Getting There - Aneel's Travelogue

The others arrived yesterday afternoon. We went over to the dive shop and met the divemaster, Rafael, and got some paperwork, which we filled out at a restaurant overlooking the Malecón (waterfront road). It was an election day, so in addition to the normal cruising, there was a parade led by a police pickup truck. Dozens of cars with yellow balloons followed.

Today we got up, had breakfast, and walked over to the dive shop to pick up our gear. Apparently I wear an XL wetsuit, not an L. Then we walked over to the marina and got on our boats.

On the way out, we saw some jumping rays. Apparently it's mating season, and the males jump out of the water because the females are impressed by the sound of them splashing when they land (or so we're told).

Our two dives were fairly relaxed. Not too deep. The visibility here is only middling good, and the water is quite cold in places (though warm in others). There were distinct currents at the second dive site, which is something that I haven't encountered before.

I'm less psyched about the rental gear here. I'm diving with a weight belt, rather than with a weight-integrated BC, and during the first dive I accidentally dropped it. Luckily, Frederick grabbed it and handed it back to me. The BC also doesn't have pull tabs to let air out of the back, so I have to come upright to release air.

We saw some neat stuff: large schools of several types of small fish, some big parrotfish and groupers, a bunch of 4ft long cornet fish, a few small rays, and some beautiful multicolored starfish. Fifi was snorkeling near us and pointed out some neat crabs that were at the waterline.

On the way back in, we saw a lot of pilot whales. There were at least 20, of various sizes. They seemed quite unbothered by the boats, stopping by to check us out and swimming near us with no hesitation.