When I was young I spent time with my friends climbing on rocks, trees, exploring the neighborhood and catching and finding animals. When the night came, we had to go home because our Mother insisted we were home for dinner. We had plenty of these short adventures, now known as 'microadventures'.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we haven´t been allowed to travel, therefore we have been spending our time at home or close to home. This limitation has not only been annoying but some of us have recognized the benefits of it.
For me, Corona meant four cancelled trips abroad, countless cancelled courses and cancelled presentations in Germany and Switzerland. I had time to relax, spent more time with the family, and have been able to do things I always wanted to do, but never had the time to: new book projects, a new website, creative work and so on. Of course it was not all fun, you still have to pay your bills and you have no clue how long the situation might last, but it is also a Freediver skill to see or search for the positive things in any situation.
One of the things I always wanted to do was to spend more time in surrounding lakes and rivers. I was really fascinated by these dive sites. In an area of 20 km around my house I can dive with turtles, the great crested grebe, all kinds of fish including big catfish, pikes and sturgeons. There are some lakes in the black forest, some in the city of Freiburg and rivers close to Alsace in France and Switzerland, so instead of meeting in the pool, I spent a great amount of time with my freediving buddies in the lakes, diving down to a max depth of 50 m (the depth of our deepest lake). After the dives we always sat together and had a beer. Before Corona, we mostly never had time for things like this.
There is also space for creativity. I spent some days hiking through the black forest and did sea trekking. This is a combination of trekking on the land and in the water, which is usually done in Thailand, Croatia or Italy. You carry your waterproof backpack on your back and as soon as you reach a lake, you get out your Freediving equipment. When you have stored everything in your backpack, you close it and blow in some air. Now you have a combination of a float and a bag. Fixed with a flexible leash on your ankle, you keep on traveling, but this time in the water. For us divers it is a wonderful opportunity to travel on, in and beside the water, and spend a lot of time outdoors.
As a freediver we have the great chance to explore lakes and rivers, even when they are in areas which you can´t reach by car, as our equipment is light and we only need a mask, a snorkel, some fins and a single breath and of course - just add water.
Nik
3rd July 2020
