{"id":1247,"date":"2012-06-05T09:52:09","date_gmt":"2012-06-05T02:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/?p=1247"},"modified":"2012-06-05T09:52:10","modified_gmt":"2012-06-05T02:52:10","slug":"so-you-think-you-are-too-old-to-learn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/dives\/so-you-think-you-are-too-old-to-learn","title":{"rendered":"So you think you are too old to learn?"},"content":{"rendered":"

While scuba diving does require a certain level of health and fitness, your age doesn\u2019t prevent people from becoming Scuba Divers. \u00a0YOU ARE NEVER TOO OLD TO LEARN TO SCUBA DIVE!<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong>People are no longer sitting home on the sofa during retirement. This generation is not only the largest, in the world\u2019s history but it has also been one the most active. Needless to say they are not going quietly into the good night!<\/p>\n

You may have read over the years about Scuba Kittens where Scuba Cat Diving has introduced diving to many of the younger generation through Bubblemaker, Sealteam \u00a0and Junior Open Water courses<\/a>. Recently we went the opposite way.<\/p>\n

The oldest newly certified open water diver from Scuba Cat has completed his Open Water Course<\/a> with Scuba Cat Diving.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Larry Boersma is a repeat customer of Scuba Cat for over 4 years. Originally from Holland he now lives in the US and still works as a professor in one of the universities over there. He enjoys regular holidays in the Far East and has visited Thailand and Indonesia.<\/p>\n

He had completed 18 Discover Scuba Diving experiences<\/a> with us, and more in Bali and Borneo, for a long time he was happy with this and enjoyed taking photographs at the beautiful Racha Islands<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year we made a special exception and Larry went with a private instructor the sites of Shark Point, Koh Doc Mai and Anemone reef<\/a>. Usually these are reserved for divers who can go to 18m or deeper. But with more than 50 dives already we felt Larry could cope with these new sites.<\/p>\n

This must have made him want more as when he came back to see us after 3 month he had decided to take the open water course with us and then join our liveaboard MV Scuba Adventure<\/a> for a 4 day 4 night trip to Similan, Koh Bon, Koh Tachai and Richelieu Rock.<\/p>\n

\"Scuba<\/a><\/p>\n

With Kath as the tour leader on the boat and Francois as his private guide Larry enjoyed \u00a0every one of the 14 dives on offer during the trip.<\/p>\n

We are not sure if at 82 Larry is the oldest newly certified open water diver but everyone at Scuba Cat is very happy to see him finally move on from being a habitual Discover Scuba Diver to a fully certified one.<\/p>\n

Congratulations Larry!!<\/h4>\n

Trying to decide if Scuba Diving is for you?<\/h3>\n

Listen to your Body.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

You can’t expect your body to be as agile when you were 21. It is normal to tire easily or succumb to illness more often. An illness is simply your body’s way of telling you to slow down a bit. Listen to your body and don’t push it too hard. Do what you feel comfortable with, why not take a leaf out of Larry\u2019s book and start with Discover Scuba Diving?<\/p>\n

Don’t overestimate \u00a0your health.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you are the type of person who runs everyday and goes to the gym regularly then perhaps, you won\u2019t have to worry so much about the encounter of health problems underwater. Nevertheless, be sure to visit your Doctor before you start this challenge<\/a>. If your doctor gives you a thumbs-up, well then go dive! If not, ask how you could get dive fit.<\/p>\n

Know your limits.<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you’ve been physically active for much of your whole life, then nothing should stop you from trying Scuba Diving. Unless your Doctor says otherwise, you could still go diving, but only do what you feel comfortable with, don\u2019t succumb to pressure from the others on the Dive trips, if you don\u2019t want to go deep or dive in strong currents, then don\u2019t!<\/p>\n

So you have decided to come out and dive with us, fantastic news, here are a couple of pointers before you take the course<\/h3>\n

More than likely your Instructor will be younger than you. As a mature student, you will have to deal with this. No matter what your position is in the \u201creal world\u201d in the pool or on the boat, the instructor is the boss. Learn to be flexible.<\/p>\n

Learning<\/strong><\/p>\n

Expect a learning curve. At Scuba Cat Diving all our Instructors<\/a> take diving courses very seriously. People who are settled into careers or retirement often forget just how hard learning new things can be sometimes. So go easy on yourself.<\/p>\n

Yourself<\/strong><\/p>\n

Be open-minded. You might think you have \u201cbeen there\u201d \u201cdone that\u201d and \u201csurvived near everything\u201d, being underwater, breathing through\u00a0scuba gear\u00a0and being dependant on a dive buddy, can take some getting used to. Some more mature students can become resistant to being told what to do and when to do it. It\u2019s understandable. It\u2019s hard giving over control to someone who may be half your age, but our instructor\u2019s want you to experience all the joy of diving while remaining safe.<\/p>\n

\"Scuba<\/a><\/p>\n

If you have always wanted to go scuba diving but have never found the time, learn why it is never too late to start scuba diving, no matter what your age!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While scuba diving does require a certain level of health and fitness, your age doesn\u2019t prevent people from becoming Scuba Divers. \u00a0YOU ARE NEVER TOO OLD TO LEARN TO SCUBA DIVE! People are no longer sitting home on the sofa during retirement. This generation is not only the largest, in the world\u2019s history but it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[248,509,508,249,27,32,502,506,55,504,338,505,507,501,282,296,62,503,247,29],"class_list":["post-1247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dives","tag-anemone-reef","tag-congratulations","tag-koh-bon-koh-tachai","tag-koh-doc-mai","tag-liveaboard","tag-mv-scuba-adventure","tag-padi-bubblemaker","tag-padi-discover-scuba-diver","tag-padi-instructor","tag-padi-junior-open-water-course","tag-padi-open-water-course","tag-padi-open-water-diver","tag-racha-islands","tag-retirement","tag-richielieu-rock","tag-scuba-divers","tag-scuba-kittens","tag-seal-team","tag-shark-point","tag-similans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1247\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scubacat.com\/en\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}