Basic Diver course for beginners with 1 dive in the Ocean

Roberta is an amazing, professional, extremely patient instructor! She was teaching the basics of scuba diving to my teenage daughter and made it an unforgetable experience for her!

My mother and partner had a wonderful snorkelling experience with a kind and professional instructor, so I know GooDiving can offer good care. But what happened during my own Discovery Dive on 19 November was not a small issue — it was frightening, and in my view, dangerously unsafe for a beginner. Halfway through the dive, I suddenly felt extremely sick and on the verge of vomiting underwater. I used the thumb-up ascent signal — the universal diver distress signal — again and again. For a beginner, this signal means one thing: I need to go up now. But nothing happened. The instructor looked at my air gauge, signalled “OK,” and continued the dive. When I involuntarily rose a little because I felt sick, she even pulled me back down. At this point, I could barely move without feeling like I would vomit. And then something I never expected happened: the instructor swam away with the other diver, leaving me completely alone underwater while I was in distress and unable to swim properly. To anyone who has never dived: If you vomit underwater and cannot ascend, you can choke — because divers must breathe through their mouths at all times. This is why instructors must never ignore an ascent signal, and must never leave a sick beginner alone. I eventually surfaced on my own, because I was very sick. The instructor, instead of offering support, she chose to raised her voice at me at the surface for not staying under the water. I vomited twice after leaving the water. What made this worse was the response afterward. When I raised my concerns later, the instructor publicly suggested I misunderstood signals that I was not taught, and I created confusion. Instead of acknowledging what happened, the blame was shifted onto me, a beginner who signalled distress multiple times. For me, this was a deeply frightening experience. For any beginner, it could have been far worse. I have reported this incident to SSI (the authority) because this was not a misunderstanding — it was a serious breakdown of fundamental safety procedures. My family’s good snorkelling experience shows that the shop is capable of excellent care, but what happened during my dive should never happen to any beginner under any circumstances.

A brilliant experience for the first time diving. Roberta and Sven are such welcoming people who are clearly so knowledgeable in their field. I’d recommend this activity to anyone staying in Tenerife. The marine life you see while diving is amazing, you are trained in an extensive after demonstration so you know what you are doing and once again Roberta and Sven are the best instructors you could ask for. Thanks for having us!! Sean

We had a great experience, super friendly staff who explained everything well. My 15 year old didn’t like the sensation of breathing under water so didn’t do the sea dive but that was not a problem

I could not recommend Andrea enough for a dive at any skill level. We were all first time divers and had an amazing experience, made super fun and friendly by Andrea. We will definitely be returning when in Tenerife again.

Excellent introductions to diving with Andrea, very professional, patient, he takes care of everything, even taking pictures! So good that we did a second dive in the same day on another site. Thank you for a wonderful day. Thierry and Sophie

Thanks To the Goo Diving team for an awsome experience last week!! I took my son's (15&18) for a try dive and it was so good that we went on to do the full PADI cert with an additional 2 half days. Andrea was such a good instructor and I felt safe going up to 18m depth with him and my boys. We saw an abundance of fish as well as sting ray, eagle ray, turtles, octopus and to top off the final trip, an Angel shark!! It's unheard of in these water in August (normally see them in November) yet Andreas managed to find us one and it was an unusual discovery that just made the experience even more amazing - you never know what you're gonna find down there! The videos that Andrea took are also excellent and a very nice souvenir to take home. Now that we are certified open water divers (which took just 3 mornings to achieve from scratch) we can go diving anywhere in the world. I would say to anyone looking for some serious adventure on their holidays (but not too extreme!) - Screw it just do it!

Enjoyed a really great refresher course and dive with Roberta who was not only a great teacher but also a very nice person. She was very friendly and went out of her way to do everything possible to help me get my confidence back diving which was very much appreciated after an almost 2 year break. The shore dive was also very nice and I saw many nice fish and nice scenery. Would highly recommend Goodiving to anyone who wanted to dive in the south of Tenerife as I thoroughly enjoyed it. Thanks Roberta and all the best to you guys at Goodiving

Amazing experience from start to finish. The team were so knowledgeable and so passionate about what they do.. would definitely recommend a visit to goodiving if you are in tenerife.. what an amazing experience.. will be back again soon

We found the Goodiving dive centre by accident as we drove past near to our hotel, I’d been looking for a dive centre for myself, my 14yr old son and his friend to do a taster dive session. The centre had a family run feel and I felt that this was a good fit for us, especially given that the initial training takes place in a swimming pool at the centre (not many centres can offer this) which offers a much more controlled environment for absolute beginners. Our instructor Mariana explained everything really well and gave us confidence for the open water dive. We then transferred by minibus to Playa Abades, a (not that) local beach, which they said is one of the better locations for beginners on their first ocean dive. There’s an area of flat sand to acclimatise to the open water along with an area of sea grass where the sea life goes to feed. We were lucky enough to see a green turtle that swam straight up to our group which is something we’ll never forget, along with a Barracuda feeding off the sea grasses. All the costs (equipment hire, transfers) were included with no hidden extras, they even provided post dive snacks. You only need to bring water and a towel. I’d strongly recommend.