Hovering barely feet above the easily stirred, silty floor of Whitestar
Quarry in Gibsonburg, Ohio, I inched along the side of a newly sunk Rebel
sailboat. The key was to stay steady, holding my buoyancy so as not to
muck up the floor. I also had to stay a constant distance from the side,
because only then would I be able to snap the pictures necessary to build
a photo mosaic and complete the final task in obtaining my PADI National
Geographic specialty certification.
Throughout my slow and deliberate swim both along the side of the 18-foot sailboat and then along its top deck – snapping frame after frame along the way – I kept in mind what PADI master instructor Rich Synowiec said about the National Geographic projects: “Everybody has a journey,” he said. “What jazzes you? What’s exciting to you?”
My answer: shipwrecks.
A course designed to “separate an underwater tourist from an underwater explorer,” the National Geographic specialty fine-tunes a diver’s buoyancy, navigation, and marine life identification skills. It also creates divers more aware of their natural surroundings – a goal long associated with the National Geographic name.
Offered only through dive centers that have been awarded the National Geographic rating, the specialty is offered to both new and veteran divers. At Divers Incorporated in Ann Arbor, Mich., owner Rich Synowiec said that every prospective student looking to be certified is offered the chance to become a National Geographic diver. But for those already certified divers, the course offers a chance to revisit some of the most basic – and most important – skills associated with conservation and adventure.
Living in northwest Ohio, in the midst of the Great Lakes, I have spent much of my diving drifting above shipwrecks. So when Rich asked what jazzes me, I immediately thought of the massive wooden schooners and metal freighters enveloped in the Great Lakes frosty waters. The individual journey I chose to take toward becoming a National Geographic explorer, adventurer, and conservationist was a photographic one.
In the water, PADI course director Patrix Heschel had set up a variety of buoyancy and navigation exercises before letting me undertake my personal expedition. Those divers living in an area where navigation is less of an issue because of extensive visibility would be required to prove proficiency in marine life identification. Visibility in the quarry that day was about 25-30 feet.
After spending a dive demonstrating peak buoyancy control – to avoid damaging reefs or stirring a silty lake bottom – and the ability to navigate in limited visibility with a compass – a skill necessary to ensure you can return to a destination you wish to further explore – I returned to the water with my underwater camera to capture images of the a small boat intentionally sunk in the quarry.
“I sit down with students and say, ‘What we’re going to do is up to you,’” Rich said of the projects. “People can go as far as they want with it.”
Because the objective of the National Geographic course is to create divers more interested in exploration and conservation, I decided that my time hovering above the Rebel sailboat was just the first of many projects I hope to accomplish. And as a National Geographic diver, I can continue developing my skills while creating several more photographic journeys.