for about the last 5 or so years Christian and i have been talking about one day buying a sailboat and sailing all around the world. Yes i know neither of us know how to sail. Well we went diving with these three folks, Kim McGowen the inventor of Suttle butt (look it up) she is the boat owner 44´ she says it is much easier than we would expect and we should totally do it. They are on their way to the Marquesas (sp) on Saturday and if i was not going back to work in a couple of weeks i would be riding along with them for the next 30 days. Christian on the other hand, i am stoked and jealous at the same time has been offered a berth on board a 50´yacht for a 6 month cruise to Australia. The owner who has been sailing this time for 3 years says, don´t worry that you have no experience, by the time you i finish with you in 6 months you will be a pro sailor. I am going to see if i can do the next leg in Sept. Australia to Thailand.
We went out diving on Tuesday with the same dive operators that took us to where the whales and the dolphins were, we saw a few turtles and eagle rays and i saw the rear end of a hammer head. On our ride back we once again came upon a pod of dolphins this time i had my camera and got some great footage. I used the movie mode and captured one dolphin that came up from the bottom of the boat and shot up doing barrel rolls easily 15 feet in the air, don´t believe me? i have proof!! We had dinner with the Suttle Butt boat people and also met a family who have been sailing since 2005, they have a four year old and 6 year old, i think that would be crazy hard to sail with kids. The one does not even remember ever living in a house. They are both well behaved and seem very intelligent. I think what a great way to grow up. We also met the two guys that want Christian to join them. There is a large amount of sailboats in the harbor. Most of them are part of a big round the world regatta, except the three groups we were with.
_Yesterday we took a day off from diving and took a $1 cab along with the Kim,Javier, and Mick (suttle butt) to a beach on the other side of the island, we had heard that there was a calm bay there that reef sharks would sun themselves in. Maybe we got there at the wrong tide? we did see a very small dead black tipped shark up on shore., We swam a bit in the calm bay and then walked over to where the big waves were, we were going to do a bit of body surfing as we were walking out we spotted a big shadow in the waves, at first i thought it was a dolphin, but it was a 5 to 6 foot reef shark, it is funny because when you are under water you swim right towards the shark, to get a better look, but when you are above water and see a shark in the surf, you are kind of hesitant to enter, we did anyway. Reef sharks are not known for eating people. While in the water we did spot two more smaller reef sharks, they were pretty close too. Mick had brought a boomerang and by the end of the day I was able to throw it and catch it when it came back around, this took me a lot of tries and one good wack to the thigh before i was able to master it. Now i am like the kid from Mad Max.
Today we dove with a new operator, we got a deal three dives for $140 this seems very high but we were paying $120 for two. We took a long boat ride to a place called Cousins Rock. on the way we spotted dolphins again but this boat capt instead of speeding up to get them running he slowed down, so the show was not as good, it was still fun to watch them though. My dives would have been great except my booties were rubbing me wrong and rubbed a raw spot on the back of my ankle. The first dive we saw lots of turtles and other cool sea life. The second dive was kind of the same, but in a good way. We putted over to another island for lunch and who was sitting on the rocks the Penguin family, a few of us jumped in the drink and snorkeled over to where they were, We right up on them like within just a couple of feet, close enough to where the capt said ¨hey you guys are getting too close´ so Jeremiah and Neil, i kicked it with real `penguins, i told them you said ¨Hi´
The last dive was the best one yet. Plopped into the water and swam near a school of 10 or so eagle rays and some kind of manta ray that is not a manta ray but looks like a manta ray only smaller. Then there is a species of fish whos name i forget but are only found around the Galapagos They school up 1000´s at a time, a big cloud of fish the size of your hand, you can swim right up on them and they sort of spit apart and as you enter the school they close in around you and your are surrounded by a darkened cloud of fish, It is pretty neat to do and pretty neat to watch another diver do. Then we dove down to the bottom and spotted some 4 foot or so White tipped reef sharks, then looked up and over a rock and there were about 30 lying there in the sand, we watched them for some time., Three of the divers had cameras so we are hoping to do a photo swap in the next couple of days. The last thing we watched was an octopus that had a couple of tentacles missing, it was sitting on a rock when a moray eel came out of its hole and took a couple big chomps of it. It was a good day and a good way to end my Galapagos diving experience, not sure what i will do the next couple of day, but i think i am going to fly back to Quito on Saturday, i still need to eat a Guinna pig
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