Saturday 19 November 2011

100 days!

Hey guys, just thought I would write a post explaining what happened on our 100th day in Paradise ... I mean Punta Gorda.
Well, it was a Friday, Friday the 18th November and Ally and I decided we would make the walk up to Marble Hill Farms to see if we could go diving and finish our PADI Open Water diver course! We woke early and set off on the half an hour walk to the resort. We headed down to the dock and met our instructor Pol, who took us through what we would be doing that day, last two confined dives and our final open water dive. We did the confined dives first, doing skills such as swimming for 15 metres without a mask on (quite weird, I couldn’t focus on breathing and panicked! woops!) and the hover technique and also removing the scuba unit underwater. Both Ally and I completed these with minimal difficulty and so we got out of the water, had a cup of tea and some cookies while Pol briefed us on the upcoming open water dive.
We soon headed out on the boat and geared up and back rolled in, I will never get used to that first moment when you hit the water and look down and just see this whole new world beneath you! We started to head down in the water, but as I had had a cold the past few days, and my ears are quite sensitive to pressure anyway, it took me quite a while to reach the bottom, but I did get to have a good look around, seeing massive schools of fish and a couple of big jellyfish floating around. When you make your way down in the water, you have to equalize your ears to the pressure, otherwise they feel like they are going to explode! But because mine have been a bit blocked lately, this a long time, well until they eventually popped quite hard and it hurt a fair amount (however, now a day later and one of them is still a little blocked, going to get some decongestants later today - advice from our instructor!) but anyway, the pain soon disappeared and I got to enjoy the dive, seeing some huge groupers and swimming through a small canyon in the coral (feeling like I was swimming in a cave), as always, diving is just great and it was even better knowing that after this one, we would be able to dive anywhere in the world, without having to do any skills or anything, and just enjoying the swim. 
When we surfaced, Pol said those great words ‘Congratulations guys, welcome to PADI’, Ally and I both turned to each other with the biggest smiles we have ever had, after returning to shore, we headed up to the office to sort out some final paper work and get our temporary PADI cards (enabling us to dive anywhere, while our real cards are sent home). After sorting out everything and saying thanks (and getting told that we get two free dives with Marble Hill Farms ... :D   ) we headed to get something to eat at the restaurant called ‘The Crows Nest’ where we ate nachos, philly cheese steaks and angus burgers (philly cheese steaks are the best things ever! haha) after this we sat and admired the view before we began the walk home. When we got home we both just crashed as we were so tired (after getting up quite early) and both went for a late ciesta (at about 5 ish) thinking we would wake up before having to go to Mary Lou’s for dinner at 7, however, I was woken with Ally flicking on my light and saying, it is 8:15 .... WHAT!! bloody hell!! haha
We got dressed and headed down to Mary Lou’s to see if she was still able to give us something to eat ... well we were in luck! haha Apparently, it wasn’t the first time that to volunteers have fallen asleep and missed dinner! haha We enjoyed a nice meal of rice, fried plantains, and sausage before we came back and chilled out with a good film and some music! (obv not at the same time!) 
Anyway, we both agreed that this was a great 100th day and both of us cannot believe how quickly these days have gone, 100 already!! :O   Almost a third, unbelievable! But they have been the absolute best 100 day of my entire life! Cannot wait for the next 258 days! lol (we are flying back a week before the date we arrived!) 
Hope you guys have had just as good a time as I have, well probs not, but anyway, hope you are all good and happy!
Till next time,
Ciao! 

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