REVIEW, REFRESH & REEF = REEF VIEW PROGRAM

A long time ago since you made your last dive…? Or maybe you have not dived so may times yet? We have a great solution!
Join “Reef-View” program. (Yes, you are right you read “review”!)

Imagine you have not a lot of diving experience yet or haven’t been diving for quite some years. But, you have planned to come diving with us at the fabulous coral reef gardens of North Sulawesi. Then this short, one day program is the solution. You even can benefit double of it.
Together with an experienced PADI Instructor you review the basic theory and specific theory related to the control of your buoyancy. After that, both of you head to one of the easier dive sites in the park, to make a Peak Performance Buoyancy dive.

Here, your instructor will help you to fine tune your buoyancy after having done some of the basic exercises with you as mask clearing, regulator recovery and octopus use.
You’ll feel like a dolphin, swimming through hoops or a juggler removing your fins and put them on again without going up or down. After 1 hour of playing around, you will feel comfortable and really enjoy every minute under water again.

After lunch the second dive. Your refresher program continuous with learning to “see” the reef. After the extensive briefing, you and your instructor go “hunting” to find all the smaller and bigger marine life species you wrote down on your slate. You will be amazed how much you actually saw without seeing.

At the end of the day you will feel confident and equipped enough to dive with our great dive guides and enjoy the rest of your dive holiday. The 2 dives you made can credit towards the Advanced Diver course when you fill out a simple knowledge review. You can also decide to continue the Advanced course if you are really into it.

CLINIC FOR TONGKEINA

From December 2001 until the beginning of 2003 Thalassa Dive Center has made an effort to realize a small clinic in Tongkeina, the small village in which the Hotel and Dive Center are located.
The poor medical back-up in the area in combination with the irregular public transportation make it hazardous and sometimes impossible to find medical treatment in case of emergencies.
In co-operation with the people of the village we decided to create a “show” for the guests of the hotel, which took place on 28th of December 2001. It was a big success. The, up-front sold, tickets were good for 10.000.000 Rupiah. Additional donations from several guests and from the owner company PHN, made it possible to start renovating two existing buildings and change them into a community house and a clinic.

Also the whole building process was part of the planning. It created work and therefore income for 40 laborers who worked on the project until July 2002.

Now the buildings were ready, but completely empty. No furniture, no medical equipment, no medicines. Again, our guests helped out.
We received boxes full of bandage materials, we received money and guests left their medicines.
Now, in February 2003, we can say that the clinic has some furniture, has medical equipment and some medicines, but no doctor yet. We are trying to find a solution for this together with the local government.

We hope that in due time, we can receive enough donations to pay the doctors’ salary of 250 US$ per month! We want to make him work and live in Tongkeina and take care of the approximately 800 families living here.
If you have some ideas or want to contribute to the hospital, please contact us for more information.

NEW DIVERS IN THALASSA

The philosophy from Thalassa is that, if we need our guys to carry resonsibilities, they have to know the company inside out, need to understand our standard and procedures, but must above all, understand what we mean with the word "service". Therefore all new staff comes in as boat crew, after which we can see, what talents and interests they have. By doing so, we have been able to train some of the very best dive guides in Manado, each of them with their own expertise. This can be accompanying underwater photographers, beginners, students or guests seriously interested in the underwater fauna.
Recently we have started to train the next generation to become a diver. A very enthousiastic group of 8 of our staff followed officially the Open water course of which already have succeeded to get their first license. They are as proud as can be. Next time you come to visit us, they might have "climbed up the ladder" and dive with you..... You will like it.