Overnight
there was a pretty intense dog fight right upfront of our bed and breakfast. It
sounded like at least half a dozen dogs with our three dogs barking their
support Rom inside the fence.
The
next morning Heidi and I had to venue off fairly early for our scuba diving
trip. Within a couple metres of our B&B on the opposition side of the road
was a huge boa contractor laying motionless the ditch. I only walked into the middle of the street
to check it out, just in case, but could see that it was missing its head! even a couple of locals were heading over to
check it out. Our guess is that that was what the dog fight was about the night
before. I wish I had my camera on me, but since we wee going to be diving, we
left them at home.
The
scuba centre was only a few minutes down the road and it turned out that Heidi
and I had a private tour! Between the
two of us, I forgot my dive license and Heidi lost her dive log, but because we
chose a PADI shop they were able to look us up so we were still able to
go. There was a group of 4 other divers
(James, Lindsey, Kasia, and Mike) who were completing their search and rescue
certification who shared our boat and helped us get equipment. They were all around our age and from various
parts of the world. It seemed like they
were having a great time; maybe a bit too great because their dive master
chewed them out for not preparing enough.
That was a bit awkward.
At the
boat we met Captain Eddy and his dog.
Well, more like Eddy was the dog's human. He was a very loving stray that took a keen
liking to Eddy and followed him everywhere, everyday. Eddy has cats at home
though so he can't kept him, but they've clearly worked out some sort of
ownership arrangement.
The
boat ride to our first dive site was a bit rocky. I was just beginning to feel
a touch queasy when we dropped the anchor to start our dive. It was my first boat entry and I think I did
pretty good...except that I landed in a patch of golden strand jelly fish. As I was shouting in pain, Victor (our guide)
and Heidi were just looking at me like I was crazy. I've never been stung by jelly fish before
(nor even heard of the golden strand variety).
It feels like a short zap of electrocution but then that's it. It doesn't linger or itch or anything, but it's certainly not pleasant, and I
seemed to have landed a nest of them.
We
descended and I escaped their attack.
Under water I immediately forgot my nausea and focused on searching for
marine life. We were in a place called
starfish garden, and it was fairly common to see sea turtles there. And
possibly sharks and dolphins as well, but I was most interested in the turtles. Unfortunately we didn't happen upon any of
those three, but we did see a bunch of starfish, black sea urchins, a couple
crabs, a monterey eel, and several species of fish. There was a lot of palm coral but not a lot
of typical fish coral. In comparison to
Cuba (the only other place I've dove) there wasn't a ton of variety, but
overall it was very nice. We were under
for about 40 minutes, and during that time collecting even more jelly stings,
primarily on my legs but once on my lip as well.
Back
up on the water we had to wait for the students
to finish their dive/search and during that time I got viciously sea
sick to the point that I didn't think I would go for my second dive. I told Victor that I wasn't doing well and he
suggested I get into the water to bob around.
That was really helpful but it didn't fully clear up my nausea. I just floated around in the water for 20
minutes while we acclimatized hoping to get through it.
I
didn't throw up but it came close a few times.
Victor finally convinced me that I should at least try my second dive and I would dictate how fast we descended. If I couldn't handle it, we'd resurface. Though I felt peer-pressured I acquiesced and
pulled myself back up onto the boat. I
was so focused on not puking that Victor essential put all my gear on for me. When I was almost suited up, I told him I was
missing my weight belt, and we had to start again. Except that I couldn't and had to abandon the boat
once again. Again, the water cleared up
a bit of the nausea but at this point I felt like a complete asshat. All the other divers were very kind and
supportive though, and the dive master came in after me with my gear and helped
me suit up in the water. At the very least I was able to practise one of my
dive skills. No more excuses left,
Victor, Heidi and I started our descent.
Another golden strand jelly fish wrapped himself around my wrist but I
was too pukey to care. I followed the rope down with Victor insisting on
maintaining eye contact with me the whole time...which was difficult since I
trying to follow the rope. Within a matter of feet I realized that Victor was right; I was instantaneously better.
This dive was very similar in
aesthetics and variety to the
first, and we surfaced after about 35 minutes with similar disappointment in not locating any sea turtles. The boat ride back was waaaaay better because we drove very fast and
I sat on the nose of the boat to
keep the horizon in view. I chased with
Kasia about their program and her travels.
It sounded like an amazing experience, traveling around, collecting your
training and hours for your full dive license, but after my stomach complaints
that afternoon I recognize that it's just not in the cards for me.
Back on land we found the other girls at the farmers market just off the shore. Most of the stalls were packing up for the day but I managed to find fresh coconut water to soothe my poor stomach. At this point I also discovered that I had
gotten pretty badly sunburned on my face, arms, and thighs from bobbing around
in the water all afternoon. Awesome.
We wandered around to find the specific restaurant that Sandra
researched, only to find out that it wasn't open for lunch. Luckily,
we saw Captain Eddy and he brought us to a little Cuban restaurant that
under other circumstances we would never had tried. It was small and dingy but made excellent food.
After lunch the girls went back total the hotel while Heidi and I caught up on all the shopping we had missed. We dawdled around
for an hour or so before grabbing a bus back to our B&B but had to get off at the dive shop on the way to get our log books
signed. While there we chatted with
James for a long time about diving and the lion fish is an invasive species who is taking over American
waterways. His hometown of Jacksonville
FL hosts lionhead hunting dives and BBQs, and the winners usually bring home
250+ lionheads. Apparently they're very tasty fish, but the local marine life
won't touch them because of their colouring and spikes.
On our walk home we saw a shop called Kids Can Save the Rainforest. We
stopped in and bought a few things because they were 40%
off and proceeds went to the charity.
When we finally got home we cleaned ourselves up and joined the girls
next door at Gaia for some drinks. We
invited the Dutch couple who were also staying at Coyoba Tropical to come with
us.
They were a fun couple and had been
travelling for quite a while already.
Their last stop was in New York before heading home and the lady was
very pleased that they didn't have adequate clothing for NY weather and would
be forced to go shopping. At one point the guy made a loose comment about
getting married which set his girlfriend off on musing about when shed get a
ring. It was funny and Sandra told him
he got no pity from us because he set himself up for that one. We eventually left them to themselves and
headed off for a restaurant that boasted fire cooked pizza. The restaurant was
really beautiful: arranged around an old train carriage and backing onto a
forest. All their walls, table lamps,
and chandeliers were made out of recycled wine bottles, and their huge wood
stove was right up front at the entrance where you could see your pizza being
made. The menu was Amazing, capital A. We each ordered a different pizza, and
were told we got in in the nick of time because they we nearly out of dough. It
took forever but our pizzas finally
arrived...or rather, 5 of the 6 did.
Obviously it was my pizza that didn't come, because I'm that special kind of lucky. I waited patiently until the other girls were nearly
done before locating a manager to locate my pizza...and as foretold, they were
out of dough. He asked if they could
make me a salad instead: what was I in the mood for? I've been known to get
hangry, but I very calmly informed him that we we at a pizza place and I was in
the mood for pizza. He didn't looked
impressed, but had his crew scavenge around until lo and behold, more dough was
found. I didn't question or care why they previously insisted they had none,
nor wondered whether it was scraped off the floor, all I wanted was a fricken
pizza in my belly. And it was the best pizza ever.
