Diving in Dakar

One of the first weekends I was in Dakar I took a risk and went diving. I had never done it before in my life. I’m not going to lie; I’m no pro at swimming. You could dive for two hours for only fifteen euros, great value! First of all we tried on all the suits and equipment, and we got very hot with all the stuff on our back. Then we took a boat just a little way off the coast but not too far, only thirty odd metres.

The instructor explained a few basic rules to us. The sign language you do under the water, for example the sign that means everything’s OK is: your thumb touching your index finger and the other fingers in the air, and also how to signal that you want to go back up.

We then learnt (equally quickly) how to jump into the water, or rather how to let yourself fall backwards into the water. Then we did a few tests to learn how to breathe and then we took the plunge! The explanations were very short! In Belgium you have to do exercises in the pool and other stuff too! Here there was none of that!

We went down to a depth of six metres! It was a bit tough on the ears, I got a buzzing in my head and I had to try a few times before getting used to being so deep in the water.

Then, once we were all underwater we could let go of the guide rope, and start swimming deep down. There was lots of rubbish, even right at the bottom! But also beautiful colourful fish and lots of different types of plants.

At one point I swallowed some water, I don’t know quite how. The pipe for oxygen moved in my mouth and I couldn’t get any air. I alerted the Senegalese man with us straight away, by making the signs to go back up that we’d been taught. That took a bit of time, it was a bit stressful but everything turned out fine and I went back down afterwards. Now it’s over I wonder whether these people actually know what they’re doing… whether they do or not I think it’s probably better to have already done a bit of diving before…

It was a great experience, even if I’m not a big fan of water. In terms of safety it wasn’t the best so it’s probably worth having done diving beforehand. In my group of friends we were all complete beginners.

I can’t remember the name of the place but I found this website which refers to three diving centres: http://www.senegalaisement.com/senegal/plongee.html I think that I went to Océanium: http://www.oceanium.org/. All I can remember is that it was in the town centre, on the coast and close to the Presidential Palace I think.