finally, some scuba diving! i was anticipating this ever since we came to Costa Rica. we rushed to breakfast so we wouldn’t be late to the departure time of 8:30AM. we got there with a few minutes to spare. whew! but there was no need to rush cause 1. this is a laid back village where a costa rica minute lasts about 3 minutes, and 2. a couple called in last minute and ask to join so we had to wait 30 minutes for them to arrive.

we went to get outfitted with our gear. our instructor, lucas, said that a wet suit was optional cause the water was warm enough. i would try it without a suit but take one just in case. the crew carried everything to the boat and we hung out on/next to the boat waiting for the couple to arrive. the water was like glass. the sky and water seemed to merge perfectly.

we were to go diving in a tiny boat. both dee and i were skeptical that everyone (9 people) would fit. we did indeed fit, but it was close quarters.

the white boat is the boat we were going on. it currently doesn’t have the engine attached. they attached it later. definitely different than the huge boat we had in thailand.

the couple showed up, and we pushed off. dee told me several times that she was nervous. i was a bit nervous too. we had forgotten some stuff, but lucas said not to worry. he was pretty laid back but he said he would be painfully slow on checking our equipment, which made me a bit more relaxed. he described the dives and how far we would go down. i was unsure if i had heard him right when he said we would be diving to 100 ft (30 m) on the first dive, but i was right. uh, i’m only certified to dive to 18 m, but what the hell, i was excited to find out what its like down there.

we arrived at the dive site out in the middle of the water about a mile off coast. lucas helped each of us suit up * WPG2 CANNOT LOCATE GALLERY2 ITEM ID 6476 * and then he would help us carry ourselves * WPG2 CANNOT LOCATE GALLERY2 ITEM ID 6437 *to the edge of the boat where we were to sit on the edge with our backs to the water and fall backwards. in thailand, we jumped off the boat feet first. so, this method sounded kind of bizarre at first.

as each person went off, lucas first checked that we were ok (tap on the head) and then gave us a score on our gracefulness. dee was so funny. she did her backflip and lucas gave her a 7 for her gracefulness, which was the highest so far. i got it all on video here.

i thought i was pretty damn graceful seeing as how i managed to get to the edge without his help and leaping off, but he gave me a 5 or something like that. oh well, i’m a clumsy goof anyways.

since my camera wasn’t waterproof, i couldn’t take pics of the diving trip, so you will have to be imaginative with my writing. we didn’t spot very many big fish, but we saw plenty of small fish and tons of coral. we dove down to 10 m and swam to the edge of a cliff and then went over. we swam down and through corridors of coral and ended up at the pinnacle, which was at the 30 m depth. the pinnacle is a huge cone shaped piece of coral all by itself. we swam around it. i remember having trouble with my thoughts when i was down at the pinnacle. i started having these panic thoughts of what would happen if i suddenly had to surface .. what if i couldn’t breath anymore … what if … what if … all starting to scare me. i remember having the same trouble when i would rockclimb to very high places and i started getting scared. like i did in rockclimbing, i pushed through the fear and keep repeating, everything is good, i can do it. the only bad thing about this slight fear is that my breathing became unsteady and i was having trouble staying level. but, that was minor and i soon recovered.

despite the lack of big fish, it was amazing to be there and to think we were off the coast of costa rica diving. there were tons of small fish, crustaceans, and interesting coral.
lucas motioned for us to come close. i started counting heads and realized we were missing hannah. hannah was one of our divers and had been paired with lucas. we sat there for five minutes to wait if we could find her. she didn’t appear so we started our ascent. when we resurfaced, she was on the boat. she said she started ascending suddenly and couldn’t control it. she was eventually at the surface, so she went to the boat. WTF? she was certified but shit happens. we were shocked the dive instructor lost his buddy.

to get back in the boat, we had to take off our equipment and hand it to the people on the boat. they would then lock arms and pull us on board.

once on board, we went to the shore to have lunch. the no wet suit dive was great. i love diving without the wet suit. the water was perfect. dee wore the wet suit and she was fine underwater, but once the boat started moving and the wind starting blowing, she became cold. she told me that she noticed i was having trouble with my leveling. i told her my fear, and she said she got that way too. that made me feel better.

we parked on the shore and unloaded the coolers. there was vast amount of coral next to the shore, so i put on the mask and snorkel and snorkeled around. it is fascinating to look into little spots and find a fish hiding there. what do you think he is thinking about? Is he hiding? is that his house? i try to imagine the coral as a huge city and apply our lives to the fishes lives. they are swimming to the convenience store to pick up a bag of plankton to eat for supper or they are swimming to a friend’s house. i could never imagine the reality of what they are really doing besides surviving in a wild underwater world.

back on shore, they have sandwiches, fruit, water, and cookies. it’s as if PADI certified a brand of cookies. in thailand and costa rica, both diving operations had the square cookies that are perfect for snacking on. the shore was beautiful and desolate.

here’s the boat with the motor on it.

that’s robin, a rescue diver that came with us for some fun diving.
the guys with us told us that they usually go to a place called the holes where we could swim through small holes in the coral and go through corridors of coral. i enjoy this so much cause it is more technical of a dive. however, they said they had found a new place called chiquita that was supposed to be amazing. so, they convince everyone to go to this new place cause they had been there once and were more excited about that one.

so, we push off and head to the chiquita location. we suited up, fell off the boat and got ready to dive. we deflated our BCD and descended into the water. i looked up to see dee just below the surface. she couldn’t descend. lucas swam up to her and was helping her. i couldn’t make out what was wrong but eventually lucas got her down. when dee reached me, she started pointing at her waist. i didn’t understand what she was saying so we said forget it and went swimming after the others.

since i had trouble with my breathing and my leveling on the last dive, i was very focused on becoming neutrally buoyant. i was able to hover in place while i breathed so i was perfect. i explored the coral looking for anything that might be interesting. there wasn’t much. i was doing a great job at being level. the one thing i love about diving is that i can be about a few feet above the ocean floor and exhale all my air. i quickly start to drift down to the ocean floor and just before i hit it, i inhale deeply and i slow down to a stop just a few inches from the coral and then i start drifting up. this is what buoyancy is all about. the more air in you, the lighter you are. it is so much fun but it drives dee crazy cause it isn’t a good technique to use to conserve air, and we want to conserve as much air as possible.

all of a sudden, lucas swam over and started taking my weight belt off. he held up one finger, which either meant hold on one sec or i’m taking one. it was the latter and he took one of my weights. i was kind of disgruntled cause i thought i was doing really well at my leveling and keeping straight, but maybe he didn’t think so. so, he came over to take one of my weights. oh well. we explored more coral and it was ok but kind of boring. there was no big fish anywhere and after a while dee and i started getting these bites all over our bodies. dee was rubbing her legs and arms. i knew what it was. the tiny little microorganisms that burn our skin were in the area. i tried to tell dee but communication underwater is quite difficult. it was painful as they would sting your face and legs and arms. i think some got underneath dee’s wet suit cause she had marks on her skin where she was stung.

the dive was soon over. i had about 1000 psi left in my tank, but someone had hit the 500 psi limit. when we resurfaced, we were so far away from the boat. we swam for about 20 minutes on our back making it back to the boat. while we were swimming, dee told me that she had forgotten to put on her weight belt. so much for lucas being painfully slow on double checking our equipment. that’s why she couldn’t descend. so, instead of lucas surfacing and getting her weight belt, he gave dee his weight belt. this would explain why he came to me to take one of my weights. well, that made me feel better about my diving skills. anyways, the flippers started rubbing my ankles raw so i started using my arms, but those got tired and i had to use my flippers on the way back to the boat. it was painful by the time i reached the boat and i was ready to get those damn things off.

i was so happy to be back on the boat. i was tired from the diving, my ankle hurt, and i wanted to get back to shore. dee felt the same way. the last dive was not that exciting.

we headed back to shore, unloaded the boat, lucas filled out our dive log and we said our goodbyes. reef runners dive outfit was not impressive and had some crap diving spots. i had the thought that any other dive outfit with a better boat, sites and equipment could completely over take this operation. the downside was that there really wasn’t much to see in costa rica besides coral. we had great conditions but we didn’t see any big fish. oh well. as lucas was filling out the dive log, he said the water was 84 degrees F. isn’t that incredible? that’s why i didn’t need a wet suit.

we headed back to the hotel and showered. the cold shower was refreshing and we were beat. after a little lounging in the hammock* WPG2 CANNOT LOCATE GALLERY2 ITEM ID 6506 *

, we decided to explore the town and find out what was going on. we soon found out that nothing was going on at the moment. we checked out the movies at hot rocks. lock, stock and two smoking barrels was the first to play and then it was city of angels. since it was happy hour at hot rocks, we sat down and ordered two mojitos. the place was empty and we were the only ones hanging out.

after two mojitos and some food, the place started filling up for the first movie. the movie started and i realized it wasn’t a great choice for us. dee was having trouble trying to understand the british english and i was explaining a lot of the movie.

just like last night, this german shepherd walked over in front of the tables near the screen and started scratching itself. the scratching would, i guess, excite the dog and he would get a hard on. it was the weirdest thing. he did this several times. when i was little, i saw a doggy with his dick out and thought it was bleeding.

anyways, dee was tired from the movie and i had already seen it, so we decided to head back to the hotel room. on the way back, dee wanted to see if a certain restaurant was open so we turned down this gravel road to check. we were halfway down when we heard four bicycles behind us. four kids were pedalling towards us. it was dark and we started sensing danger. a local girl was walking towards us and dee quickly struck up a conversation with her. we started walking with her and the kids passed by. two cars appeared at the end of the street, parked in the intersection and people get out. the lights were on us and i was starting to get nervous. this place is creepy. there was nothing wrong though. the cars were dropping people off. we said goodbye to the girl and walked towards the hotel.

we stopped off at the internet place to check email. while we were checking email, we noticed that the large crabs were trying to get in the air conditioned room. the attendant would open the door and kick them away. the attendant told us they wanted in and sometimes they would get in. they would hide underneath the desks and run across people’s feet while they were using the computers, scaring the crap out of them.

so, that’s it. the end of the trip. we had done everything we wanted and tomorrow we would head back to san jose. the day after, we would be flying home. we had to wake up early to catch the early bus back to san jose. we had no problem falling asleep.