scuba...or bust!

Monday, August 2nd
I woke up early, bright eyed and bushy tailed, so excited to dive. I was a lil nervous about how absolutely cold the water was (around 55 degrees) and if it would negatively affect my dive. I was gonna suck it up and dive in head first. John was so excited to dive you would have thought it was his first dive down here. We got all our gear on board and hopped on the boat. The ride out to the dive site was a lil rocky to say the least. One of the kids on the boat was seasick within the first half-hour of the ride. I felt so bad for the poor thing especially since the ride didn't get any smoother and we still had about an hour to get there. When we arrived to the dive site the divemasters gave a thorough refresher lesson. We got our gear on and jumped in backs first. At first, the water temperature didn't seem to bother me and the thickness of the wetsuit was doing it's job. The visiblity was decent at about 10 meters. We saw all the same species of fish as we had seen during all the previous snorkeling trips. "So..." you ask ...."why dive then, if you see all the same things?" "GOOD question!" I reply. Diving offers to be immersed in a world unfamiliar to man and be a part of something much bigger than ourselves. When you dive versus snorkeling you can see the underwater world up close and personal. On the dive I was able to see seastars, coral life, and anemones that you can only see from a distance while snorkeling.
During the first dive (we did two 60 min dives at 60-70ft) I had issues with one of my flippers. The flipper kept unbuckling and would slide off my right foot. It happened 3 times. The third time it happened, I was trying to fix it and all of a sudden (I think my breathing must had started to rapidly increase because I was struggling with the flipper) I started to float up to the surface. I shot up 60 feet in a matter of seconds. Because of this, dramatic pressure increase I got (what they call in scuba) a sinus squeeze. Its when you feel loads of pressure in your sinuses, kinda like a migraine, and your eyes feel like they are gonna pop out of your head. It sucks and it's painful. And the bad news is that I'm gonna fly tomorrow. Not so good for me!
A minute after I surfaced, the dive master surfaced checked in with me, asked me what went wrong and if I was ok. I told him that I was fine and that the ascend was a complete accident. He said "no worries...you ready to go back down?" I replied "let's do it!" the rest of the dive was fantastic and oh so chilly!!! The second dive was crazy! We dove in a spot where the current just ripped through. The current was so strong that we actually had to hold onto the rocks and coral in order to stay together and from floating away into outer(ocean)space. I preferred the first dive to the second because the current was so strong it made the visibility worse and cloudier. the diving wasn't as easy as I had thought it would be nor was it as clear as I had hoped. Nonetheless, the experience was one I will never forget (that's why I keep a blog...so I won't forget it).