Diving

What a fantastic day!  I went out for my first dive today with Dive Grenada.  As luck would have it, the day dawned miserable, rainy and windy.  Yawning, I headed out at 7:30 with grumpy thoughts and some English Tea in hand.  At 8:00 in the morning, the beach is deserted and Matt (my dive buddy) and I slowly make our way down the beach to our dive shop.  Rain or not, the beach is a beautiful sight even in the mist.  I chose Dive Grenada for their affordability and mainly their expertise.

Their boat is strictly for diving.  No frills...no fuss.  Which translates into a 20 ft-ish open boat.  No dive bags, no towels, no personal belongings...just you and your gear.  There is no dock so you have to don your gear and then shuffle down to the beach and wade to the boat which rests in about 4-5 ft of water depending on the swell.  Not a big deal right?  Throw in a little surf, your gear, your awkwardly held flippers, and you have a floating disaster waiting to happen.  I made it to the boat in the pelting rain wondering why I didn't choose the Aquanauts with their pretty, fancy, COVERED boat on the dock.  Sure...they left that one dive group the one time but it was only for like a half hour and it wasn't like anyone got hurt....  So with an unhappy mind, I haul myself up the ladder and into the yellow, poncho clad arms of Rafie our captain.  Great, I thought, the one local on this trip and he's clad likes he's expecting the next Katrina.  Matt and I bolt our gear in and prepare for the blustery trip out.  After a rather concerning GPS search for our dive site, that had me rethinking my Dive Masters' expertise, we arrived in the middle of no where.  I listened with rapt and terrified attention to my dive master while she explained to Matt and I how to do a back roll into the 4ft surges around us.  Again...why am I here?  The count of three occurs and I'm in the water clinging to my buddy and the rest of our floating group.  Our dive master wastes no time and down we go.  This was my first experience with the Big Blue.  Down, down we go with nothing but blue all around...the bubbles the only thing to mark what direction is up.  Hmmmm...not seeing a reef here captain.  Check the good ol' dive gauge...90 ft!!  30 ft farther then I'm suppose to dive.  Sorry Kerry!  Just as I'm gearing up to spend waaaay too much time contemplating the 9 story water column above me, I hear a rap of metal and glance over to my dive master to see two large Jacks scoot away (they're the length and width of my arm).  Behind them comes a curtain of "purple rain" made up of Blue Creole Wrasses.  And swimming in their midst are two Spotted Eagle Rays with wing spans of 4ft and tails longer then I am.  And they're simply one of the most amazing creatures I've ever seen.  Grace on wings.

The reef is now in sight and we're climbing out of our 90 ft hole to level off at the relaxing depth of 60 ish ft.  Life is everywhere, fish highways swirl around the rocks, moray eels the width of my arm move water over their gills, eels that look like snakes wriggle away, wrasses, butterflys, triggerfish, parrotfish.  Beauty. 

Now I'd love to say I wanted to stay down there forever, and didn't notice the passage of time...but I'm not quite there yet.  I'm very aware of my breathing, how cold I am, and probably spent more time wondering about my gear, position, etc then the teaming reef beneath me.  And I deeply missed regular air.  31 minutes later we're back in the rain and the chop and I'm FREEZING.   After another awkward ascent up the ladder I'm on the boat and give myself a pat on the back for the decision to down some anti-nausea meds this morning.  I made it.  This dive stretched every ability I have and it was incredible, hard and thrilling.  Next time will be better.
I didn't take the pictures in the photos but they are some examples of what was seen today.  My early birthday present to myself though is a real diving camera.  I am so excited!
Love you all.  And for goodness sakes, GET SKYPE ALL OF YOU or at least Yahoo IM so we can chat.  I'm missing everyone!  Bit homesick...okay...A LOT homesick.  Come see me!