One of the most experienced instructor and diver in Iceland

My SIF now has over 500 dives on it, and counting!   -Finni Finnbjornsson
Finni Finnbjornsson is the owner and head instructor of Scuba Iceland an established diving school that also offers guided adventure tours.  He  is one of the most experienced instructor and diver in Iceland with over 3500 dives under his belt. His qualifications include a PADI Master Scuba Dive Trainer qualified to teach 11 specialties, he´s a full time dive instructor and guide. He has been diving instructor in Iceland since 1998.

After doing his training with Ocean Divers in the beautiful Key Largo, Florida in 1995, he worked as a instructor for Florida West Scuba School in Venice, Florida, and GCMI-South, Associated Marine Institute in Florida when he lived there from 1996-1998. While living in Florida he dived extensively in wrecks which is his passion, he never feels more alive except when he is at 100 feet inside a huge wreck.

Finni can be found at the Scuba Iceland headquarters close to Reykjavik harbour, most of the time working on diving equipment or teaching new students, that is when he´s not under water.  Scuba Iceland has a laid back atmosphere and German Shepherd "ULI" is always on guard to meet and greet new friends, and Finni´s wife and daughters are never far away, you could say "it´s a family affair".

Finni never dives without his JS watch, that is, you could call him our quality control, wearing our watches, while submerged in the North Atlantic or in a sub zero temperature lake dives in Iceland during winter, if our watch can stand up to Finni´s activities and demands we have succeeded in making one tough timepiece.  

We look forward to see and read about sport and rescue diving in Iceland

Diving with a Orca (Killer Whale)

Garðurinn (The Garden) is a name of a small fishing village on the Reykjanes Peninsula. This is the place where I had my most memorable dive to date. This was around my 25th logged dive.

The end of the old pier is a magical dive site, there site many divers have had their most beautiful dives, myself included. The reason is the plethora of fish af all kinds and sizes. On a good day a diver will see Sea Wolfs, Cod, Haddocks, small spotted Dolphins and the APEX killer in the ocean, the ORCA whale. 

And that is just what happened to me on a bright summer day when I went diving there with my dive buddy. We arrived there at noon and the water was calm og relaxed. As soon as we walk out of the car we saw a big fin coming out of the water about 50 meters from the pier. We looked at each other with a grin, is this for real?

To wait out the whale we where in no hurry to jump in water so we took our time to prepare.  By the time we jumped in the water we wanted to make sure that the whale was gone. As soon as we hit the water the vizibility was great for Iceland, in the 20 meter range. We swam out of the pier to the left and followed the bright sand to where the Sea Wolf live underneath the rocks and creavaces. 

I was playing with one big Sea Wolf a little over one meter long when my friend started to yerk me around and point to the north of us. In the small distance about 10 meters away from us came this most beautiful creature on the planet ocean, the ORCA in all its beauty.

I really dont know what happened inside of me, if my heart was pounding or if it stopped. I just know that I was really avare of the danger. I wanted to get out of the water but at the same time I wanted this to go on forever and it actually felt forever for him to swim by us.

The whale swam away from us and did not approach us again. We swam slowly back to the pier, looking with wide open eyes in all direction.

When we came out of the water we hardly spoke a word, we drove in silence back to Reykjavik.