I know, it’s been ages. Some of you even asked me what the heck was going on. I was busy running a dive shop haha.
I don’t even know where to begin to sum up the past 3 months. We officially opened on July 1st and took our first divers out the next days, and since then it has been exponentially busy. August was better than July, September was better than August, so we hope this trend is gonna keep up!
So we survived the first 3 months, yay to us.
Overall, those first months have been extremely positive. We took a lot of people diving, they were overall very happy, we had some great dives and have been blessed with mantas and molas and sharks.
We slowly found our pace into running everything, even though every day brings its pile of problems to solve. We are slowly finding our way to work too, I am pleased to report that Julia and I still talk to each other and enjoy each other’s company. Although we seriously need to set up this date night thing where we don’t talk about work, because that isn’t happening yet and we need it.
We have a serious construction site on the way, and in another few months the premises should be ready. Meanwhile we are operating from a nearby restaurant and despite a few logistic bumps it is working out just fine.
It is hard to sum up 3 months in a blog post, so here are a few snippets of the most memorable days, good and bad, so you can get a feel for what our days look like:
The day when, after only diving with pros for years, I had to take my first bad Discover Scuba students, and I cursed them in my reg the entire time while holding onto 150 kilos of non finning guests.
The day we got our first boat out all by ourselves after boat sharing for a few weeks, and even filled it to the max.
The day when my friend Dan came to visit and gifted us our mascot Mr Octopus.
The days, many days, when we saw threshers sharks in the past few weeks and made everybody SO happy on the boat
The day when we forgot to pack an entire kit and realised when starting dive briefings on the boat. Luckily we were close to the gear place on shore, so Antoine just grabbed his fins, swam to shore, got a BCD and some fins extra and swam back to the boat. This is how we roll.
The day where after days of negotiation, pleas and even threats, we got our initial boat captain fired (Captain Twat as we know him) and got him replaced by Captain Awesome.
The day when we gave our first staff Ketut a contract full time, and within a few days he totally owned it and is now Happy Mool instead of just Mool (his nickname). How he has now become Julia’s reminder of things she needs not to forget.
The day when I closed the accounts after the first month and went : “wow, we actually made money this month, look at us goooo”. When every 1st of the month I have to do accounts and swear all day long. If you need anything from me, the 1st ain’t a good day to ask, heads up.
The day when our TripAdvisor ranking went in the top 10.
The day when a tank valve started leaking so bad that we had to drain it and take it apart. After using the tanks for 2 months. This supplier is not exactly my best friend right now, I might be on his hit list.
The first time when we had to turn down people and say: sorry, we are full tomorrow. Then looked at each other and went: shiiiiit we are full tomorrow!
The day, shortly after that, where we had to go rent another boat so we could run 2 boats the next day.
The day when the excavating machine finally broke ground and started digging our compressor room, pool and more.
The day when the final plans came back from the architect and all of us went: “WOOOOOW”
All the days when my friends went: “It’s gonna be ok, keep doing what you are doing and take a breath”.
It’s been a crazy 3 months and it is clearly not the end of it. But we are up and running, we are making progresses every day, and most important we go out diving, we love it, our guests too and at the end of the day that is what matters!