Cozumel, Mexico: Lunes - The real down under.

Our diving company

Five years of Spanish, and I cannot speak a lick of it. Just small commands like "Donde esta el bano?" or a great stand by: "Como se dice... en espanol?" (how do you say (blank) in spanish). I guess I never realized as a young girl in Litchfield, NH, the least diverse area of anywhere, that my Spanish classes might actually be useful. Oh well, it's a little late now, albeit I have been saying "forgive me" instead of "excuse me" this entire trip. It doesn't take the locals long to switch to English when speaking with me.


Most people here have no trouble communicating with us, it's very impressive that such a large portion of the people are bilingual. At least to some degree. Our scuba instructor, Ricardo, speaks English very well, which is very important since both Dave and I have a hard time remembering things as it is. That's right, I said scuba instructor! After yesterday's snorkeling we decided to try it, and no better place than in Cozumel. The island is known as one of the best diving places in the world and we have met people from all over that have come here to do just that. We looked into getting certified in Boston, but it seems a shame to spend all of those hours in a pool when we can get certified here and get the benefits of the location.

Our first dive went great, it will take me a little bit to get accustomed to the weight of the gear and the hose in my mouth, but overall it went so smoothly that we decided to complete the entire certification on our trip. Ricardo brought us to a "plane wreck" about fifty feet from our hotel. I put that in quotes because a). it is hardly a plane and b). it was staged there for a movie. Which undoubtedly awful film that is, I have no idea, but I'll make sure to find out before we leave and possibly throw it on the queue when I get back. Either way, it was pretty awesome to see how the sea claims these wrecks and artifacts, it was hard to make out a plane shape through all of the coral and plant life that grew on it and the animal life that now calls it home.

The fish we saw were even more amazing than when snorkeling and the freedom of being able to be at their level and interact directly with them is a huge advantage. No sting rays nor sharks, to both of our dismay, but we have hope for what we may see on our boat trip dives later in the week. They even offer a dive here at a site called Devil's Throat, properly named for the narrow cave passage that is the majority of the dive. It's for advanced divers only since you are carrying lights and need to know how to react within confined spaces. Plus, at the end of the cavern you are 130 ft below sea level and I am having trouble remembering to equalize in 30 ft. Because of the depth and the pressure, the entire dive lasts about five minutes before you need to ascend and refill. I guess we'll need to revisit Cozumel someday when we are master kick ass scuba divers.

The one downside to this training is the size of the book that we need to read in order to pass our final exam.  250 pages of detailed, over repetitive scuba-ness. We both laughed when we got the textbook and laughed even harder when they told us that we should take the test on Wednesday. Um, yea, about reading all of that in 2 days. How is that going to fit in with all of our other plans such as the tequila factory and the bar on the cliff? I guess we'll have to manage it somehow.

Anyways, I'm going to return my attention back to finding our waiter and securing another pina colada and whatever magic they put into it :)

-A