Today was diving day. We did sneak in about an hour at the pool before I went to my scuba refresher course. It’s a good thing I decided to do the course. I remembered everything to do, but it was good to get under the water again and remember how it all feels. It had been 4 years since my last scuba adventure.
After the refresher, I went back to the hotel to get a quick lunch, pick up Jim, and headed back to the dive shop for our afternoon dive. We were told to be at the dive shop at 1:30 for a dive that was sche
duled for 2:00. At 2:30 we were still waiting at the dive shop. Island time is on an entirely different clock! We met the others on our trip – a family of 5 from Costa Rica that included the dad, 2 sons, a daughter and her boyfriend. Luckily they spoke English as well as Spanish, so we could communicate with them pretty well. We finally left for the boat around 2:45.
We got our equipment set up on the dive boat and met Tito, the dive master who would escort us on the dive. He’s done over 20,000 dives! I can’t imagine that many dives. He is from the island of Bonaire and he said he started diving at the age of 4! Amazing!! He was a great leader – very patient and thorough in his explanations.
We entered the water and began our descent… only I didn’t descend! I didn’t have enough weight. I was carrying 14 pounds, but it wasn’t enough to get me under. I never thought I’d be told I wasn’t heavy enough! LOL!! He went back to the boat and added more weight – I now carried a total of 20 pounds. It worked – I sunk.
At first I had some trouble with my bouyancy. It was hard to get to neutral bouyancy – where I could just rise or fall by exhaling or inhaling – but Tito helped guide me. I was able to get control enough to glide easily over the reef. We saw some amazing things – Sergeant Majors, Blue Tangs, Trumpetfish, Parrot Fish and a huge Sea Spider. Scuba opens up a whole new world!
Before we knew it, it was time to ascend and board the boat. The water was quite choppy, and as I floated on the water, I bobbed around like crazy. I finally got on board, ditched my equipment, and took a seat. Unfortunately, I had bobbed around a little too long. Suddenly, and without warning, I got nauseous. I ended up heaving over the side of the boat. Ugh! The Costa Rica family and all the dive masters were very gracious about it. We all laughed it off and then enjoyed some watermelon.
After we got back to the pier, we cleaned up our equipment then returned to the dive shop. From there we went back to our hotel and got cleaned up for dinner. We had a big dinner ahead of us. We had a $100 gift certificate to The Buccaneer, courtesy of La Cabana (for the time we spent at an owner’s update). Jim was looking forward to the dinner since he secretly wishes he could be a pirate. The restaurant didn’t disappoint. There was half a ship in the entry room of the restaurant. Each table had its own aquarium and was set with goblets and huge plates and silverware. It reminded me of what you see in pirate movies. Very cool!
We started our meal with a drink and appetizers, followed by a salad course. We then had our entrees. My meal consisted of seafood, seafood, and more seafood. It was all delicious! For dessert, Jim ordered an incredibly-chocolate chocolate cake. Somehow we managed to spend nearly all $100! We certainly didn’t eat it all, but we did spend it all. I had a few meals worth of leftovers. It was the dinner that kept giving!
03/28/10
The New Griswolds 