Diving in Utila

Me, my instructor, and my classmate right after getting certified!

Diving was an awesome experience. I ended up being in a class with one other girl, Jing, from Toronto. I’m very happy we had a small class size because we both got lots of attention and didn’t have to wait while our instructor was helping other people. It was a more personal experience. Our instructor, Heather, instantly set me at ease. It was quickly apparent that she was very knowledgeable about diving, cared about teaching, and put safety as her number one priority. The afternoon before our first dive lesson was raining, which made me nervous, but luckily it has been clear ever since.

Jing & I in scuba gear!

We started out right off the shore in shallow water, just kneeling on our knees. It was comforting to know that we could just stand up if anything went wrong. Breathing under water with a regulator was definitely a trip the first time we did it. We did a few skills here, and then went to deeper water, about 10 ft, to practice the skills some more. I was a little nervous because I am not very good at equalizing my ears, but it turned out to not be a problem. I was so preoccupied with trying to equalize my ears while exhaling on the way down that I kept forgetting to inhale. It sounds silly because breathing is so natural to do above ground, but I’m used to holding my breath when I go under water, not breathing. We had to take off our masks underwater for a minute, which is the skill most people have a hard time with. I thought it would be more difficult, because I often hold my nose when jumping in the water and hate getting water in my face, but it turned out to be easy. After mastering our skills, we had a night off, and the next day we had our first dive out in the open water. It was very exciting to go diving. We saw lots of beautiful fish, many an electric blue color. The visibility right now is only so-so because it’s spawning season – meaning there is fish sperm everywhere, lovely. We had to repeat our skills in the open water, one of which was taking off the mask and putting it back on and clearing it. While easy to do in the shallow water, I did not like doing it in the deep water, I think I just freaked myself out because we were 12m under water and I couldn’t open my eyes and see anything. I ended up inhaling some water through my nose which wasn’t too fun.

After finishing my open water certification, I moved onto the advanced open water course, we just entails doing 5 more different dives. We did a deep dive, going down 30m to a boat wreck. While it was interesting to see the wreck, it was not my favorite because there just wasn’t a lot of wildlife to see down there. Also, when we got down to the bottom of the ocean, I realized my regulator wasn’t working very well, so I switched to my alternate. I forgot to clear it though before taking my first breath, and so I got a mouthful of water – grr. Then we did a PPB dive to work on our buoyancy. We took turns swimming through hoops and knocking over weights with our regulators. The next day we did a dive to work on our navigation skills with a compass and then did a drift dive. The drift dive was definitely my favorite so far, even though it wasn’t much of a drift because there wasn’t a current pushing us along. We swam for 40 minutes and surfaced, where the boat came to pick us up instead of turning around half way through the dive. This dive was my favorite because we saw so much wildlife. There were lots of beautiful fish of all different colors, munching on algae or digging through the sand. I also saw two fishes fighting by biting at each other’s mouths. The highlight was seeing a little orange sea horse. I was able to swim right up to him; he was hanging onto a plant about 3 inches from my face. Seeing all the colorful wildlife was amazing, and I have just one more dive left until I am certified.

Beach at Utila!

Diving definitely takes a lot out of you. I went to bed pretty early every night after diving, completely exhausted, and always had a large appetite as well. Last night was New Year’s Eve, and I was planning to go out and do something, but I couldn’t muster the energy. Plus, being on the rocky boat definitely made me feel nauseas and unsettled. After eating dinner, Nate and I ended up taking a nap, setting our alarm clocks for 1130. We got up and went down to the dock in front of our hotel to watch the fireworks, and we were the only people down there. We were able to see four different fire work shows that went for about an hour, so we were able to have a fun albeit mellow evening. Today we’re taking a break from diving. Since it’s not wise to dive hung over, the dive shops decide to just close and give everyone the day off. I actually appreciate it because even though I’m not hung over, my body is still suffering from some vertigo from being on the boats so much. We have spent the day lying out on the dock and swimming in the ocean, not a bad way to spend the first day of the year!