Diving & Dolphins

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Roatan:
Flew from Quito, Ecuador, back up to Miami, and back down again to San Pedro Sula, Honduras. Pretty silly way of doing it, but that's what worked out. Stayed in an unremarkable sort of hostel for one night, then a quick flight to Roatan, part of the Bay Islands, off the coast of Honduras. Was occupied by the British for a while, so a lot of English speakers there, and enough gringoes that US dollars are accepted almost as easily as lempiras (a 19 to $1 exchange rate).

The big draw is the coral reefs around the island, offering some of the best and cheapest diving in the world. Especially good for beginners, with a lot of safe, experienced instructors, mild currents, clear warm water, etc. Most are registered and monitored by PADI, the world's foremost diving agency (Professional Association of Dive Instructors, I believe it stands for). That's what I was there for. The Open Water Diver certification (allows you to go up to 60 feet deep) takes three days, so I planned to be there for 5 nights. Ended up staying 7 nights, because of a storm, mostly.

The first day, I secured accommodations and checked out the different dive shops. Accommodations were a stroke of luck... A tour operator I talked to rents out the basement suite of his house. He had a gap between renters, so I got a slightly dirty but serviceable mini kitchen, dining area, fridge, bedroom, and private bathroom for $10 a night for the first five nights, and he threw in the sixth night for free.

The stove died on the first day, but he allowed me the use of his stove if I needed it, so that was nice. Didn't do much cooking but a bit of beans and tortillas and bread with nutella and peanut butter helped offset the expense of any regular meals I was paying tourist prices for.

Roatan is very beautiful, the quintessential island paradise with coconut trees, white sand beach, clear warm water... However, the West End village alog the beach where I was staying felt a little artificial, as if without tourists to hold it up, it would collapses and disappear. Walked a couple hundred metres away from the beach and it felt more real. On the beach, one might too easily be lulled into inertia, doing little but sit around between dives and sip little fruity drinks and turn into a lobster in the sun.

I tried to avoid that, and found a dive shop fairly quickly. Almost went with Coconut Tree Divers, the biggest, most popular dive shop, but decided to check around a bit more and discovered Enomis Divers, a smaller, quieter operation. They offered one on one instruction for cheaper than Coconut Tree. All in all, one on one instruction for the full course was $295, plus $10 for your diving logbook to record all diving experiences. Looked up the price at a dive shop back home... I'm paying literally half what I would in Canada.

Glad I didn't go with Coconut Tree, actually, as I wasn't supposed to hear this, but I overheard the owner of Enomis and my instructor discussing Coconut Tree. They have a somewhat lackadaisical approach to safety, and too large groups, apparently, so good thing I didn't pick them.

Couldn't get started immediately, though, as the morning of the second day there was a storm that raged all that day and into the next. But I did watch the necessary cheesy instructional videos, so it wasn't a total loss. The third day I could get started, despite the storm, as the first diving is practice in shallow water, and could be done in a pool. My instructor, Mag, a nice Canadian lady, was very patient, which was good as I was very nervous.

Scuba diving is just such a weird thing to do, honestly. Most of it goes completely against your instincts. When you are underwater, you WANT to hold your breath, not keep breathing, and it's new, so you breathe too fast. Strap lead weights on and jump in the water? Are you crazy? Deliberately take off my mask underwater so I can put it back on? Oh, and now you're going to shut off my air supply so I know what it feels like? Eep. I am VERY good at psyching myself out, but I was the only student, so we could do at my own pace.

As it was, I started freaking out a bit, so we took a break for the day, and Mag told me to do the necessary readings to prepare for the quizzes (yes, there's a bit of an academic component, too) and we'd continue on tomorrow afternoon, if I wanted to. Or, I could quit, and just say 'well, that wasn't for me, oh well."

I honestly think that if I'd been in a big group, and feeling the pressure of keeping up with everyone else, and not holding them back, etc, I probably would have quit by this point. But I wasn't holding anyone back but myself, so I did some relaxing yoga, talked myself out of it and back, talked to my mum and sister over the internet, and convinced myself to keep going. The next day I did all the readings and came in during the afternoon, ready to dive!

Sadly they had to catch up on their previous student, who was meant to have finished already, but the storm had cancelled her dives. They only have two instructors, Mag and Lee, the owner of the shop, and they had both done as many dives as they safely could that day. Darn. So I went kayaking around the bay, watched the sunset, etc, and came in the next day to finish the confined water component.

Surprise! Turns out I'd done enough confined water skills for the first of my four open water dives, so grab your stuff, we're going down to 35 feet! Sounds mean, but it was actually really smart. Because the minute we were down in the coral reef, floating amongst the multitudes of colorful fish, giant sponges, and beautiful coral formations... I was hooked, if you'll pardon the fishy pun.

Seriously. So glad I didn't quit. Scuba diving is AWESOME. It's very cool to be in other 70% of the planet, so to speak... Actually IN the ocean, not on top of it. Very odd feeling looking up and seeing 30 feet of water between you and the surface. Did that dive, another confined water dive (this time in the shallow bay), and another open water dive that day. The second dive was probably the best. Got very close to a sea turtle, and at one point looked around and realized I was completely surrounded by a massive school of fish!

Ended the day feeling a lot more confident about the whole thing. Finished the quizzes and most of the academic stuff, just had to go over dive tables (figuring out how long you can safely stay under at different depths, how long to wait between dives, etc.), finish the last two dives, and take the exam. On the last dive I had a little bit of problems with equalizing my ears going down, but sorted that out and had no problems.

Went all the way down to 60 feet this time, which is the limit for Open Water divers, that was neat. Then easily passed the exam, and boom, I was certified! Proud of myself because I almost quit, but didn't, made it through, accomplished it. Will continue to scuba dive when I get back to Canada, I think...

Once I got over the nervousness, I quite liked it! Was going to continue on to the neighboring island, Utila, the next day, to see a bat cave, but unfortunately had to cancel it... In order to snorkel with dolphins! (I know, you must feel so sorry for me). I had booked it for Saturday morning, leaving on the 1:30 ferry. Unfortunately the booking didn't go through to the office, and a cruise ship booked all the spot, so I had to go at 1 pm, instead, and miss the ferry.

Switched to a hostel a little bit away from the main drag for that night, and then headed over the Roatan Institute for Marine Sciences at Antony's Key Resort on the island. They are captive-bred dolphins, not wild ones, but they live in an net enclosed lagoon with coral, seaweed, wild fish, and enough space that if they want to be alone, they can. No barren concrete tanks here.

Began with a half hour introduction with a trained dolphin, who did a few jumps, and tricks, then let us stroke him and hug him very gently, while he trainer talked about dolphin biology and other info, and gave the dolphin his lunch. At one point the dolphin went speeding off to chase some other dolphins, then came back after a moment or two. That part was quite cool, and most people in the group only stayed for that part, as the snorkeling was extra, so it was just me and a pair of ladies doing it.

Got in and snorkelled around a bit, supervised by one of the trainers. Took a few moments before any of the dolphins approached, then one sped past, and another. Following the instructor's advice, I dove for a length of seaweed... They like to play with it.

One was swimming around the trainer, so I went over. She came up to me, and we played tug of war with a piece of seaweed. She play-bit my arm at one point, which was a bit scary... Dolphins have large mouths and sharp teeth! Not done to injure, though, and pretty great anyway. I stroked her a bit (skin felt almost like a diving wetsuit) and she sped off again. Snorkelled for a bit, then a group of three came up, including a ten month old baby dolphin who also played tug of war!

They swam off, and it continued in much the same way. I dove down a few times (they liked the bubbles), played tug of war with some other dolphins, petted some more, had a few bump into me jokingly and try to bite my flippers... Seriously great experience. Not just saying this, but I watched the other two ladies a little bit, and I think the dolphins liked me best...

There were about twenty dolphins in total, and some of them definitely were more aloof than others. It was a big enough lagoon that they could easily avoid us... If they were playing with us it was for their own amusement, not ours. Ended all too quickly though, and it was back to the hostel. Tried to do some more yoga, but the class had been cancelled, so I watched a terrible quality pirated copy of the Avengers instead. Good movie. The next morning, I managed to fit in two extra dives while waiting for the ferry, then it was off to the mainland.

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