10 August 2009

At last it’s summer.

The air temperature has been high now for four months, high as in over 100ºF. In the beginning this is okay, but after some weeks it wears you out! Diving in May and June was still very refreshing, with a water temperature of around 73-75º. How nice to be able to really cool down!

Now we cannot hide anymore; the water temperature is on the surface around 88 and on the bottom 85º. It’s nice to go in, you don’t get ‘overheated’, but it doesn’t cool down anymore. After the dive, back in the boat, pulling in the equipment of our guests, is enough to have the thermostat going crazy again; to keep the ‘engine’ within limits, sweat is breaking out. All day wet, if not of the sweating, it’s of the diving, or because you hide under the shower (again). Luckily for life on land every afternoon we have a bit of a breeze, sometimes (early night) it can be more forceful. Unfortunately without any rain and thus with a lot of dust.

So under water it’s better, a lot better and beautiful, very beautiful. The ‘wind’ under water is quit forceful too. The current is strong, takes you through the reef in too short time, floating from school to school. The fish are having trouble with it too and are looking for cover, rocks, walls and overhangs, every bit of cover is taken and nobody wants to leave their shelter. A school of yellow tale snapper, not as big as normal, since the rock doesn’t give enough slack for the whole group, so not four or five big schools of snapper, but maybe fourteen or sixteen, the pork fish, the burrito grunt, the goat fish occupying huge areas, close to the bottom, almost touching the sand. The moray eels not coming out in the open more than necessary, just their heads and a bit of body peeping out of a rock. Only the big fish, the grouper and the dog snapper seem to be able to withstand the water and the flow of it. Slowly moving over the reef, nose into the current, constantly swimming but not moving an inch. And then there is a diver, fining to stay with all this life, trying to take it in and to not miss anything... Wow, men and woman, what a luck to be part of this, to be able to enjoy so much life and to be able to get so close to it... What a great job we’ve got!!!

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