Hey guys, we've hit the end of the road in our trip through Central America and it has been a ride to remember!
The day before yesterday, as I said, we went to Masaya, north of Granada and also a little larger but it is the "capital" of Nicaraguan artifacts and since it is the end we thought it would be the right time to stock on traditional items hehehe. There was the "Mercardo Viejo" which resembled a lot the one in Antigua...actually pretty much all the three countries (Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua) have the same artifacts and they all sell hammocks...the local pastime :)
We got back to Granada in the afternoon and had dinner in the main square before heading back to the hotel with the free internet and telephone calls, not to mention the pool in the middle of the courtyard hehe
Yesterday we took a chicken bus down to San Jorge where we got a fishing boat (converted to passanger boat) to the Isla de Omotepe. The boat trip was a bit of an adventure as the lake water was rugh because of the weather and the boat rocked back and forth as if a baby in its cradle with water coming in from all sides and quite a few people getting seasick! The island is made of 2 volcanoes -- Concepcion and Maderas -- one of them is still active and the other now has a lagoon in its crater...unfortunately we did not have enough time to climb up the one with the lagoon as we had to leave the next day and a tour usually takes at least 8 hours! We got a hotel on the shore of the lake pretty deserted from everywhere else but next to Charco Verde (green lagoon) which we explored this morning.
Today after walking a bit around the lake and taking some photos of the local women washing their clothes on the shore with little tables set up in the lake with huge stones on top for "beating" the clothes clean we got back on another chicken bus to get to the ferry (this time a big ferry made for cars that didnt rock as much as yesterday's :) and then on another chicken bus to make the 2 hour ride back to Managua, where 2 canadian girls we crossed on the island had gotten robbed by 4 "kids" with a gun (dont worry, they didnt have much of value on them)...needless to say we dont plan on venturing much farther than the hotel today except for, of course, the internet hehehe. Also, today in Managua is the last day of Carnaval which, according to the taxi driver, is when people get the most drunk and the most likely to pick a fight, especially with an easy target such as a tourist with a camera hehehe...so yeah, he recommended us not to go see it...too bad :(
Right now, we are checking to see the new developments with flights into the USA due to this latest "terrorist plot" and we can no longer bring liquids or gels of any kind in our carry on but luckely they dont say anything about cameras so we're safe, its only for travelling into the UK that they are being more strict! So as of now (and for your knowledge in case of anything, tomorrow we will be on an American Airlines flight #970 from Managua to New York with a stopover in Miami and we should arrive in New York via flight #1072 at 9:15 pm(21:15) (local time). So keep a look out on planes tomorrow or the news hehehe
Thanks for reading us! Hope you've had a good time following us around Central America. We will update the blog with photos and some stories of New York once we get back to Brussels on tuesday morning!
Love,
Jo and Fil
Friday, August 11, 2006
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
The last stretch --- Nicaragua!
So, we made to our last country on our list an d friday we will be on our way to the Big Apple!
While still in Honduras we went to visit the national park La Tigra, 11 km from Tegucigalpa. For this we had to get a chicken bus in the morning that took us nearly to the entrance of the park ( all uphill by the way). On this bus we had an old Italian guy and middle-aged biologist /historian which completed our bus ride with a detailed briefing of the hi story of the European continent and of the Central American continent (not bad for a sunday morning:)
We got to the park with the sun beating down on us and alraedy with the full knowledge that we were going to miss the last bus back to town if we were to cross the entire park (11km), which was our goal that day :) So up a steep hill we go for at 1km. The park was beutiful but we didnt get too see too much wildlife although it is home to many different bird, insect and mammal species such as jaguars!! We only got to agoutis (sorta of a big cute rat and rounder and browner :) and quite a few insects but we only heard the birds as the park was very dense. After our arduous climb it began to get easy and we made it throught the uneven path, crossing many Hondurans on the way, to find a beautiful waterfall (this park is where 70% of Tegucigalpa's water comes from). There was a TV station with a camera there filming the people that came to see the waterfall so we might have been on TV this weekend :)
We crossed the entire park in 3 hours and of course got to the end to find that the last bus had already left so we start our walk down to the little quaint town on Valle dos Angeles where the lonely planet told us was definitely worth seeing. As we are quite lucky on the way down we found this nice (rich!!) Honduran couple who were looking for the old mine and decide to be nice and take us along with them as they were heading down to Valle dos Angeles as well!!! So we found the old mine, which is now closed and then went down in their very nice and comfortable car to Valle dos Angeles where they said that if we did not fin d a bus they would be more then happy to take us with them back to Tegucigalpa (I love nice people!)
Valle dos Angeles is very beautiful. Its a small town and since it was sunday night everybody was out walking and taking their kids to the central plaza for ice cream and cotton candy. We decided to stay there for dinner so said goodbye to the nice couple. We walked around and took some pictures before settling down for dinner on the main plaza. After,as we had been told that there were taxis that could take us to Tegucigalpa, we went looking for one, to find none whatsoever!! Everyone told us there wasnt any taxis and all buses had left. When we saw that our only chance would be to hitch hike back we were told of a nice man that might take us as he was the only taxi driver of the town...so we went to knock on his door and negotiate our trip back (as we would be leaving Honduras the next day we were running low on lempiras!) He was kind enough to take us in his beaten up taxi and we got back to the Hotel at the decent hour of 8 at night :)
Early to bed as today we had to get up at 4:30 in order to catch our bus down to Nicaragua!
We got the deluxe (although there are not very punctual around here as the bus is supposed to leave at 6, the customers didnt arrive until 6:30 and the man supposed to run the office didnt arrive until 7 and we had been there since 5:15!! ), although it was the same price as the normal bus and it wasnt even on our guide! We even had breakfast served to us and the chairs could recline almost to sleeping position---how's that for comfort?! At the border we got the foreigners treatment and didnt get our bags searched while everyone else had to -- I call it favourable discrimination or mayb e they just cant be bothered to check backpackers as they are tough to look into without taking everything out hehehe
Made it to Managua (the capital) by 1pm and after a quick stop in an ATM machine got on a minivan down to Granada, the most beautiful colonial town of Nicaragua.
It is quite beautiful and the hotel we are staying at makes it even more so...called The Oasis, it acutally has a pool in the middle of the spacious courtyard (which our room gives out to), there are hammocks, free internet, free phone calls (each person gets 10min each day) and it is locally right in the centre of town! Oh, and we ran into the couple we had shared the dormitory with 2 nights before (its quite common when backpacking : )
We had a nice walk around town this afternoon looking at the colonial buildings. At one point, after lunch, on the way back we walked to a side street full of kids that as soon as they saw our cameras came rushin g to us to get us to take photos of t hem and they even asked to take photos with our cameras :) We stayed with them for a while letting them play a little with the digital camera and Jo letting them see through his camera but of course not letting them take pictures hehehe
We got back to the hotel for a nice dip in the pool and we will probably hit the bed early as tomorrow we would like to go to another colonial town known for its artifacts called Masaya and chill in Granada in the afternoon before heading down to Isla Omotepe on wednesday :)
Its almost over guys...thanks f or sticking with us and dont forget to send us your comments!
Love,
Jo and Fil
While still in Honduras we went to visit the national park La Tigra, 11 km from Tegucigalpa. For this we had to get a chicken bus in the morning that took us nearly to the entrance of the park ( all uphill by the way). On this bus we had an old Italian guy and middle-aged biologist /historian which completed our bus ride with a detailed briefing of the hi story of the European continent and of the Central American continent (not bad for a sunday morning:)
We got to the park with the sun beating down on us and alraedy with the full knowledge that we were going to miss the last bus back to town if we were to cross the entire park (11km), which was our goal that day :) So up a steep hill we go for at 1km. The park was beutiful but we didnt get too see too much wildlife although it is home to many different bird, insect and mammal species such as jaguars!! We only got to agoutis (sorta of a big cute rat and rounder and browner :) and quite a few insects but we only heard the birds as the park was very dense. After our arduous climb it began to get easy and we made it throught the uneven path, crossing many Hondurans on the way, to find a beautiful waterfall (this park is where 70% of Tegucigalpa's water comes from). There was a TV station with a camera there filming the people that came to see the waterfall so we might have been on TV this weekend :)
We crossed the entire park in 3 hours and of course got to the end to find that the last bus had already left so we start our walk down to the little quaint town on Valle dos Angeles where the lonely planet told us was definitely worth seeing. As we are quite lucky on the way down we found this nice (rich!!) Honduran couple who were looking for the old mine and decide to be nice and take us along with them as they were heading down to Valle dos Angeles as well!!! So we found the old mine, which is now closed and then went down in their very nice and comfortable car to Valle dos Angeles where they said that if we did not fin d a bus they would be more then happy to take us with them back to Tegucigalpa (I love nice people!)
Valle dos Angeles is very beautiful. Its a small town and since it was sunday night everybody was out walking and taking their kids to the central plaza for ice cream and cotton candy. We decided to stay there for dinner so said goodbye to the nice couple. We walked around and took some pictures before settling down for dinner on the main plaza. After,as we had been told that there were taxis that could take us to Tegucigalpa, we went looking for one, to find none whatsoever!! Everyone told us there wasnt any taxis and all buses had left. When we saw that our only chance would be to hitch hike back we were told of a nice man that might take us as he was the only taxi driver of the town...so we went to knock on his door and negotiate our trip back (as we would be leaving Honduras the next day we were running low on lempiras!) He was kind enough to take us in his beaten up taxi and we got back to the Hotel at the decent hour of 8 at night :)
Early to bed as today we had to get up at 4:30 in order to catch our bus down to Nicaragua!
We got the deluxe (although there are not very punctual around here as the bus is supposed to leave at 6, the customers didnt arrive until 6:30 and the man supposed to run the office didnt arrive until 7 and we had been there since 5:15!! ), although it was the same price as the normal bus and it wasnt even on our guide! We even had breakfast served to us and the chairs could recline almost to sleeping position---how's that for comfort?! At the border we got the foreigners treatment and didnt get our bags searched while everyone else had to -- I call it favourable discrimination or mayb e they just cant be bothered to check backpackers as they are tough to look into without taking everything out hehehe
Made it to Managua (the capital) by 1pm and after a quick stop in an ATM machine got on a minivan down to Granada, the most beautiful colonial town of Nicaragua.
It is quite beautiful and the hotel we are staying at makes it even more so...called The Oasis, it acutally has a pool in the middle of the spacious courtyard (which our room gives out to), there are hammocks, free internet, free phone calls (each person gets 10min each day) and it is locally right in the centre of town! Oh, and we ran into the couple we had shared the dormitory with 2 nights before (its quite common when backpacking : )
We had a nice walk around town this afternoon looking at the colonial buildings. At one point, after lunch, on the way back we walked to a side street full of kids that as soon as they saw our cameras came rushin g to us to get us to take photos of t hem and they even asked to take photos with our cameras :) We stayed with them for a while letting them play a little with the digital camera and Jo letting them see through his camera but of course not letting them take pictures hehehe
We got back to the hotel for a nice dip in the pool and we will probably hit the bed early as tomorrow we would like to go to another colonial town known for its artifacts called Masaya and chill in Granada in the afternoon before heading down to Isla Omotepe on wednesday :)
Its almost over guys...thanks f or sticking with us and dont forget to send us your comments!
Love,
Jo and Fil
Sunday, August 06, 2006
White river...
We are now in the capital of Honduras, Tegucigalpa and very soon on our way down to Nicaragua where we will end our Central America journey....
Yesterday we had a pretty full day. We decided to go white water rafting up in Pico Bonito and the Rio Cangrejal as we were told it was definitely worth it.
Well, you definitely get your money's worth!! We got there and there were two more couples (both American) and 5 guys from El Salvador (all quite big and clumsy :) We were to have 4 boats in between all of us but before we were allowed on the boats we were in for some training...this meant passing two hours learning how to swim against the currents, getting caught in the rapids and knowing how to get out of them!! Well, I had done rafting before, once in the States and we never had any training, and Jo did kayaking in Bolivia and there they just checked that you knew how to float :) Here it was a whole other story that left us quite worse for wear! We had 4 tasks: the first was just to swim against the current from one side of the river to the other...you probably guessed that I was already freaking out by now as they also told us that an instructor had died on these rapids about 3 years ago and that is why one of the falls is now level 5...yes, an instructor!!!!
But anyways, we did the tasks well enough although the current was really strong and the river a little flooded as it had rained the night before so the instructors were throwing ropes every which way in order to catch us before the big rapids gobbled us up hehehe ... Think getting stuck in a washing machine and you will understand the feeling of getting sucked in and out of one of those rapids, not a pleasant feeling but we got through it (I with a couple of bruises and Jo begging for more!)
During the rapids we had tons of instruction from our guides: paddle forward, back paddle, on the floor, lean back-- but we made it through it all, even the level 5 drop! Jo never fell out of his boat (we werent allowed to be together as the guide said that when couples got on a boat together they are more preocuppied that the other is safe than doing the necessary paddling hehehe) and I only felt out once after a drop because the instructor that was next to me leaned too far left and made me topple on him making both of us fall out of the boat but they caught me straight after :) It was fun all in all but we had to work so hard against the current that now we could do with a long massage: I have a huge purple bruise on my left knee, my left shoulder feels like it just shoved 3 cows and Im limping on my right foot due the amount of pressure I was putting against the boat in order not to fall off!!! Okay, I need a massage, Jo was happy if we had done it for the whole day instead of just half a day!!! hehehe
We left the lodge and the mountain in the afternoon and just decided to walk down the mountain all the way to La Ceiba but after an hour down a nice pick-up truck picked us up free of charge and dropped us off at the entrance to La Ceiba where we then got a chicken bus that dropped us about 2 minutes from my friend's house.
We went to the cinema last night (for 40 lempiras each who wouldnt!! (that's 2 dollars per person!!) We saw Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and to be honest the film was good but the ending crap so we dont know if we can honestly recommend it...
This morning we said goodbye to Tiga and got our butts to the bus terminal to catch our 6 hour bus to Tegucigalpa...
We arrived at 16:30 and had no clue where to go and shared a taxi with another American couple and ended up getting the same hotel...at the beginning there was only one double room and one dorm room with 2 bunk beds...being the nice people that we are we decided to look at another hotel where there were 2 double rooms...kinda got screwed there as the other hotel was much more expensive and when we got back to the first hotel the double room had already been taken so for the first time during our trips (including India) we will be sleeping in bunk beds with a nice American couple from Idaho :)
Tomorrow we will be visiting the supposedly most beautiful national park of Honduras called La Tigra and visit a quaint little town called Valle los Angeles before heading down to Managua in Nicaragua on monday...
See you later
Love,
Jo and Fil
P.S. We have added some more photos so dont forget to scroll down to see the other entries :)
Thursday, August 03, 2006
We are now PADI certified!!
Hey guys,
When we last left you we had already done two days of scuba. The third day we had our final exam and we did great although jo had a little bit of trouble but that was mainly due to the translation to the french, it was quite crappy! Then we had our last two dives where we still had to do some skills, such as the mask flooding thing I dont like but we did great, I'm telling you, once you know you can do it you just need to breathe and take it easy and redo what you know you can :)
That day we also learned how to use a compass underwater, quite cool but I was crap at it, so Jo and the instructor had a good laugh about it...well, at least I'm good at reading maps!
At night we had a really nice barbecue, although we had to wait 2 hours for it as they got our order wrong the first time (just a tip, you need to be very patient with the island people here, they are incredibly slow and a bit dim-witted sometimes!!) And then we went ot one of the local bars and they had a band from El Salvdor playing drums and a hippie guy was juggling some fire torchs, pretty cool but we had an early night as the next day we had to get up super early in order to get our free fund dives before leaving with the 14:00 ferry back to La Ceiba.
For our fun dive we went to the other side of the island where the current is much stronger. I had a really hard time equalizing and sometimes it was really painful! And Jo went into the water with a headache so that wasnt too good either. We did get to see a lot of waterlife but in the process you kind of forget your underwater and start chasing the fishes and then find yourself much deeper than you should, at one point we were at 24 meters when we really should have only gone down to 18!!! So, when we left the water -- which was in itself a battle as the current was killer that at points you were swimming with all your strength and you still felt like you werent moving --- Jo started getting decompression symptons, such as headache and tingling limbs and had to be administered oxygen for 40 minutes, the poor guy!! I was okay but my ear was blocked for the rest of the day, also very painful...so all in all, we didnt get to do the second dive as it wasnt safe for Jo to return to the water... but we are now certified and free to dive unsupervised anywhere in the world (where gonna check out where we can do it in Belgium hehehe)
Now we are in La Ceiba with my friend Tiga.Tomorrow we are taking a tour to Pico Bonito, a mountain with white water rafting and we stay in a lodge in the forest so shuld be nice and then saturday we will head out towards the capital as we do have to start moving towards Nicaragua and our flight home hehehe...
Speak soon,
Love,
Jo and Fil
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
Scuba diving with the fishies!
Hey everyone!
Since our last entry we had just enrolled in the Open Water Diver Course which will make Jo and I certified to dive anywhere in the world unsupervised but always with a buddy :)
Now I have to admit I was nervous, scared, anxious and all the rest while Jo was just plain looking forward to it, but I do have a couple of things against me that he doesn’t, like I'm claustrophobic which makes me panic a lot faster, I have also never done this before and he has (even if it was 6 years ago he knew the experience!) and I am coming off a bad cold which could cause respiratory problems (but Jo had a little one too and that only meant that there would be more snot than usual in our mask (yummy!!) ). Even so, with all these things against me, we went and tried it :)
On our first day we had to study our manuals and do quick quizzes and knowledge reviews, also watch 3 DVDs (telling us the same thing the manual did!) and do two quick exams. That was the morning... In the afternoon we had to learn how to assemble and disassemble our gear out of water (of course!) and then we got on the boat with a couple of other divers and our instructor ---we had an instructor all to ourselves which definitely reassured me cause that meant we would get a lot more attention (especially me -- the anxious one hehehe). We got into our suits (squeezed was more like it -- those things are hot and with the sun blaring its not much fun), got our gears on ---you try walking on a boat with a huge tank of air on your back! -- and did our first long stride into the water with our regulators, fins, masks and all that stuff....Breathing underwater is cool -- a bit scary at first because you don’t really trust the regulator and its hard to tell your brain to switch from nose to mouth and stick to it! We snorkeled out to the shallow end for our contained water dive (that means that we are always close to the surface in case of emergencies or panic attacks)... I'm guessing that from all my mentions of panics attacks you've assumed I've had one -- well, you're right! Jo did all the tasks perfectly while I had quite a bit of problem with mine at first. There is a part when you are asked to flood your mask and take the air out after -- well, as the most important rule of diving is to never, ever hold your breath, I didn’t really get how it was possible to keep breathing through the regulator and breathe out your nose while holding your mask up and removing the water (and I have contact lenses so I had to do this with my eyes closed while Jo didn’t!) Anyways, to sum it all up, I got water in my lungs, panicked a couple of times, rose up, coughed, burped and even puked (yeah, I know, not pretty but at least I got to feed the fish hehehe!!) At one point I was really bad but I was able to get my breathing and gagging under control, floated for a bit and regain the nerves to keep going...also I asked a lot of questions of what I was doing wrong and finally understood the concept!!
We spent 3 hours doing these exercises and by the end both Jo and I could switch from regulator to snorkel and from regulator to alternate air source underwater, we could flood our masks and clear them, we learned buoyancy control (one of the most important lessons as this permits you to stay in the water without floating or sinking and most importantly without touching the coral at the bottom!!) and we (our I) learned that I could do pretty much everything with the regulator that I can out here, such as cough or spit into it (necessary if you have trapped air or some water in the regulator!) Came back out of the water a little shaky but happy that I didn’t quit (Jo would have killed me and I would have been disappointed with myself! -- especially when you see 9-year-olds do it so easily!!!!) We were exhausted after that so headed home (or hotel) and watched some TV before dinner and then decided to go to the bar next door to do our next chapters of the manual with a nice cold beer :)
Today, we had 2 more DVDs to watch and 2 more quick exams before hitting the water. We first had to prove we are physically fit so the instructor (Dan from London who has been diving since '96) made us swim 6 laps (without our gear --- don’t worry) and float for 10 minutes :)
Then, in the afternoon we got back on the boat but as we were leaving the propeller got caught on a rope so we had to wait for them to cut it off (this meant me looking out at the horizon in order not to get seasick!) When we finally made it to the site we dove in for a nice 43 minute swim to get to see the coral and get more used to the equipment... I was a bit anxious at first (just from remembering yesterday's experience) but I also remember that I did master the skills needed so there really shouldn’t be a problem!
The first dive was pretty cool but we had a bit of problem with our buoyancy control at first and I was having a hard time equalizing (this means popping your ears on the way down so that the pressure outside is equal to the pressure inside your body so that you don’t experience that painful sensation in your ears you get when you free dive deep down) but it got better as we went along and our confidence got higher :)
We got back on the boat to rest and also to let the nitrogen out of our bodies and got to enjoy a bit of swimming without all the gear (it’s a really nice feeling when you finally get the fins out :) When we were nice and rested (1 hour and 6 minutes -- we had to learn to calculate all this!!) We got ready for our second dive which would involve going through some of the skills we learned yesterday like buoyancy control and flooding masks (my favorite - NOT!!) Again Jo did great (he even managed to remove his mask at one point when it got fogged and actually took out his regulator to put saliva on his fingers to put it into the mask to defog it and get it back on -- I don’t know if I could be that brave hehehe) I didn’t do too bad myself and mastered all the skills, I'm quite pleased with it and after we completed them I felt even more confident because now I knew we could do it! So, from here on it was just smooth sailing and enjoying the wildlife -- it was amazing!
We saw tons of fish, of course, of all colours, shapes and sizes but we also saw coral life, jellyfishes, conchs, water snails and the coolest of all, a crab fight (but not just any regular crab, these looked like giant spiders with really thin legs and were yellow with back spots but are actually crabs) there were four of them and 2 were battling it our for the territory -- imagine these tiny things at the bottom of the ocean and you can actually enjoy the fight like a WWF wrestling match hehehe -- one finally managed to send the other running by pocking one of its many legs into its opponents mouth -- it was great!! hehe
We came back up happy and exhilarated -- the dives went great and the wildlife was amazing!
Tomorrow we finish the course and have our final exam. Then we just have to complete 2 more dives in which we redo some of the skills we already know and get to learn to use a compass underwater -- then we will have our Open Water Diver Certificate :) followed by 2 free fun dives on Wednesday --- can't wait so catch you guys later!
Thanks for the commentaries (would still prefer to get more though -- you don’t need to register in order to post!)
Lots of love to everyone,
Jo and Fil
Since our last entry we had just enrolled in the Open Water Diver Course which will make Jo and I certified to dive anywhere in the world unsupervised but always with a buddy :)
Now I have to admit I was nervous, scared, anxious and all the rest while Jo was just plain looking forward to it, but I do have a couple of things against me that he doesn’t, like I'm claustrophobic which makes me panic a lot faster, I have also never done this before and he has (even if it was 6 years ago he knew the experience!) and I am coming off a bad cold which could cause respiratory problems (but Jo had a little one too and that only meant that there would be more snot than usual in our mask (yummy!!) ). Even so, with all these things against me, we went and tried it :)
On our first day we had to study our manuals and do quick quizzes and knowledge reviews, also watch 3 DVDs (telling us the same thing the manual did!) and do two quick exams. That was the morning... In the afternoon we had to learn how to assemble and disassemble our gear out of water (of course!) and then we got on the boat with a couple of other divers and our instructor ---we had an instructor all to ourselves which definitely reassured me cause that meant we would get a lot more attention (especially me -- the anxious one hehehe). We got into our suits (squeezed was more like it -- those things are hot and with the sun blaring its not much fun), got our gears on ---you try walking on a boat with a huge tank of air on your back! -- and did our first long stride into the water with our regulators, fins, masks and all that stuff....Breathing underwater is cool -- a bit scary at first because you don’t really trust the regulator and its hard to tell your brain to switch from nose to mouth and stick to it! We snorkeled out to the shallow end for our contained water dive (that means that we are always close to the surface in case of emergencies or panic attacks)... I'm guessing that from all my mentions of panics attacks you've assumed I've had one -- well, you're right! Jo did all the tasks perfectly while I had quite a bit of problem with mine at first. There is a part when you are asked to flood your mask and take the air out after -- well, as the most important rule of diving is to never, ever hold your breath, I didn’t really get how it was possible to keep breathing through the regulator and breathe out your nose while holding your mask up and removing the water (and I have contact lenses so I had to do this with my eyes closed while Jo didn’t!) Anyways, to sum it all up, I got water in my lungs, panicked a couple of times, rose up, coughed, burped and even puked (yeah, I know, not pretty but at least I got to feed the fish hehehe!!) At one point I was really bad but I was able to get my breathing and gagging under control, floated for a bit and regain the nerves to keep going...also I asked a lot of questions of what I was doing wrong and finally understood the concept!!
We spent 3 hours doing these exercises and by the end both Jo and I could switch from regulator to snorkel and from regulator to alternate air source underwater, we could flood our masks and clear them, we learned buoyancy control (one of the most important lessons as this permits you to stay in the water without floating or sinking and most importantly without touching the coral at the bottom!!) and we (our I) learned that I could do pretty much everything with the regulator that I can out here, such as cough or spit into it (necessary if you have trapped air or some water in the regulator!) Came back out of the water a little shaky but happy that I didn’t quit (Jo would have killed me and I would have been disappointed with myself! -- especially when you see 9-year-olds do it so easily!!!!) We were exhausted after that so headed home (or hotel) and watched some TV before dinner and then decided to go to the bar next door to do our next chapters of the manual with a nice cold beer :)
Today, we had 2 more DVDs to watch and 2 more quick exams before hitting the water. We first had to prove we are physically fit so the instructor (Dan from London who has been diving since '96) made us swim 6 laps (without our gear --- don’t worry) and float for 10 minutes :)
Then, in the afternoon we got back on the boat but as we were leaving the propeller got caught on a rope so we had to wait for them to cut it off (this meant me looking out at the horizon in order not to get seasick!) When we finally made it to the site we dove in for a nice 43 minute swim to get to see the coral and get more used to the equipment... I was a bit anxious at first (just from remembering yesterday's experience) but I also remember that I did master the skills needed so there really shouldn’t be a problem!
The first dive was pretty cool but we had a bit of problem with our buoyancy control at first and I was having a hard time equalizing (this means popping your ears on the way down so that the pressure outside is equal to the pressure inside your body so that you don’t experience that painful sensation in your ears you get when you free dive deep down) but it got better as we went along and our confidence got higher :)
We got back on the boat to rest and also to let the nitrogen out of our bodies and got to enjoy a bit of swimming without all the gear (it’s a really nice feeling when you finally get the fins out :) When we were nice and rested (1 hour and 6 minutes -- we had to learn to calculate all this!!) We got ready for our second dive which would involve going through some of the skills we learned yesterday like buoyancy control and flooding masks (my favorite - NOT!!) Again Jo did great (he even managed to remove his mask at one point when it got fogged and actually took out his regulator to put saliva on his fingers to put it into the mask to defog it and get it back on -- I don’t know if I could be that brave hehehe) I didn’t do too bad myself and mastered all the skills, I'm quite pleased with it and after we completed them I felt even more confident because now I knew we could do it! So, from here on it was just smooth sailing and enjoying the wildlife -- it was amazing!
We saw tons of fish, of course, of all colours, shapes and sizes but we also saw coral life, jellyfishes, conchs, water snails and the coolest of all, a crab fight (but not just any regular crab, these looked like giant spiders with really thin legs and were yellow with back spots but are actually crabs) there were four of them and 2 were battling it our for the territory -- imagine these tiny things at the bottom of the ocean and you can actually enjoy the fight like a WWF wrestling match hehehe -- one finally managed to send the other running by pocking one of its many legs into its opponents mouth -- it was great!! hehe
We came back up happy and exhilarated -- the dives went great and the wildlife was amazing!
Tomorrow we finish the course and have our final exam. Then we just have to complete 2 more dives in which we redo some of the skills we already know and get to learn to use a compass underwater -- then we will have our Open Water Diver Certificate :) followed by 2 free fun dives on Wednesday --- can't wait so catch you guys later!
Thanks for the commentaries (would still prefer to get more though -- you don’t need to register in order to post!)
Lots of love to everyone,
Jo and Fil
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