Merry Christmas Everybody!

What a day. I slept late and Rob had an early dive. I had a facial scheduled this morning and stayed in bed as long as I could before I had to go up to the spa. It took almost an hour. Of course, at the end, she had a whole bunch of bottles and jars lined up for me to buy. I didn’t. They are really hard-sell at that place. The one I went to in Hawaii only had a “recommended” list at the end. These people sit with you and try to convince you that you are intent on being unhealthy by not buying their wonderful, overpriced products. That’s the last time I intend to go there.

After that I had a late breakfast and changed into a swimsuit to float around the pool before Rob got back. I was just leaving the room when he came down the hall with all his stuff in a very heavy bag. He dropped it all on the floor, showered and changed and had a nap before we went to lunch.

Rob’s day began at 8:00 a.m. The boat met the divers just outside the security checkpoint. It was a 15 foot boat with no covering, no bathroom and stacked to the gills with air tanks. They packed everyone on board (20 in all) and water started coming in at the back through the seep holes. They had two massive Mercury motors that powered them through the water. They took us to their dive shop on the beach and we had to wade into the surf to get ashore to pick up our weights and stuff. Then they waded back out to the little boat, all with their id cards and wallets and stuff.

Once back on board and rather soaked, it was clear nothing would stay dry on this trip. The captain put a few things up forward, wallets and other paper work. Unfortunately, once in the water, the visibility was down to about 30 feet as there was a lot of wind and wave action. They didn’t see as much as they could have. This particular group of divers seemed to be an aggressive lot. Rob accepted a spot at the back of the pack where it was more stirred up than ever, but at least he didn’t have someone banging him into the reef on a regular basis.

The name of the first dive was Boss Reef. It was actually a drift dive where they slipped down into this little canyon looking at the side along the way and then around the edge until they were low on air. There were two dive masters, one at the front and one at the back. The one at the front did a good job pointing stuff out, the one at the back was mostly a shepherd keeping everyone from going too far astray. Rob got lots of neat pictures, including another couple of eels. Unfortunately, by the time he came to them, they were frightened by the herd and hard to coax out for a pic. Once he actually had someone shove him out the way to get between him and the reef. He wasn’t too happy with this aggressive group of divers.

The second dive as a wreck that had been accidently deposited on a reef. It was the Veronica Ale. She was a boat from Trinidad hauling food that went down in the harbor. They re-floated her part way and got hung up on the reef trying to get her over to a sandy location. The old hulk was mostly intact, but the upper deck was completely gone. Rob swam around it along with everyone else. They said as long as the divers stayed near the wreck they would be fine. Rob swam around to the other side of the ship to avoid the pushy divers and he missed his chance to see a barracuda swim into the area.

He did find two tube worms about ten feet from the wreck which he didn’t bother to point out. The worms looked just like the varieties seen at great depths, but these were very shallow. They were red and white. When they were all low on air, they got the signal to surface. That was the end of the dive.

Once again, he had less than 30 minutes to get on the Princess before it left. He did finally get a chance to look at a bookstore (open on Christmas Day) before returning. There was nothing on astronomy, however.

When he got back to the Princess, he slept. We left port about 2:00 p.m. after waiting for five people who were late getting back.

We are going to take a few pictures of the big Christmas display in the Piazza before we go to dinner. They are planning a special turkey dinner tonight. Should be fun. Santa supposedly came on board today just after we left port. Good trick, eh? The kids all lined up for a chat with the big guy.