking for someone to manage his fledgling dive operation and was hired. He had a significant budget and I thought this would be a terrific opportunity for me to manage an operation AND teach. Plus, he was looking for someone to be his General Manager and Yim filled that position. It was also a bit of a safety choice for us.
We had managed to get our first two houses built at Ocean’s Edge and rent them out for a full year when Hurricane Iris hit the peninsula and tore the roof off one house and damaged the other. We managed to get them fixed in time to honour the bookings, but there were no builders available for a year to continue developing the balance of the houses we hoped to build. They were all busy re-building communities so going to work for someone else with the budget to build a proper dive operation and marina seemed like the prudent thing to do. It turned out to be an excellent decision.
Over the next four years, I managed to get in 10+ dives a week so a little over 2,000 dives and completed my Master Scuba Diver Trainers certification.
Dear Steve: I wanted to thank you again for making my recent trip and first diving experience particularly wonderful. I couldn’t have asked for more consideration and encouragement.
If I could write like my husband, you would have seen a scuba story instead of a fishing one in the Philadelphia Inquirer this past Sunday. At least he was able to weave you into the story. Also, if he’d heard my 2 cents worth you would have been described as more than “affable”. I would have at least added patient and professional.
My best to you and for your continued success.
– Brenda Grove
I hold the following certifications: Master Scuba Diver Trainer, Open Water Scuba Instructor, Underwater Photographer Specialty, Underwater Navigator, Underwater Naturalist, Night Diver Speciality, Enriched Air Nitrox Diver, IANTD Trimix Deep Air Technician, Drift Diving Instructor, BC Marine Naturalist Certification, Divemaster, Rescue Diver, Advanced Open Water Diver and Open Water Diver.
I was fortunate to spend ample time at places along the barrier reef such as Moho Caye, Gladden Spit, The Silk Cayes, Ranguana Caye and Laughingird National Park (all pictured above) as well as many visits to the lower Sapodilla Cayes, almost down in Guatemala.
During those years, I led Whale Shark tours to Gladden Spit and twice led the Board of Directors of the World Wildlife Fund to the reef in an effort to raise funding for offshore moorings along the reef, to no avail. I even got to lead Steven Frink on a shark dive since I knew the waters and he needed someone to get him into a shark feeding cluster for photos.
I had the opportunity to visit and dive the second largest barrier reef in the world in southern Belize led by Steve Roper. Along on this trip were several members of the Board of Directors of the World Wildlife Fund.
During the trip out, Steve explained in great detail the wonders of the barrier reef system and the need for people to respect and protect this wonderful resource of ours. He carefully explained the dive to us and led us along a remarkable visit. I happen to recall his charm when he commented on how good a diver I was. He made us all feel at ease.
His commitment to our oceans impressed me as he outlined his vision to reduce commercial fishing vessels and install moorings along the barrier reef to preserve this pristine environment, a vision I share. I am pleased that he is continuing to contribute and promote awareness, knowledge and insight into ways others can protect our oceans.
Keep up the good work, Steve.
-Kathryn Fuller. President.
The World Wildlife Fund
The last year in Belize, Yim and I spent quite a bit of time with our friends Stu and Fran aboard Two if by Sea teaching small groups of guests who had wanted to do some sailing and learn to dive and during that process, I also taught Stu to dive. When we left Belize, he and Fran went on to become instructors on their own and headed down to Panama before we hooked up again in the British Virgin Islands about eighteen months later.
In late 2004, we decided to sell our property in Belize as we both felt that there was no stability in the country and we felt the lawlessness. We were closing in on 50 and decided we needed to move back to Canada.
Once back ‘home’, I struggled a bit but found work and decided to maybe try and help people build websites for their conservation and dive businesses and over the years, I did help a few people I have come to respect, most notably Andrea Marshall, an emerging National Geographic Explorer and Queen of the Mantas. She is also the Director of the Marine Megafauna Foundation and I also built their website and helped re-brand their foundation as well.
I also built Janneman Conradie’s website, who is an underwater videographer, explorer and conservationist and of course, built a beautiful website for Two If By Sea, which was very successful in growing their charter business for several years.
in 2006, we were offered a position in Fiji to run the dive operation out of a new Hilton that had been constructed and we visited for two weeks but decided that it was simply too far away to spend a couple of years there and too isolated and I chalk that up to our growing older and wanting to be around friends and family.
Over the years, we have visited the British Virgin Islands three or four times for two weeks at a time and really enjoyed the variety of diving there and have also spent time in Kauai and Cozumel.
Take a look at my photo gallery titled The Wreck of the Rhone for some great photos.
Over the years, I have tried to find a volunteer opportunity teaching scuba diving somewhere that I may be able to take part in but simply cannot find something which I think makes sense to me so I content myself with reading about what some scientists are doing and hope for the best.
So, as I close in on 70 years old, I have pretty much retired my scuba gear and taken up land locked pleasures such as hiking with Yim. As you will see, there are now dozens of excellent adventures we have enjoyed above the water but I’ll never forget being able to head out into the ocean every day for four years teaching in southern Belize.
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