You’re planning your next holiday and want to squeeze in as much diving around the area as you can. Borneo itself being one of the top dive destinations in the world and you start reading reviews on dive centres and dive sites. Comments you see floating around being “hitting my personal max depth record of 29.7 metres!”, “definitely have your advance before coming here!”, “Eagle rays swam past at 25metres!”, “frogfish at 28metres!”. You have an open water diving license and definitely want to get the most of your diving holiday. So you think to yourself, maybe it’s time I get my advanced open water certification.

Here are 5 reasons to do your Advanced Open Water in Kota Kinabalu:

1. Convenience

Kota Kinabalu is the capital of Sabah (North Borneo). It has an international airport that is 10 minutes away from the city centre. Your dive sites are only 15 minutes away by boat from town. First-world amenities at your doorstep and 5-star hotels within a 10-minute drive to the jetty to head out for a day of diving. There’s no other place on earth with this quality of diving so close to the city centre.

2. Cost-effective

In Kota Kinabalu, almost all dive centres are mainland-based. This means you can book your dive courses without having to worry about inflated dive resort prices but still get your certification from a top-rated dive centre that maintains high standards in training its student divers. Choices of accommodation from cost-effective backpackers to 5-star resorts are abundantly available within 10 minutes from the meeting point/most local dive shops. This is one of the cheapest places to get a proper diving certification.

3. Calm waters and ideal underwater topography

Kota Kinabalu is known and ideal for doing any course because of its calm waters and mild to none currents. This makes doing advanced open water dives such as peak performance buoyancy or underwater navigation a lot better because you’re focused fully on the skills at hand and not being dragged away by currents. It is also ideal for doing the course’s deep dive as most of the sites are sandy at 30 metres. You can rest assured and be comfortable completing the tasks during the deep dive without worrying about damaging corals or hurting yourself.

4. Affiliated dive centres

Plenty of the dive centres in Kota Kinabalu are attached to or have branches in other areas. Some even in other countries. This allows you to get first-hand information on deals and special promotions being given, with possible discounts! Most of the dive staff have worked in other areas as well and can give you their personal opinion on where the best diving is and dive centres they feel give you the best service, value for money and are environmentally conscious.

5. Easy booking

Enrolling in a course in Kota Kinabalu is so easy. Dive shops are in town and the jetty is a 10-minute walk from the dive shop. Even if diving wasn’t on your list of things to do, you can easily squeeze in an advanced open water course in between your activities as Kota Kinabalu is generally the base for most travelers. Ideal for the last-minute backpacker/planner, all you do is show up, make a booking, and do 2 days of diving the following days (or days of your choice) without any extensive travelling from your base. It doesn’t get any easier than that!