Sea Snakes and Sweetlips- Week One at CCC

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After a very busy first week I, along with Debs, Iris, Pau and Guisla, are now certified Advanced Open Water Divers! It has been hard work, having to work around the windy and rainy weather, which made the sea next to Napantao too choppy for training but the hard work and careful planning by the CCC staff meant training was able to carry on.

We ended up travelling to the more sheltered bay at Analao which meant the days were long and had to be carefully organised but it was worth it in the end when we finally qualified! Tomorrow we begin the Science Development Programme with the new volunteers but today we are recreational diving to celebrate our new qualifications. It was great to be back on house reef where the wildlife is so much more abundant as Analao is a bit more empty although I did spot a sea snake, a juvenile spotted sweetlips (an adorable fluttery spotted orange fish which grows up to be far less cute. Unfortunately, my inability to adequately reproduce the 'wigglebum' dance that the fish is so famous for later that night meant that my nomination of it for Creature of the Day was invalidated), and a crab wearing an upside down jellyfish there.

Life at CCC is hard work with lots of training and plenty of chores to keep the place nice to live it, but I love it here. Being so close to such an amazing site of nature is a real privilege and I am lucky enough to here with a group of great people.

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