Caye Caulker, Belize

Sept 12th

We arrived in Belize four lovely days ago. Upon checking the weather before leaving I didn’t think we would be staying for long. According to the report there would be thundershowers everyday for ten solid days. After those ten days they didn’t have a report, but I had a feeling it wasn’t good. The flight was not great. I usually travel with two litres of water and the recent regulations say you can’t have any on board! I managed to smuggle 12oz or so on board, but thank god since the first leg was 6hrs and American Airlines ran out of water an hour into the flight. What bull @#$%! At least if they aren’t going to let you take water they could provide you with some, or hell sell you some!

Anyway in effort to distract myself from dehydration, I threw myself in to BG's copy of “Kite Runner.” What a fast read. I nearly finished it on the way over. Now I am left with nothing to read!

We arrived in Belize City the next day at around 11 am. It was humid and hot, but otherwise dry. We headed straight for Caye Caulker, an island about a 45 minute ferry ride way. The sleepy little island has about 700 inhabitants, who are all quite friendly. There are no cars on the island, which i like. Several people have golf carts. Belize was once occupied by none other than the English, so everyone here speaks English quite well. All the signs and everything are in English, at least so far. The island is a small one. In certain parts you can see the ocean on either side of you. This means I could actually watch the sun rise in the morning and then go to the same place in the evening and watch it set.

We spoiled ourselves the first few days and checked into a nice hotel. I wanted a hotel with a pool so I could practice my swimming for my dive test so we got one. The pool area was gorgeous, from the pool there was a lovely view of the beach. The water tasted like human sweat. I am guessing they don’t change it very often. Praveen says I should think of it as salt water (like the sea) and not sweet. I am pretty sure it is sweat though. Oh and it is only about 10 feet across-- So much for swimming laps.

That night we went out and had a few drinks. The island is very laid back. There are signs everywhere that say “No shoes, No Shirt, No shit, No problem.” The food is surprisingly good. It is a mix of Creole style and Mexican. They have a lot of red beans and rice, stewed chicken, burritos, seafood, oh…and LOBSTER, tons of it. I have had lobster almost everyday. It is the only thing here that is significantly cheaper than back home. You can have a lobster omelet, lobster curry, lobster sandwich (kind of like a crab cake) and then in variety of ways whole, garlic, spicy, I don’t know what else…..the lobsters here don’t have claws though! At first I thought the rainbow restaurant was ripping me off. “Where are my claws?”, I asked the waiter when he brought me my plate. Anyway, it is not as sweet as a Maine lobster and it is a hair over cooked, but it is good. I have a favorite restaurant here too called Syds. I want to eat there every day for breakfast, lunch and dinner but praveen is trying to talk me into trying more of the random mediocre places. Syds, is pretty cheap and DELICIOUS!!!

Oh, so after a night of drinking we showed up to our dive class a few hours late. Luckily we were the only ones in it and that day we only had to watch some DVDs and read a shit load of material. For the last four days we've done nothing but read, eat, sleep and breathe diving. I have learned and seen so much! Today we did our dive down to 60 ft (the last one for the certification) and we took a camera with us. I am hoping we got some good pictures but I will not be able to develop and post them until we are back home.

The first day we got in the water I experienced claustrophobia for the first time ever. I was supposed to be going down to the bottom of about 10 feet to practice pulling a regulator (a breathing tube) in and out of my mouth without drowning and some other exercises, but I couldn’t make myself sink. Everything was closing in on me and I felt trapped and I wanted out!!! I was thinking, about how I’d just have to sit on the beach and drink 'panty rippers' while Praveen got certified. What a shame! I knew there was a whole new world of experiences waiting for me and there was no way in hell I was going to be able to do this! Then I managed to breathe a little deeper and calm myself down. It is pretty interesting that you can remove your mask under water, put it back on and get the water out, all while still under water.

The training they give you for a certification is very thorough. We also learned how to use each others' back-up regulators in case one of us runs low on air and or runs out. There were some very scary moments when both of us wondered what the hell we were doing out there.

Yesterday the water was extremely choppy. Everyone was sea sick, some more than others. Getting into the water and waiting to go down was the worst part. Once we finally got underwater it was great.

I like how peaceful it is underwater. You feel a sense of weightlessness like never before. I kind of felt like an astronaut. The views are spectacular. Today we saw some green eel, a big turtle, a bunch of yellowtail and some nurse sharks. There was a bunch of other stuff too that I didn’t know what was. I will have to start studying up on all these fish and coral.

Praveen snorkeled down and got me a conch but since there was still a live conch (the animal that lives in a conch shell!) inside we were not allowed to take it home and kill it. Too bad it would look really pretty in my garden or somewhere.

So now, it is time to have a drink. We have had to study and be up every day at 7.30 am. Also they say that drugs and alcohol increase your chances of experiencing some of the illnesses brought on by diving, honestly I don’t remember which of the three sicknesses it is right now. So I will maybe find you at the bottom of my tequila shot…..until next time………ruth