Scuba courses
Advanced Open Water Diver Course

You've done your PADI Open Water Diver Course and you loved it. Go deeper into this adventure by doing your PADI Advanced Open Water Course! This course, offered by Into the Blue, Cape Town, is tailor made for the adventurous scuba diver at heart.

This is where you start to specialise in the other exciting types of scuba diving which will allow you to dive on wrecks, at night, to depth of up to 30 meters, with a dry suit and even teach you how to take awesome photos underwater.

The PADI Advanced Open Water Diver Certification is awarded for doing 5 “Adventure” scuba dives, of which one needs to deeper than 18 metres and the other needs to be an Underwater Navigation dive.

Please note that although we do up to 5 “adventure” dives, the course material and dives that we cover in this course, are not as in-depth as the Speciality Dives. In other words when we teach you Underwater Navigation in this course, there is still much more that you could learn by doing a dedicated Underwater Navigation Specialty Course.

Quick overview of the PADI Advanced Open Water Scuba Diving Course in Cape Town

• Review  the Advanced Open Water Theory and then scuba dive in the ocean surrounding Cape Town
• You must have your PADI Open Water certification to do this scuba course
• Duration: 5 dives (minimum 2 days)
• Certification allows you to go up to 30 metres deep.
• Should you only do 3 adventure dives while on the course, you would be awarded with the Adventure diver certification.
• Bring your swimsuit, sunscreen, towel and a snack.

Course Schedule

We meet each morning at the Into the Blue shop in Cape Town as our central starting point. Here we do registration, theory and we also get your scuba equipment. Meeting times are normally at 09:15, but could change if we are do any boat dives. You can expect to be finished between 3 and 6 in the afternoon, depending on where we are diving on the day.

Course Theory

There are knowledge reviews to be done as homework, which we will mark and review with you. There is no exam for the advanced certification. This course is also available on e-learning, which is a great option if you are pressed for time, or do not want to be doing theory homework while you are on holiday in Cape Town. If you decide to do e-learning, you get a R500 discount off the normal course price, but please note that you will not be receiving a crew pack in this case and that there is a fee payable to PADI. If you would like to sign up for e-learning, please click here.

Course Ocean Dives

When you do your Advanced Open Water Scuba Course at Into the Blue in Cape Town, you have to do 5 “adventure” dives. This is usually done over 2 to 3 days, but these days do not need to be consecutively.

You can choose out of the following types of dives:

• Deep Diving course – on this scuba adventure we take you deeper than 18 meters (to a maximum of 30 meters) and we teach you how to deal with things like Nitrogen narcosis, ascending and descending and we also show you how some colours disappear on the way down. Diving deeper than 18 meters is a really valuable skill for any diver, especially if you want to visit deeper wrecks or reefs. The deepest we can go in Cape Town is 33 meters.
• Underwater Photography– take pictures of the amazing things that you see underwater and share them with your friends! Nothing quite says “I was there!” like a picture.
• Underwater Navigation– Knowing where you are going is important when you are scuba diving in Cape Town. The navigation skills that we teach will come in very handy in all of your scuba dives!
• Wreck Diving – wreck diving is awesome! Not only does history come alive, but animals also love to live in and on wrecks – they make great artificial reefs. We will teach you how to navigate your way safely around shipwrecks. Over the decades hundreds of ships have sunk around the shores of the Cape. There is therefore no shortage of excellent wrecks to explore near Cape Town.
• Peak Performance Buoyancy Scuba Diving – good buoyancy is an essential skill that is used on every single scuba dive that you do! Good buoyancy skills will improve your air consumption, your comfort under water and will also help you to protect the delicate sea life!
• Search and Recovery Diving – as a diver, someone might ask you to recover something for them that they have lost in the water. In this scuba dive we teach you different search patterns, and also how to bring heavy objects out of the water in a way that is safe.
• Dry Suit Diving – is the cold getting to you while you are diving in Cape Town?  We teach you how to scuba dive in a dry suit – designed to keep you snug in even the coldest of waters!
• Boat Diving – in this scuba adventure we teach you more about the boats that you will be diving from.
• Underwater Naturalist Diving – would you like to know the names of the animals and plants that you see while you are scuba diving in Cape Town?  Then this is for you.
• Night Diving – James Bond style! We take our underwater torches and we go and look which animals come out at night. Just the same as in game parks, different animals come out at night in the sea and others go to sleep!

The Deep and the Underwater Navigation Dives are compulsory, which leaves you with 3 more to choose from for your PADI Advanced Certification. If you would like to do more than 5 Adventure dives, talk to us about it, it can be arranged!

1. Why would I want to dive deeper than 18 meters?
   Although there are a lot of pretty things to be seen above 18 meters, it often happens that a reef or wreck worth visiting is lying a little bit deeper than 18 meters. Your Advanced Course allows you to dive down to 30 meters, which allows you to visit to a lot more dive sites!

2. Is there anything to see at night?
   Just as on land, some animals go to sleep at night while others come out. You can quite often see animals underwater at night that you have never seen before!

3. I want to do a dry suit dive – can I rent one from Into the Blue?
   We do have a limited number of dry suits for rent – whether we have one that will fit you depends on your size. The best is to come in before your course, so that we can fit one to see if we can help you out.

4. Where do I get a MPA permit?
   Temporary MPA permits can be obtained at Into the Blue Scuba Centre for R45 (valid for one month), or yearly ones can be obtained from a Post Office at a cost of R102.

5. Which course is next?
   There are many options! You should consider doing your Rescue Course, which teaches you what  to do in emergency situations, and you can specialise in the types of diving that really interests you – such as Wreck diving, Deep diving, or Underwater Photography.