svbeachhouse

Category: 2009 Blog

  • Onboard \”Sky Dancer\” Dive Boat…..

    Dear F&F,
    May 17-19, 2009

    Because the Galapagos rules limit where private yachts can go, Scott arranged for us to go on this boat for 1 week of scuba diving. We have been on 4 live aboard dive trips of this kind in the past. The last was about 13 years ago. It is a splurge & hopefully a \”vacation\”. I know this sounds funny since we are retired. But the first night I woke up & the boat was underway & Scott was also right there asleep, it was so strange. Neither of us on watch. Free from any responsibility of maintaining or caring for the boat. No navigation to figure out. No watching the weather. No cooking por moi – a real leisure cruise, with diving – my favorite!

    The Boat: I was upset at first by the horrible smell of mildew in our below deck cabin. Scott had requested an upstairs one with a view & windows that open, but we were lucky to get a cabin at all. Even though he booked this trip in February, it was the last room available. Once we got underway the ventilation system kicked on & the smell improved greatly. Or else I got used to it. Anyway, our cabin is fine. The motion of the boat is less on the lower decks than above, so from the point of seasick prevention it is better that we are down low. We have two twin beds, mine is a bit higher, but they are not bunk beds. Scott\’s is a bit longer & separated on each side of the small room. Plenty of drawers under the beds, surface area & a closet to stow all our stuff. It seems like we brought everything but the kitchen sink! We moved on before the other guests arrived, who all came by airplane from various places, & had strict luggage limits. We are so used to having everything with us all the time that it was hard to leave anything behind. We moved in with 3 dinghy loads of stuff!

    Dive Gear: We had been told by email from the boat company that we would not be allowed to bring our own scuba tanks. The reason we prefer to dive with our own tanks is that they are steel, not aluminum, so heavier & less weight is needed on our weight belts. The first dive was a \”check out\” dive so the dive master could see how we handle ourselves underwater. I used my dry suit for the first time in several years & was pleased that it was not only toasty warm, but I felt very comfortable managing it. Diving with a dry suit requires one additional hose from my regulator to be able to put a little bit of air inside my suit to relieve the \”shrink wrap\” effect as I descend. The water is about 5 degrees cooler than at Coco Island so I expect to be in my dry suit most of the time, although I brought my new 6 mm wetsuit since it may be warmer in the northern islands. With their aluminum tank I needed to wear 18 lbs! We spoke to the dive master after the checkout dive & he had no problem with us bringing over our own steel tanks. Their panga driver gave us a short ride to where our boat was anchored & we brought back our tanks. Scott\’s steel tank holds 95 cubic feet of air, which gives the big guy an equivalent amount of air to my 80 cubic feet. I was able to take 10 lbs off my weight belt, so am much more comfortable.

    Other Guests: It is an international group. Two Canadians from Calgary: one a retired woman dentist originally from Tanzania. The other Calgarian owns property in Costa Rica where she hopes to build a house & retire. Three guys from Monterrey, Mexico including one who has done the \”Tour de France\” four times and was a team mate of Lance Armstrong. One New Zealand Guy. Honeymooners from England. Two guys from Buenos Aires. A beautiful couple from Curacao: he is originally from the Netherlands. She does not dive, but is enjoying herself anyway. A couple from San Fransisco that we hit it off with right away. Scott & I are by far the most experienced divers. Some are really newbies, or have just not been diving recently. We help them get their act together whenever we can.
    There are only a couple guys besides Scott doing underwater photography or video. So it is not a competitive crowd which is great, very mellow. Everyone is friendly & easy going. The Latins speak enough English so that we can communicate with them. Scott & one Calgary women seem the oldest of the group, although besides the young newlyweds everyone seems in the 35-45 range.

    Crew: I think there are as many crew as guests (15). Our cabin is cleaned & tidied up several times per day by Darwin (gotta love the name). When we get out of a dive there are warm towels. They feed us snacks & hot drinks (cocoa or tea) besides breakfast, lunch & dinner. I am really enjoying being served & not cooking at all. We are always hungry after a dive so it is hard not to eat too much. After the last dive, alcohol is included if you wish & I\’ve been enjoying the Vino Tinto from Chile (red table wine).

    Dive Highlights:
    Yesterday I DID get to snorkel with penguins. They are so cute. Not much larger than a seagull. Standing or hopping on the lava shore rocks or swimming fast below. I have always loved penguins. They make me laugh. *SEE VIDEO GALLERY*

    Dive #2 today at Wolf Island was the best so far. Non-stop sharks – both hammerheads & Galapagos sharks. A couple of eagle rays. A few turtles. Lots of moray eels. Plenty of fish of every size & shape. Unfortunately Scott had some technical difficulty with the video so did not get as much great footage as he could have. C\’est la vie. We have regaled the group with our stories of San Benedicto manta rays & shown them the \”Manta Magic\” video which is always a crowd pleaser.

    On Dive #4 I got soaked on the inside. I felt the water flooding in as soon as I did my back roll from their panga into the water. Not a pleasant feeling. It wasn\’t like I was going to freeze to death, so I continued with the dive & did not alert Scott to my problem for about 30 minutes. He noticed me hugging myself, trying to keep my armpits warm. I was able to finger spell (sign language) to him: \”total wet\”. He understood & we notified the dive master that we were going to ascend. The light was already dim at 5:30 pm so I didn\’t feel guilty for taking him out of the water, we didn\’t miss much. It was a rather dull dive. We searched for a tear in a seam or the seals at the neck & wrists but could not find a breech. We suspect I had just not completely closed the waterproof zipper & through that small opening water flowed in. The deck hands were most kind in helping me rinse my fleece long johns in fresh water & took them to the boats dryer. We hung my suit inside out. I will try it again tomorrow.

    Dinner tonight was prawns which were delicious. It is a treat for me to have seafood at every meal that it\’s offered. Scott is not much of a fish eater, so I don\’t usually prepare it for us. We also had chocolate ice cream for dessert, so my day was complete. We are in bed by 9:00 p.m. & up at 6:00 a.m. They keep the boat on Ecuador time (Central) even though the Galapagos is actually 1 hour earlier (Mountain). I guess it helps the guests feel less jet lagged & the \”wake up\” call at 7:00 a.m. does not sound as early as 6:00 a.m. Scott told me they do this to keep boat and the main office in Ecuador on the same time zone.

    Yesterday besides 2 dives and snorkeling with the penguins, we went ashore for a hike up to a viewpoint where we saw the signature photo (Tower of San Bartolome) from on high. It felt good to exercise on land & the view was worthwhile. For the photographer he would have preferred a sunrise view than the sunset. But in the moment it was great.

    Scott & Cindy

  • San Cristobal, Land Tour…..

    Dear F&F,
    May 12, 2009

    We hired the taxi driver/guide recommended by the check-in agent we used to go sightseeing on San Cristobal Island. There are only roads in the southern portion of the island, but they do go up to almost the highest elevation. The highlights were:

    Seeing the marine iguanas on a rocky beach. They almost blend in with the black lava rocks they perch on. They let you get quite close & look very much like mini-dinosaurs. *SEE PHOTO GALLERY*

    We drove by a hilltop with wind-powered generators, like they have on the way to Palm Springs. This provides 50% of the islands power needs. The other 50% is by traditional diesel generators.

    We drove through a few different climate zones. High up at a volcano called El Junco it was very foggy & at first we saw nothing but the mist. Then we waited & could get a glimpse of a lake in the center of the extinct volcano, formed from rainfall. It was cold felt like we were in San Francisco, whereas down by the coast it feels warm & tropical.

    We went to a preserve where they are assisting the survival of the giant tortoises. These enormous \”E.T. faced\” creatures do not begin to reproduce until 25 years old and can live to well over 100 years old. The female lays only 8-10 eggs a year, and in the wild only 1 will survive. With the assistance of incubators & semi-captivity they have increased the survival rate to 5 or 6. The little ones are so cute. But the big ones are awesome. Unfortunately it was not feeding day. They only feed them 3x/week. We did see 1 near the entry that seemed more free-ranging, chomping on a leaf. It is a very large site so they have plenty of habitat to roam. But they seem content just slowly walking into their little water pond or out of it. Mostly they just sitting there, patiently letting we tourists take a thousand photos. *SEE PHOTO GALLERY*

    We stopped for lunch at a restaurant with lovely grounds. Many beautiful native trees & plants. We enjoyed sitting outside. The appetizer of half a pomelo (similar to grapefruit) was the highlight. The meal itself was nothing special – a chicken leg, rice & a couple token vegetables. Dessert was half of a canned peach. The main benefit of this stop to us was speaking to a large bus load of American tourists. They are touring the many islands aboard a large power catamaran. We asked questions about their impressions of Santa Cruz Island which we had considered taking the \”ferry\” to visit. We will have an opportunity to see the Charles Darwin Center there when we are with the dive boat, so we will probably not go on our own. The other island of interest is Isabella, but it is a 30 minute airplane ride. We will inquire about the cost & consider a day trip there.

    Otherwise, we are getting ready to join \”Sky Dancer\” for a week of diving in 5 days.

    Scott & Cindy

  • San Cristobol Island, Galapagos…..

    Dear F&F,
    May 11, 2009

    We knew \”Sky Dancer\” was scheduled to move from Santa Cruz back to San Cristobal that night so I was looking for her. Just before 5:00 a.m. she appeared. Scott got up & spoke to their captain on VHF radio asking if we could follow them in. He said yes, so we had the benefit of a leading boat plus first light. What a difference! Many cruising boats, including several other catamarans. Plenty of room for everyone. Flat water, as the island protects Wreck Bay from the wind & swell.

    We flew the Q (quarantine) & Ecuador flags & then I conked out from 6:30-9:30 a.m. Scott took the dinghy ashore on a scouting mission since we needed to find an agent to check in. We heard that other boaters had a perfectly fine stay at Academy Bay a month or so ago. So we suspect the weather has everything to do with the conditions there. But it was certainly more crowded & seemed very industrial to us. Scott quickly found 3 agents & after we got a thumbs-up from the dive master on one of them, we engaged Bolivar. He took our passports & copies of our other documents yesterday. Otherwise Sunday was a recovery day. Today he showed up on the dot at 9:00 a.m. & we went him to Immigration. We don\’t get our passports back until tomorrow. I guess they want to check if we are wanted criminals or some such thing. To get our international Zarpe to leave we will contact the agent 2 days before our departure date. The fees here are not as expensive as for our stay at Coco. There was no onboard inspection by the Navy or required fumigation as was rumored.

    The fearless sea lions climb onboard wherever they can. *SEE PHOTO GALLERY* All the catamarans with our inviting stern steps are targets. We tried stringing lines across but that is not much of deterrence. The small ones wriggle under. They could easily make their way up into the cockpit, although they have not done this yet. We love to see them in the water, but it is not so amusing to have a large wild animal outside the front door, or blocking your way to your car (dinghy). We have to figure out a better way to block them. They cough & sneeze & bark & take turns knocking each other off the steps. It is pretty funny, as long as I can keep my Good Humor hat on.

    On the taxi boat to shore (50 cents each – such a bargain) we met a couple of other cruisers. One couple is leaving for the Marquesas today. She said they enjoyed a land tour here with a taxi driver recommended by Bolivar. We arranged the same thing, beginning at 8:00 am tomorrow.

    I need to start being more realistic on what these third world places are going to be like, despite romantic names like Costa Rica & the Galapagos. The town here is very similar to Turtle Bay, in Baja Mexico: dirty & depressing (in my opinion). The shopping opportunities are limited to small \”tiendas\”. The meat is not of a quality that I am willing to eat. I am so glad that Mike can bake bread. We will be eating a lot of beans & rice on the way to the Marquesas…

    We had a half hour stop at an internet site, but not good enough to do Skype so not very interesting to me. I did get to retrieve Skye\’s e-card for Mothers Day, so that was worthwhile. We had a soft serve ice cream cone. I left the shore visit feeling quite down. I think the fatigue of the passage combined with uneasiness about leaving the boat unattended for a week while we go diving, plus the burden of provisioning with limited resources have put me in a funky mood. Hopefully tomorrow we\’ll be getting out to see the real beauty of this place and help wash away the blues.

    Hope to send a happier Galapagos report after tomorrow. I am most looking forward to snorkeling with penguins a week from today!
    Scott & Cindy

  • Land Ho! Galapagos…..with an unplanned trip

    Dear F&F,
    May 9, 2009

    Scott was scanning the horizon & spotted 2 islands about half an hour ago. Always very exciting. The sea calmed down dramatically & we had a smooth day of sailing. We rolled up the genny & main sails a while ago as the wind lightened. It was nice that we were both up & it was daytime when we crossed the equator. Neptune seemed to enjoy the Tender Bits, I\’m sure he gets tired of eating fish… We are heading for the barn. It will be after dark when we enter the bay at Santa Cruz Island but with the night scope & good charts we are going to go for it. We are both looking forward to have a good night\’s sleep at anchor. We may see up to a couple of boats we met at Coco Island already anchored at Puerto Ayora.

    We will be in these islands 20 days as is allowed cruisers. Our live aboard dive week with \”Sky Dancer\” is May 17-24.

    Besides trying to figure out if the red or yellow stripe of the Ecuador flag goes on top, we are doing great. I\’ve got taquitos in the toaster oven & Abba on the Ipod. We are very excited to get here. It is amazing how one can trot across the globe at only 6 knots (7 mph)!

    May 10, 2009
    So Close & Yet So Far�
    We pulled into Academy Bay of Santa Cruz Island – the most populated of all the Galapagos Islands at about 9:00 pm. Santa Cruz island is one of the two Galapagos Islands where private yachts are allowed to go without obtaining a more extensive (& expensive) visa. What a disappointment! It seemed more like we were entering Long Beach than any vision of a nature preserve that you can imagine.

    Scott had been trying to hail \”any vessel\”, including the Port Captain, for an hour as we made our approach. No one responded, which struck us as odd for such a busy port. There were many shore lights, so the night scope was not as helpful as other places. We cautiously made our entry. The place was so crowded. There were many many large boats anchored with assorted lights. Cargo vessels, dive boats, Declasse – Class cruise ships. The harbor had an industrial & unwelcoming feel.
    There were just a handful of small sailboats anchored that mostly looked neglected with nobody home.

    It was very shallow with a big swell coming right in – no protection. None of the bay has protection from the south swell. There was no \”swinging room\” & we did not feel safe to anchor there. Especially since once we choose an island, we cannot move for our 20 day allotted stay. And for 1 week, we will leave our boat will be at anchor unattended. No bueno aqui!

    Another boater had referred us to an agent on Santa Cruz. All entering boats are required to check in to the country with the service of an agent. But the referring folks had not actually yet been there & used him. We had been in frequent email contact with this agent who is either clueless about boaters needs or deliberately misrepresented the place in order to collect his fee. Scott used our last satellite minutes to call the guy at home to express our concern & disappointment.

    Scott spotted the boat \”Sky Dancer\” that we will join for diving next week. How the poor passengers onboard were tolerating the boats motion at anchor I don\’t know! Scott got the attention of a crew member (later we learned he is the head dive master). Edwin was nice enough to talk to us by VHF radio. He advised us to proceed to San Cristobal Island which he guaranteed has a MUCH calmer anchorage. It is on the north side, so it made sense that it would be more protected from the southerly wind and swell. We would have gone there direct & not wasted our time at Santa Cruz, but we took the recommendation of the agent instead of finding out for ourselves where all the cruisers go. Our bad & now we are paying the price by having to travel all night to San Cristobal. We will go slowly to travel the next 45 miles to arrive about day break. It is ALWAYS a better to enter an unknown place with daylight.

    Meanwhile we are flat out of satellite phone minutes. We did not realize how fast we burned through them. It was very difficult to connect to a Winlink station from Coco Island plus you can never get out on Winlink (HF EMAIL) at night which is when I do most of my writing. We will be able to order more minutes when we can get a Winlink connection during the day, but it is bad that we ran out of satellite time. It is our link to the world for urgent weather info or any emergencies. This is a short trip with not much traffic. I napped for the first 2 hours, while Scott negotiated around Santa Fe Island. Then Scott will rest for 3 hours & then we will there. Yet again, we are slamming into a 20 knot headwind. Oh joy! Scott promises me that the wind & sea will be at our back for the trip to the Marquesas. I am starting to wonder if this is just a sailors dream…

    I pray this next island is calmer & more of a cruisers desired destination than industrial port like the last place. I was so looking forward to a good night\’s sleep, but we would not have gotten it if we\’d tried to stay at that first place. There was no safe place for us to put down our hook, too crowded & 4-5 foot swell rolling in. No thanks. It is one thing to roll around a bit with the wind & current, but an anchorage is supposed to be protected from the swell. It is a mystery to us why it got so developed as a port. But most of the population is not sleeping on a boat, they are in houses on the land.

    Report on San Cristobal to follow

    Scott & Cindy

  • Coco to Galapagos Islands Passage…..

    Dear F&F,
    May 8, 2009

    We have been at sea 30 hours with another 30 or so to go. Motoring head on into the wind & sea, it is very rough going.

    \”Good Humor Girl\”
    Boater friend Tami Stewart thought the Good Humor Man was Jonathon Winters. Maybe the company sponsored his radio or TV show.

    Per Wikipedia: Good Humor was an American brand of ice cream novelties sold from ice cream trucks. Their heyday was in the 1950s. Scott remembers these trucks coming to his L.A. elementary school during recess. I don\’t know where or how I\’d heard of it, but the term \”Good Humor Man\” came to mind after my 7:00-10:30 a.m. nap. I was in quite a good humor. Good thing!
    I actually laughed out loud as I was thrown off my feet in the bathroom while attempting to put in my contact lenses. My sense of humor is greatly affected by the amount of rest I\’ve had. I was able to get 15 minute cat naps during my prior shift so was in fine form.

    The arduousness of this journey is incredible. King Neptune is having a really good time tossing us about in our small vessel as we dare approach his kingdom. We are about 150 miles north of the equator. It is custom to have some type of \”crossing the equator\” ritual. You may have read about sailors pouring food on their heads & tossing liquor into the ocean as an offering. I have my revenge for Neptune planned. The oldest can onboard is Loma Linda brand \”Meatless Tender Bits\” made with gluten. Do not ask what possessed me to ever buy this item. No doubt a sentimental memory of my good old Seventh-Day Adventist vegetarian days. I have been shuffling it about my pantry for 4 years & it is now showing a bit of rust around the edges. I consider it a fine item to open up & toss contents and can right over at zero degrees latitude. We\’ll make sure to duck since I expect Neptune will heave it right back at us!

    In these conditions it is easy to understand all the sailing superstitions & lore. Even the call of the Mermaid is understandable. I often turn around with a start, quite sure that I heard someone whistle to me or moan or speak. It is only the wind in the rigging, the creaking of our hull or the slap of the waves. But it is enough to make me glance down at Scott through the little window from the cockpit into our cabin to make sure he isn\’t calling me. Of course he is just lying there asleep. Besides we have a special whistle that we use with each other, purposely unmistakable.

    The great news is that we began sailing at 6:00 a.m. We had motored south during the night in order to get a better wind angle today. That strategy worked. I stayed up to help Scott by steering upwind to raise the main, running the staysail lines & trimming all. Little by little I am getting a clue on how to get this barge to run with the wind. Scott still does the fine tuning, but I no longer need to ask him every single thing every single time which is encouraging. The noise of the engines creates a monotonous \”white noise\” that helps with sleeping. We hear all the creaks & smacks when we sail. At times it feels as if we make as much motion up & down as we do in a forward direction. But overall we are averaging 6 plus knots under sail, about the same as while motoring & it saves fuel. Hopefully the wind will be good enough to sail all day.

    I need to eat some lunch so will sign off for now. Tuna salad & potato chips, no vegemeat! Thank you all for writing. It is great to get mail while out here with the elements.
    xo Cindy aka Good Humor Girl (well sometimes!)

    Scott & Cindy

  • Last Day on Coco Island…..

    Dear F&F,
    May 6, 2009

    Yesterday we went for another hike. It drizzled at the beginning. We were wishing for more rain once we got going, as the sun was pretty hot even though it was only 7:30 a.m. It was about 1 hour & 20 minutes; a VERY steep climb up. Poor Scott found it aerobically challenging. I had a harder time downhill, with shorter legs, keeping my balance. The hike was worth our efforts. We enjoyed a beautiful canopy of trees at the top, some covered in vines & bromiliads. So green, lush & tropical rainforest-y.

    Two rangers & a volunteer came by to collect our additional fees. We had paid up through the last day of diving, not exactly sure at that time how many additional days we would stay. It is $85 a day for us & the boat, not diving. We paid $20 more per day (for both of us) on the diving days. This is the one place in Costa Rica that they are doing a really good job of preserving nature, so we are happy to support their efforts.

    Scott is slogging away at the photo & video editing while it is fresh. It is just VERY time consuming & rather tedious. He has the patience for it & without the pressure of any deadline, he keeps at it. I keep him fed & watered, get him up to move from time to time & then he is back at it. Meanwhile I write, so it works out well. We each appreciate the others contribution to the website, so make a good team.

    Tomorrow it is off to the Galapagos at first light. The wind picked up from the east today which may make for lovely sailing. In any event, we have enough fuel to motor the distance if necessary. We expect to be at sea 3 days & nights.

    Thank you for writing us, we love to get mail! (beachhouse51@gmail.com) if you don\’t have another address.

    Scott & Cindy

  • Coco Island, more diving…..

    Dear F&F,
    May 2, 2009

    After gluing & hand stitching a torn seam in my wetsuit yesterday, I was hot & bored enough to risk the afternoon dive. We stayed fairly shallow & my ear did not bother me. I was able to clear it on the descent which is the most important thing. It is great to be back in the water. I realized it is not just getting to see neat things, but I love the weightless feeling, the quiet sound of my own breath, and the ability to stretch & move my whole body in ways not possible with gravity. It was a shallow dive so we were able to stay almost 1 hour. Wonderful.

    I enjoyed watching Scott\’s night dive video of the White Tip Sharks hunting, but was just as glad I hadn\’t gone. There were 10 tourists underwater with Scott & Wilson. I am spoiled with usually just the 2 of us, here the 3 of us. The group diving does not appeal to me. We will be with a gang onboard \”Sky Dancer\”, the boat we will live on for a week to dive in the Galapagos. Scott arranged this because they limit where private yachts can go. (With the outbreak of swine flu, they are getting even more strict & we may have to undergo fumigation or at least pay for an inspection). This, even though we left Mexico before the virus broke out. Anyway, not having to cook or clean for a week will make it worth being in a group setting. And who knows, we may meet our next best friends? Scott is still in email touch with a photographer we met on the charter dive boat out at San Benedicto Island & they met one time, visiting for one hour. But they are kindred spirits in their passion for underwater photography, so it was a nice connection. I know Scott will really be vibrating from the energy of many other photographers on board.

    This boutique situation with our own divemaster & dinghy driver has turned out great. So much easier than having to load & unload our gear every day, find the dive site, deploy & hoist the anchor each time. Plus the worry about the current & not being able to swim that far out of sight of our dinghy anchor. Here, Raynor finds us very quickly on the surface & comes to scoop us up wherever we have drifted. A real luxury. Wilson has been a pleasure to be with.

    We had pretty good hammerhead sightings on Dive #1 & #2, both deep dives. It was pouring rain when we ascended from #2. I felt sorry for Raynor bobbing on the surface in the dinghy getting soaking wet. This morning I gave him one of our clip-on hat-keepers, like I use, since I noticed he frequently was taking his hat off our turning it backwards so the wind wouldn\’t blow it away. He was happy a sweet guy. His brother-in-law is the captain of another dive boat out here, \”Okeanos Agressor\”.

    A solo sailor came into the bay this morning. Scott spoke to Bob on the radio & coached him on where to locate the mooring & the check-in procedure. Poor guy has been at sea a month from Manzanillo, Mexico. Had been trying to head straight to the Galapagos but said the wind & current were against him & he was running on fumes. He got within 65 miles of the Galapagos and ran so low on fuel and couldn\’t make headway, so pulled in here to rest & hopes to buy diesel from one of the dive boats. There are 3 here right now & they go back & forth to mainland Coast Rica every week, so I am sure they will help him out. We bought 100 gallons, Scott had pre-arranged with the manager of our dive boat. This insures that we can motor all the way to the Galapagos, although we are sure hoping to sail.

    Scott has been pulling up weather charts daily to see how the patterns our shaping up for our intended May 7th departure. The Inter Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) is just about on our head. It is where the Northern Hemisphere weather patterns meet the Southern Hemisphere weather patterns, so often squalls, varying & unpredictable wind directions. It is common for it to be here, a bit north of the equator. But it moves & they outline where it is every day on NOAA\’s tropical surface analysis chart. We are so fortunate to have access to all this data & not just sail along unsuspecting.

    I am religiously rinsing & drying my ears so microorganisms should not decide to set up housekeeping in there. This, plus continuing the full duration of Levaquin with no side effects which is great.

    It is still raining very hard. The cooling benefit of spending time underwater is so fabulous. It is cooler today due to the rain, only 77 degrees. Perfecto. Not sure if we will go on an afternoon dive or not due to the rain as it affects the visibility. Tomorrow is our last day of diving here. We plan to get in at least one more hike before we must leave here for our next island paradise: the Galapagos.

    Scott & Cindy

  • Bravado Vanished Overnight…..

    Dear F&F,
    April 30, 2009

    I awoke at 2:30 a.m. with raging right ear pain. Skye, Linda & probably many others of you know what this feels like. I was only off antibiotics a week from my finger wounds & now began Levaquin. I was not willing to rely on just the ear drop antibiotics & want to wipe this out ASAP. Codeine knocks the pain down pretty well, but I am one of the few weird people that do not get drowsy from Codeine, if anything a bit hyper. So I did not sleep much by the time our 5:30 a.m. alarm went off. I told Scott he was on his own with the diving, make sure to bring back great video. Off he went with Wilson, plus Roberto, \”The Boss\” driving the dinghy today.

    Five hours since the first codeine the pain started escalating again. I do not believe in suffering, so took another. With the edge of the pain & a burst of energy, I changed our sheets. A job Scott usually helps me with as it is akin to \”diapering a whale\”. I also dug out our awning poles & searched multiple lockers not remembering where we stow the big tent. When Scott returned from dive #1, he told me it was buried under sails in the sail locker. So I climbed down there, pulled out fenders, hoisted out the spinnaker & unearthed the tent.

    Meanwhile, Scott during Dive #1 kneeled full shin, on a sea urchin. The spines penetrated his rather worn out wetsuit giving him about 11 pricks in the shape of some unknown constellation. There were no spines imbedded, but they left what looks to be dark purple blood blisters, poor baby. After his shower we rinse the area with vinegar & daube on topical antibiotic cream. Good thing we brought all these meds along!

    I got Scott to help me put up the tent. If I\’m going to be stuck on the boat all day & not get any cooling benefit of diving, I want all the shade I can get. It helps dramatically. Right now at 4:00 pm it is 87 degrees inside & 89 outside. Usually by this hour it has been more than 4 degrees hotter inside than out & it does not cool off in the house until the middle of the night.

    Scott has just returned from dives #2 & 3 with reports of large schooling fish & turtles. Some shark action. I am not feeling too sorry for myself. I hope I feel well enough to dive again here, but if not, at least I had 3 good days & can see Scott\’s videos. I am slogging away at Mark Twain. In today\’s chapter, I learned about where the term \”thug\” comes from. If you don\’t already know the history, you don\’t want to. It is simply awful & yet another reason that India is not high on my list of desired destinations. Alternately reading chapters of Thich Nhat Hahn, I am keeping my sense of balance. This experience will simply add to my appreciation & joy & diving without pain. I am in pain, but I am not suffering. Blessed be the invention of antibiotics & narcotics!

    Scott & Cindy

  • Coco Island, \”Shark Week\”…..

    Dear F&F,
    April 27-29, 2009

    April 27
    We got up at 5:00 a.m. pumped our tanks, assembled all our dive gear & are now just waiting for our divemaster Wilson Cadavid & panga. He radioed us at 6:30 a.m. that he wouldn\’t pick us up until 8:00 a.m. He said he would take us first on a \”check out\” dive. Scott informed him that he is an instructor & I am Rescue certified and that we already did our own gear check plus 2 other dives. He seemed happily surprised to hear we are on the ball, but no doubt he will watch us like a hawk the first dive. Which is fine, safety first in diving always.

    Dive #1
    A hammerhead showed up right away. We only saw 2 the entire dive. Sometimes the best part is right up front & sometimes at the very end. You just have to keep your eyes open. The visibility is pretty good. It was a pretty dive around an island called Manuelito, a short dinghy ride from where our boat is anchored. We had not even signed their liability waivers & they just took us. Good start. What a luxury for us to just shower & have a snack & relax, instead of pumping up our next set of tanks. They are doing that for us on their big boat. They have 16 divers going out in 2 pangas. We are going to sites where they are not. Perfecto.

    Dive #2
    Wilson had us sign the waivers, no problem. He explained that the dive boats bring the supplies for all the island park rangers & volunteers: food, fuel, everything they need. As well as transporting their people back & forth to the mainland. We had quite a long surface interval since Wilson wanted to take us deep again for another chance to see hammerheads on a different area of Manuelito. We did see a couple more. But the sad truth about hammerhead sharks is that they are skittish. They run away if you look directly at them, so we try to avert our gaze. They don\’t like our bubbles, so we hold our exhalation when they are close. We hid behind a rock in hopes that they will think we believe they are the \”Baddest Dudes\” on the reef. They do not lie still on the bottom like the plentiful white tip reef sharks, they swim all the time. Mostly when they see us they swim away. Scared of sharks? Mostly they are the scaredy-cats!

    Wilson asks if we are \”Nitrox Certified\”. We are, a class we took over 14 year ago! But it qualifies us to get our tanks filled with a higher concentration of oxygen than regular air. This will extend our allotted bottom time & increase safety with repeated deep dives. Terrific!

    NITROX IS NOT NITROUS OXIDE! Normal air you breathe & that we compress in our tanks is 79% Nitrogen & 21% Oxygen. This is EXACTLY what everyone breathes normally. The name of an enriched blend of air (higher percentage of oxygen) is called NITROX. We are using a 69% Nitrogen with 31% Oxygen mix. Rest assured his is NOT nitrous oxide! The cause of \”the bends\” is a build-up of Nitrogen in the blood & other tissues. By increasing the Oxygen percentage & decreasing the Nitrogen percentage, this risk is decreased. So we are at reduced risk of the bends. Plus the benefit of being able to stay deep, longer. Scott & I don\’t carry much oxygen on our boat so we don\’t get to fill our tanks with this O2 enriched blend. But since the dive charter boat is filling our tanks, we will take advantage of the opportunity.

    Dive #3
    Scott took the video all day. It is smaller for him to drag around than the still camera. More chance to get a good result with video, although more time is required in post-production to edit the raw footage into an interesting 3 minutes.

    Scott set our dive computers to the correct Nitrox settings. Our dive computers which are waterproof and about the size of a large wrist watch, go with us on every dive and calculate how long and how deep we can safely go. We get about 20 extra minutes of bottom time. Fantastic! Different panga driver. I imagine the Operations Manager, Roberto has more important business to do than drive us around. It is nearly 4:00 p.m. & the sun sets behind the island peak at about 5:00 p.m. so there is not much ambient light below. At first the dive is ho hum. Tons of white tip reef sharks (aka hamsters!) as on every dive. We saw a pelagic black tip briefly at a distance. But the highlight was an Eagle Ray. Black base with white polka dots, snout like a pig. Not skittish, it let me & Scott swim very close. He filming, me trying to look as svelt as possible in dive gear. The ray was chowing down on algae clinging to rocks. He is about 4 feet wide & 3 feet long. Funny looking & could care less about us. Not interested in us like the manta rays, but did not seem to mind us being close. All the animals seem to know they are in a marine preserve so have no fear. The lobsters are out walking freely. The eels swimming about. Schools of fish of many colors & shapes. Disneyland for us. We are so stoked we get to do this for an entire week!!! Great first outing. Wilson said he\’d pick us up promptly at 7:00 a.m. since the 1st day\’s busy-ness is behind him.

    April 28
    We were up at 5:30 a.m. & still felt rushed & unprepared when our divemaster & dinghy driver showed up at 7:00 a.m. I had not had time to jump in the ocean for my morning wake up dip & that is important to me. Tomorrow I set my alarm for 5:00 a.m. to not feel rushed.

    Dive #1
    We went a 15 minute dinghy ride to a rock called \”Dirty Rock\”. Named because of the bird doo-doo all over it. There was pretty good hammerhead action although the water was pretty hazy & they were hard to see. I wore my new warmer suit, although when we went shallower I was too hot to kick hard comfortably. Never saw water temp below 78 degrees & that was only very deep. We are diving Nitrox all the time now. A higher percentage of oxygen which allows us to stay at depth longer. Our computers calculate the profile automatically when we input the mix of our air fill.

    Dive #2
    \”Alcyone\” (discovered by Jacques Cousteau) an underwater pinnacle, top height 85 feet. We went down to about 110 ft. Saw just a couple of hammerhead sharks, lots of white tip reef sharks, several marbled rays, one mobula & a turtle. A school of shiny jacks a 10 inch long silvery fish).

    Dive #3 Wilson gives us a choice to go to a shallow spot or the same site as #2. We choose the deeper one with shark potential. There is less current so less animals seen. Not that exciting. I wore my old 5 mm suit & am still plenty warm. Not getting benefit of hypothermia yet. Tomorrow I will choose a shallower dive in the afternoon.

    April 29
    Early downpour, so we delayed the first dive 1 hour.
    Dive #1
    The water is very warm at shallow depths – too warm for the sharks. They like it a bit cooler & it does get a bit cooler below 75 feet. \”Cool\” is a relative term though & I have not yet seen it less than 78 degrees. Mostly it is 82-84 degrees. There are plenty of other interesting fish, rays, eels, lobsters, etc. But the sharks are the highlight. We saw 5 Galapagos sharks that are all grey (9-10 ft long) & quite girthy (about 2 1/2 ft diameter). We also had many dolphins swimming above us & 1 that came in for a closer look. It is always a thrill to see dolphins above or below. Hopefully Scott got some great video footage of all.

    We went onboard \”Sea Hunter\” during the surface interval & Roberto gave us a tour of their boat. The owner (not onboard) is a well known underwater photographer whose work Scott is familiar with, an Israeli, Avi Klapfer. The divers are a mix of Americans, Hispanics & Italians. Two guys from Chicago were very friendly, one offered to cook for us, in order to join our program. He said he is a 2-star Michelin chef, sounds good to me! It was nice to rub shoulders with the fellow divers.
    We have a 2nd down pour. The visibility below is not so great when the sun is not shining, but we will definitely dive again rain or shine. Early this morning the rain came hard but passed quickly. This time it is sticking around for a while.

    Dive #2
    We snuck in a 2nd dive during a lull in the rain. The dinghy ride to the dive site took more than twice as long & was 100% uncomfortable since there were big swells in our face & we had to go slow. Pounding, pounding over each wave. Poor Scott trying to not bash his video camera got the brunt of it. I was able to stand up & hold on with two hands, sort of \”posting\” my body, like a horseback rider during trotting, to minimize the slamming effect

    We went to \”Alcyone\”, the site we\’d been to twice yesterday & it was productive with a couple brief hammerhead sightings plus a more lingering encounter with a Silky shark. The silky swam circles around us while we were at our 15 foot safety stop. Now before you get nervous, rest assured, he was not interested in us. He was getting \”cleaned\” by some smaller fish. His body posture was relaxed & he may have been curious about us, but Silkies are not known to be aggressive sharks. I kept eye contact & never let it out of my sight & kept my body vertical which we have been told makes us seem larger & more threatening than if we swim horizontal. Scott got some great video footage. If you know Jimmy Buffet\’s song \”Fins\” it was playing in my head the whole time.

    The rain resumed as soon as we finished the dive. The dinghy ride back to our boat was smoother since we were going with the swells on the return but the rain was coming down so hard it actually hurt my head! Tons of new waterfalls sprouted & this is the reason the place is so lush & green. They tell us there are 2 kinds of weather on Cocos Island: it is raining, or it is about to rain. That was about 6 hours ago & it is still raining. So Dive #3 was canceled. The water all around the anchorage is murky brown from the island run off. The boat is lying sideways to the swell due to effect of current, so we are rocking & rolling a lot. We both took seasick medication at the first hint of symptoms. I am writing this while the meds are in full force. Otherwise writing & reading our out for me. The great part about the rain is that it has cooled down to 72 degrees. We have not been in temperatures this comfortable in over a year. Last night it was never less than 82 degrees outside & we had a heck of a time getting it cool enough indoors for sleeping.

    My right ear is tender. I always have to take care to prevent ear infections with frequent swimming & diving & have been faithfully using the drying drops at the end of each day. But the right one is hurting & itching so I started antibiotic drops in it. As long as I can clear my ears when I descend it will not do any damage to keep diving, so do not intend to let it slow me down. I know it probably won\’t completely go away until I stay out of the water for about 5 days, but there is time for that soon enough. Meanwhile a codeine for the pain to sleep & we\’ll see how it goes.

    I\’ve made our morning oatmeal & have my tea brewing overnight so I don\’t have to turn on the stove in the morning. Today I cooked scrambled eggs with red bell pepper & onion & although it was delicious I was cranky from being so hot in the galley right off the bat. We may be eating more cold cereal.

    Scott & Cindy

  • Coco Island, \”Shark Week\”…..

    Dear F&F,
    April 27-29, 2009

    April 27
    We got up at 5:00 a.m. pumped our tanks, assembled all our dive gear & are now just waiting for our divemaster Wilson Cadavid & panga. He radioed us at 6:30 a.m. that he wouldn\’t pick us up until 8:00 a.m. He said he would take us first on a \”check out\” dive. Scott informed him that he is an instructor & I am Rescue certified and that we already did our own gear check plus 2 other dives. He seemed happily surprised to hear we are on the ball, but no doubt he will watch us like a hawk the first dive. Which is fine, safety first in diving always.

    Dive #1
    A hammerhead showed up right away. We only saw 2 the entire dive. Sometimes the best part is right up front & sometimes at the very end. You just have to keep your eyes open. The visibility is pretty good. It was a pretty dive around an island called Manuelito, a short dinghy ride from where our boat is anchored. We had not even signed their liability waivers & they just took us. Good start. What a luxury for us to just shower & have a snack & relax, instead of pumping up our next set of tanks. They are doing that for us on their big boat. They have 16 divers going out in 2 pangas. We are going to sites where they are not. Perfecto.

    Dive #2
    Wilson had us sign the waivers, no problem. He explained that the dive boats bring the supplies for all the island park rangers & volunteers: food, fuel, everything they need. As well as transporting their people back & forth to the mainland. We had quite a long surface interval since Wilson wanted to take us deep again for another chance to see hammerheads on a different area of Manuelito. We did see a couple more. But the sad truth about hammerhead sharks is that they are skittish. They run away if you look directly at them, so we try to avert our gaze. They don\’t like our bubbles, so we hold our exhalation when they are close. We hid behind a rock in hopes that they will think we believe they are the \”Baddest Dudes\” on the reef. They do not lie still on the bottom like the plentiful white tip reef sharks, they swim all the time. Mostly when they see us they swim away. Scared of sharks? Mostly they are the scaredy-cats!

    Wilson asks if we are \”Nitrox Certified\”. We are, a class we took over 14 year ago! But it qualifies us to get our tanks filled with a higher concentration of oxygen than regular air. This will extend our allotted bottom time & increase safety with repeated deep dives. Terrific!

    NITROX IS NOT NITROUS OXIDE! Normal air you breathe & that we compress in our tanks is 79% Nitrogen & 21% Oxygen. This is EXACTLY what everyone breathes normally. The name of an enriched blend of air (higher percentage of oxygen) is called NITROX. We are using a 69% Nitrogen with 31% Oxygen mix. Rest assured his is NOT nitrous oxide! The cause of \”the bends\” is a build-up of Nitrogen in the blood & other tissues. By increasing the Oxygen percentage & decreasing the Nitrogen percentage, this risk is decreased. So we are at reduced risk of the bends. Plus the benefit of being able to stay deep, longer. Scott & I don\’t carry much oxygen on our boat so we don\’t get to fill our tanks with this O2 enriched blend. But since the dive charter boat is filling our tanks, we will take advantage of the opportunity.

    Dive #3
    Scott took the video all day. It is smaller for him to drag around than the still camera. More chance to get a good result with video, although more time is required in post-production to edit the raw footage into an interesting 3 minutes.

    Scott set our dive computers to the correct Nitrox settings. Our dive computers which are waterproof and about the size of a large wrist watch, go with us on every dive and calculate how long and how deep we can safely go. We get about 20 extra minutes of bottom time. Fantastic! Different panga driver. I imagine the Operations Manager, Roberto has more important business to do than drive us around. It is nearly 4:00 p.m. & the sun sets behind the island peak at about 5:00 p.m. so there is not much ambient light below. At first the dive is ho hum. Tons of white tip reef sharks (aka hamsters!) as on every dive. We saw a pelagic black tip briefly at a distance. But the highlight was an Eagle Ray. Black base with white polka dots, snout like a pig. Not skittish, it let me & Scott swim very close. He filming, me trying to look as svelt as possible in dive gear. The ray was chowing down on algae clinging to rocks. He is about 4 feet wide & 3 feet long. Funny looking & could care less about us. Not interested in us like the manta rays, but did not seem to mind us being close. All the animals seem to know they are in a marine preserve so have no fear. The lobsters are out walking freely. The eels swimming about. Schools of fish of many colors & shapes. Disneyland for us. We are so stoked we get to do this for an entire week!!! Great first outing. Wilson said he\’d pick us up promptly at 7:00 a.m. since the 1st day\’s busy-ness is behind him.

    April 28
    We were up at 5:30 a.m. & still felt rushed & unprepared when our divemaster & dinghy driver showed up at 7:00 a.m. I had not had time to jump in the ocean for my morning wake up dip & that is important to me. Tomorrow I set my alarm for 5:00 a.m. to not feel rushed.

    Dive #1
    We went a 15 minute dinghy ride to a rock called \”Dirty Rock\”. Named because of the bird doo-doo all over it. There was pretty good hammerhead action although the water was pretty hazy & they were hard to see. I wore my new warmer suit, although when we went shallower I was too hot to kick hard comfortably. Never saw water temp below 78 degrees & that was only very deep. We are diving Nitrox all the time now. A higher percentage of oxygen which allows us to stay at depth longer. Our computers calculate the profile automatically when we input the mix of our air fill.

    Dive #2
    \”Alcyone\” (discovered by Jacques Cousteau) an underwater pinnacle, top height 85 feet. We went down to about 110 ft. Saw just a couple of hammerhead sharks, lots of white tip reef sharks, several marbled rays, one mobula & a turtle. A school of shiny jacks a 10 inch long silvery fish).

    Dive #3 Wilson gives us a choice to go to a shallow spot or the same site as #2. We choose the deeper one with shark potential. There is less current so less animals seen. Not that exciting. I wore my old 5 mm suit & am still plenty warm. Not getting benefit of hypothermia yet. Tomorrow I will choose a shallower dive in the afternoon.

    April 29
    Early downpour, so we delayed the first dive 1 hour.
    Dive #1
    The water is very warm at shallow depths – too warm for the sharks. They like it a bit cooler & it does get a bit cooler below 75 feet. \”Cool\” is a relative term though & I have not yet seen it less than 78 degrees. Mostly it is 82-84 degrees. There are plenty of other interesting fish, rays, eels, lobsters, etc. But the sharks are the highlight. We saw 5 Galapagos sharks that are all grey (9-10 ft long) & quite girthy (about 2 1/2 ft diameter). We also had many dolphins swimming above us & 1 that came in for a closer look. It is always a thrill to see dolphins above or below. Hopefully Scott got some great video footage of all.

    We went onboard \”Sea Hunter\” during the surface interval & Roberto gave us a tour of their boat. The owner (not onboard) is a well known underwater photographer whose work Scott is familiar with, an Israeli, Avi Klapfer. The divers are a mix of Americans, Hispanics & Italians. Two guys from Chicago were very friendly, one offered to cook for us, in order to join our program. He said he is a 2-star Michelin chef, sounds good to me! It was nice to rub shoulders with the fellow divers.
    We have a 2nd down pour. The visibility below is not so great when the sun is not shining, but we will definitely dive again rain or shine. Early this morning the rain came hard but passed quickly. This time it is sticking around for a while.

    Dive #2
    We snuck in a 2nd dive during a lull in the rain. The dinghy ride to the dive site took more than twice as long & was 100% uncomfortable since there were big swells in our face & we had to go slow. Pounding, pounding over each wave. Poor Scott trying to not bash his video camera got the brunt of it. I was able to stand up & hold on with two hands, sort of \”posting\” my body, like a horseback rider during trotting, to minimize the slamming effect

    We went to \”Alcyone\”, the site we\’d been to twice yesterday & it was productive with a couple brief hammerhead sightings plus a more lingering encounter with a Silky shark. The silky swam circles around us while we were at our 15 foot safety stop. Now before you get nervous, rest assured, he was not interested in us. He was getting \”cleaned\” by some smaller fish. His body posture was relaxed & he may have been curious about us, but Silkies are not known to be aggressive sharks. I kept eye contact & never let it out of my sight & kept my body vertical which we have been told makes us seem larger & more threatening than if we swim horizontal. Scott got some great video footage. If you know Jimmy Buffet\’s song \”Fins\” it was playing in my head the whole time.

    The rain resumed as soon as we finished the dive. The dinghy ride back to our boat was smoother since we were going with the swells on the return but the rain was coming down so hard it actually hurt my head! Tons of new waterfalls sprouted & this is the reason the place is so lush & green. They tell us there are 2 kinds of weather on Cocos Island: it is raining, or it is about to rain. That was about 6 hours ago & it is still raining. So Dive #3 was canceled. The water all around the anchorage is murky brown from the island run off. The boat is lying sideways to the swell due to effect of current, so we are rocking & rolling a lot. We both took seasick medication at the first hint of symptoms. I am writing this while the meds are in full force. Otherwise writing & reading our out for me. The great part about the rain is that it has cooled down to 72 degrees. We have not been in temperatures this comfortable in over a year. Last night it was never less than 82 degrees outside & we had a heck of a time getting it cool enough indoors for sleeping.

    My right ear is tender. I always have to take care to prevent ear infections with frequent swimming & diving & have been faithfully using the drying drops at the end of each day. But the right one is hurting & itching so I started antibiotic drops in it. As long as I can clear my ears when I descend it will not do any damage to keep diving, so do not intend to let it slow me down. I know it probably won\’t completely go away until I stay out of the water for about 5 days, but there is time for that soon enough. Meanwhile a codeine for the pain to sleep & we\’ll see how it goes.

    I\’ve made our morning oatmeal & have my tea brewing overnight so I don\’t have to turn on the stove in the morning. Today I cooked scrambled eggs with red bell pepper & onion & although it was delicious I was cranky from being so hot in the galley right off the bat. We may be eating more cold cereal.

    Scott & Cindy