Just back from a diving weekend with V and Dave. We left for Redang Island (on the NE coast of Pennisular Malaysia) on Thursday morning.

Here's a pic of our dive center. L to R: River, Dave, Me, Victoria and Pan. Pan was our dive master and he was great! We had a fabulous time diving with him! River was a helper at the dive center - insuring that we *ahem* turn our air on properly, for example. Our fellow divers were also lots of fun and made for a great atmosphere! We were able to go on 5 dives over the weekend and saw loads of fish! Including a school of barracuda and a Nurse Shark! Ahhhhh Very exciting! The snorkeling that was available just off the beach was amazing - complete with turtles, more barracuda and a handful of black-tipped reef sharks! I'm so jealous that Victoria is so close - it only took 40 min by plane. We left my sister's apartment by 11am and were diving by 3pm!

Victoria and I are novice divers...Which was made very apparent by all the mistakes that we made! Humm where to start:

• forgetting to turn air supply on
• falling down on boat
• dropping equipment
• getting pushed over by a wave on shore...
• forgetting on inflate BCD at surface (leaving the person at the surface but with their head barely out of the water....)
• incorrectly draining air from BCD before disconnecting....Resulting in a large popping sound as various tubes are being disconnected - - and everyone looking our way and shaking their heads...

Even with all our newbie mistakes the people running the dive shop were very helpful and friendly. If I have free time and spare cash in Malaysia again, I'm heading back! A great place to dive!