Rowan's Round of Days

So yesterday we were talking to some other couples at the resort and they were going to go out with the hotel divemaster to some local sites in the morning. So at about 9am we presented ourselves to the divemaster with our vouchers and by about 10:15 we were on the water. This boat is much smaller than the Carey Dive Center boat and the captain was very good. The divemaster is a young man from Chicago (today was his 28th birthday) named, I think, Ivan. He is a bit of a goofball but also a serious diving guide.

We went first to MUSA (Museo Subacuático de Arte) and swam around the sculptures. Compared to the photos we've seen from Gwen & Jeff's visits, I think the coral and algae are taking over fast. The sculptures are amazing and the idea that they will someday be a reef of their own is way cool. Kurt wore the GoPro camera today and didn't get pix of the sculptures very much for some reason. Maybe we'll manage to go back.

After MUSA we neaded over to a section of Manchones and drived the reef looking at amazing schools of brightly coloured fish. There are a fair few pix on Flickr.

Because we had left our gear at Carey, we used loaner gear from the hotel. Oh man, I missed my fins! The loaners were just slip-ons and fairly flexible compared to my serious diver fins. My hips are killing me! We had a night dive schedule with Carey tonight but I begged off and Kurt went alone. I just don't think my body is up to all this. Too bad, night dives can be awesome fun. But we have a fairly strenuous dive scheduled with Carey for tomorrow and I think it was the better part of valor to go to bed early instead. Kurt is having a blast and it is definitely fun to watch someone fulfilling a lifelong dream. He says he has wanted to dive since his first Jacques Cousteau special at like age 8.

Anyway, I'm going to get some sleep and hopefully be all un-sore and vigorous in the morning.

I spent the week after the anniversary party recovery and working on my metadata class and packing for a trip to Isla Mujeres, Mexico with Kurt. We are staying in the hotel that Gwen and Jeff really like and it is quite spectacular. Gwen also sent us to Carey Scuba in town and their owner/dive master has taken Kurt through his water dives. He did the first one yesterday and today is doing open water. I got benched because I went on a dive yesterday with another of the shop's dive masters and I got a pretty bad mask squeeze (when you go down without equalizing your mas a vacuum forms against your face and breaks blood vessels). It can be really bad if you get too much pressure on your eyes. I didn't, but he thinks I'd risk it if I went in today. :( But Kurt will finish his open water certification this morning and we'll be good to go. The reef was really full of life and a nice dive. I look forward to doing it again (and I really wish I had an underwater camera)! So, I didn't manage pictures but my favorite fish looks like this - it really is neon blue.

So I guess once Kurt is done diving, we'll wander around town a bit and tool around the island. (We rented a golf cart which is a standard mode of island transportion.) The hotel has a swim up bar in the afternoon (they open different bars and restaurants with different times of day) and there is some kind of show tonight. (The first night we were here was karaoke. I did Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and Kurt and I did an amazing duet of Angel of the Morning. But most of the songs were by Britney Spears so we weren't able to do more. *giggles*)

Anyway, having fun in paradise. :)