Week nine: We've passed out - but the hard work continues

Completing the course has been a real roller-coaster ride.

Unfortunately week nine started on a sour note with our old problems with kit coming back to haunt us.

We failed our Final Military Exercise (FME) inspection undertaken by the Lieutenant Commander who is in charge of training.

As a result our instructors decided that we needed some more time to get this right and that we were worth another chance.

Therefore our training was extended by one week.

That meant that we didn't pass out with our original class and instead joined another class who were a week behind us.

We were gutted to begin with, but were grateful for another chance and were determined to make the most of it.

The recruits in our new class, Pellew Division, made us feel really welcome right from the start.

Fortunately we knew some of them already and by the end of the week it was as if we had been with them from the beginning.

Week nine started with damage control and fire-fighting.

Split into teams we were taught how to tackle a range of fires on board ship and were also able to get some practical experience using the correct extinguishers.

Then it was on to HAVOC - a sinking ship simulator that rocks from side to side and fills with water.

It simulates a ship holed by enemy attack and we had to work together to plug the breaches in the hull by hammering wooden wedges into the holes.

We then had to shore up the bulkheads with timber to re-establish the water-tight integrity of the ship.

It was very realistic and the equipment we used was exactly the same as what is used in a genuine situation at sea.

HAVOC was brilliant and was by far the best thing we had done during training.

While we were out saving ships from sinking and battling fires, the FME inspection was being carried out and we were both relieved to pass at the second attempt.

Our last major training milestone was the Final Military Exercise, known here as 'Wacky Wednesday'.

It started with a squad run around the camp.

Each team had to carry a stretcher with the object to complete the run as a squad in the fastest time.

From this we moved on to the Endurance Run, which was the assault course followed by the obstacle course.

The courses are about 400 metres apart and we had to sprint between the two to complete the challenge finishing back at the assault course. It was really tiring.

We were kept busy all day with a series of other team building exercises before finishing the exercise with a presentation on a subject which we had researched as a team.

Adam's group gave a presentation on the Battle of Jutland in World War 1, while Nick's team concentrated on the Battle of Trafalgar.

After completing Wacky Wednesday all that was left was the end of course appraisals and rehearsals for the passing-out-parade.

On Thursday night we were given a few hours off to go and meet our parents, grandparents, our cousin and our best friend who had travelled from home to see us on parade.

It had been nine weeks since we last saw them. It was the longest we had ever gone without seeing each other and strangely we were a bit nervous about meeting them.

In the end it was great and it was really nice to see everyone again.

The last day started with more rehearsals for the parade and then packing up our kit bags ready to move on to the next phase of our training.

Finally we marched out on to the parade ground as the passing out classes.

It was brilliant. We were so proud and it was the best day of our lives so far.

Overall initial training has been great. There have been good times and bad.

Meeting loads of new people have been among the high points.

So it's on to phase two training for us now and after a long weekend celebrating with our family and friends, we are due to return to Raleigh on Monday to start four weeks of seamanship training.

Then it's off to HMS Collingwood to learn our trade as Navy divers to make us ready to take our place at sea.